Jörgen Gustafsson (Sweden) – Disperse (sample track from the album A Darkened Harbour)

Jörgen Gustafsson is from the lakeside city of Jönköping, and he is strangely one of few Swedish artists we’ve had at all from the southerly part of the country apart from big cities like Gothenburg and Malmö/Lund.

‘A Darkened Harbour’ is his debut album, it came out on 1^st March, and I selected the first track, ‘Disperse’ as the sample here, partly on the advice of the record label, Ombrelle Concrète. More about them later.

He is an ambient artist, which can mean different things to different people. In his case he is at the deeper, more intense end of the scale but is a picture painter all the same and I’m always intrigued as to what sort of signal my receiver is going to be picking up out of this sort of work.

There is a story behind the album’s title as there often seems to be in Sweden.

The phrase ‘A Darkened Harbour’ is taken from a Swedish psalm, ‘Don’t Be Afraid’, and Jörgen cites hymns and sacred music among his inspiration for this album; influences that are apparent in more than one track. The individual pieces move at a stately pace and build up to choral resolutions.

So what picture did it paint for me? My first crack at it revealed the coming of a storm, with the, let’s call them floaty bits of music, the rolling clouds and darkening skies, represented in part by a harmonium, an instrument you don’t hear as often as you should, offset by the singularly hard and precise impact of synth keyboard-generated raindrops, perhaps onto a window. The storm backs off and the listener is left in limbo as to whether or not it will return.

But second time around I watched the video as well and it took on a whole new meaning, the swimming against the tide battle of the spermatozoa to find the egg.

I’m fairly content with those interpretations whilst wary that I’ve missed the point and neither really equate to the word ‘disperse’ anyway.

But isn’t that what music is about? To get you thinking? He sure does that.

Ombrelle Concrète is a British self-financed independent label run by three artists wishing to release interesting, thought-provoking, more different music, and this is their first release this year.

Find him on:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jorgen.gustafsson.79