An unusual one tonight. Soul Traveler is Sebastian Malinowski from Helsinki and his speciality is to be a nylon string finger-style guitarist, a skill he combines with ritualistic percussion, poetry and imagery “to tell stories inspired by life, death and the journeys within.”
His new EP, titled ‘Melancholy lovers’, was released in November and the idea for it came to him while walking through a Swedish forest a couple of years ago.
He perceives a relationship between the ‘feel’ of autumn and that of nostalgia and sought to write a love letter to a nostalgic heart “in longing for a place and a time that maybe never existed” while at the same time encompassing desire, darkness and corruption as key themes.
He also chose to leave some flaws in each song in order to “add authenticity”, as he puts it, preferring the “gritty over the polished, and the authentic over the perfect” in “a time of artificial perfection in art.”
He suggests that darkness and longing are recommended when listening. Releasing it in grey, moody November helps, Sebastian.
What this adds up to is something that is carefully crafted and that rapidly becomes evident.
I have to say that the nylon string sound is somewhat jarring at first. I reckon it is the sound employed in some ‘action’ cinema movies, for example when James Bond is en route his final meeting with Mr Big, his Aston Martin winding its way up the mountain road to his mansion. Or ‘The Jackal’ is halted at a fork in the road, unsure of whether or not to continue to Paris and his assassination attempt on de Gaulle, having been told he has been ‘rumbled’.
It is certainly the music to various ITC Entertainment TV shows in the 1960s here in the UK, such as Man in a Suitcase and if you know what I’m talking about you’ll recognise it straight away.
None of this probably has any bearing whatsoever on Soul Traveler but it’s always good to know that you’ll be in demand if that TV genre ever returns!
There are two other artists and songs you might ‘recognise’ from this piece. One of them is Mike Oldfield’s ‘Tubular Bells’ and the other is Mason Williams’ ‘Classical Gas’. That doesn’t mean Sebastian is channeling them, it’s just that his creation has their mark. And that’s no mean achievement.
The one bit I don’t get is ‘melancholy’. The piece seems quite uplifting. Or is there some irony that I have missed?
And hey, I didn’t hear a single flaw…
Find him on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/soultravelermusic
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/soultravelermusic/
The cover art was hand-drawn by Andrey Skull.
