Jenny Hval
Jenny Hval : Viscera
Her voice, delicate, mesmerizing, draws you into a quietened sense of self. The harmony of her songs: acoustic guitar, waves of voice that ebb and lap over a tide of abandon is matched brilliantly by the arrangements of her accomplices Havard Volden and Kyrre Laastad. This contrast of idealogical sensibilities, that of the singer-songwriter and that of the improvisational sound art / free noise jazz maker, furthers the scope and depth of musicality that is matched by the range of her lyricism. It brings them into a realm of its own creating. One dark, sweet, sardonic, dripping with sensuality and abandoning itself into a beauty of intimacy. There is no confessional aspect to these songs, theirs is not to relief a sense of guilt but instead a to share a joy of expression. A world of impulse, a once forgotten space that presents itself in glimpses.
Viscera is something verging on the present, an ancient remembrance that we all know, all have some idea of, but until reminded are unsure if it was dreamed or overheard. Somewhere between the ethereal sounds of Julie Cruise and Dead Can Dance, somewhere in-between the frail power of Stina Nordenstam and Múm, a confrontational Tori Amos and harsh abandon of pure noise. Somewhere in these places is a ground that Jenny Hval thrives, at once grasping the roots of classicism, the folkloric and contemporary. The fusion being a hypnotic revelation. One of milk, bile, honey, and the soul laid bare.
Contrasts and juxtaposition abound. One could easily assume a saccharine aesthetic and miss out on the raw, earthen and brutal honesty that Hval delves into. These songs, poems, associations, are the creation mythology. The artist as goddess, Theia, Earth before a cataclysm separated aspects of personality, and left them ever present, but separate. Like the moon, obvious, but kept for the realm of the night. Takes the legend and brings it into the present day, takes it from the seediness of shame and into the beauty and light of honesty. Creates an odyssey, one where allegorical gods, human behaviour and reality of sensuality are one. In her own words Hval says that the body is at once traveller and travelled, insides brought to the outside. Instead of the stars, Milky Way, and Underworld, Hval’s myths are the city, the journey of self, and the always. The mind Olympian, courts it’s own body. Sensuality is just that, it is not for provocation, not confrontational, but an openness. One that is shocking in its beauty because it is so rare, because it is not encumbered in a way that we expect it to be. This is her power, her force, her vitality. Not craven, not wanton. A gift of unexpected truth.
Live performances of such a woven sound can be difficult, often with artists eschewing some intricacies in favour of a more straight sound. This however is where Hval, Volden and Laastad excel. The album, you soon realise, was born from the tenuous and fickle temperament of the live set, it’s a realisation of hamonies between acoustic guitar, voices and a reeling dissonance. They are well prepared, and in the temporal, fleeting moments on-stage, create such force and brilliance that whoever lucky enough to see them live will remember it for some time to come. Drenching delay and reverb, light synthesiser touches, dark electric guitar all wash over the audience and makes an immersive spectacle. The communion between these musicians is utterly fantastic, their music, as a result being thick with understanding and balance. If the record is the myth, then the performance is the magic.
And there, in that space, magic is very real.
Check out Jenny Hval’s website and her music on myspace.
Rune Grammofon
