Album: Aidattu Tulevaisuus
Label: Svart Records
Genre: Psychedelic rock / Krautrock
Country: Finland
Release Date: September 7, 2018
Do you know what teletext is? Our American readers are probably not familiar with the term – it was mostly a European thing. It’s a sort of supplementary broadcast to TV channels accessible via a button on your remote that contained simple text and graphic data, nowadays slowly disappearing due to TV stations switching to digital. It was very useful for getting random info like tv schedule, news, weather or sports results (often accompanied by some quite creepy graphics). You switched the teletext pages by typing in a three-digit number on your remote to find what you were looking for. The experience was often eerie with its black background, bright colours, limited resolution, common glitches and some very strange content on the later pages. Teksti-TV is the Finnish word for teletext, and like most kids back in the day, they typed in the page number 666 to see what happens (unfortunately, and I can attest from experience, nothing cool ever did).
The name is entirely appropriate for a band that strives to play odd music, and krauty psychedelic rock with tons of other influences certainly fits the bill. You can hear noise rock, indie rock, surf, prog, the occasional metal foray and much more. And they all meld so well. The sound has that slick flow that creates a natural whole out of different styles. Achieving this requires solid composition skills, and Teksti-TV got plenty. Also needs be mentioned that at any point there’s at least four guitars playing, sometimes even five. That’s a lot, and one might be worried that it’ll end up sounding like an awful mess, especially with the production we got here which is not exactly clean. But it doesn’t! There’s certainly a lot going on, but like I’ve mentioned, the sound achieves a very pleasant organic wholesomeness. All those guitars never feel superfluous – when you snap out of the psychedelic daze the band inflicts on you so well, you can take the time to pick out all the different details that contribute to the music. It’s complex, but never overwhelmingly complex. Teksti-TV mastered the dialectic between individual parts and the whole.
The first track, Turbo-Mondeo introduces you nicely to the trip you’re about to embark on. Like most of the album it’s an energetic, upbeat endeavour, a sunshine ride into the motorik vortex. There are vocals which are nothing spectacular but serve well the role of a knowledgeable compatriot to your psychedelic journey. Plus they’re in Finnish, a very incomprehensible language to most of us which only adds to the mystery. About halfway through the song bangs you with a hard riff only to segue into some blast beats. We’re in there now, and there’s no going back.
The rest of the songs kick things up a notch. Title-song Aidattu Tulevaisuus picks up the speed and is a very fun punkish romp. Rauhankone draws things out again and stops by the beach for a bit of sunbathing and some bass-driven jam with a neat climax. Severny lulls you in with an electronic bit before kicking the riffs into gear. Katko nicely ends the album with a 10-minute instrumental summing up what we’ve heard so far.
All in all, it’s a very enjoyable album. Fans of psychedelic rock will feel right at home. Fans of rock music in general will find a pleasant mash of genres with great capacity to suck you into its hazy whirl. Aidattu Tulevaisuus gets good recommendations from me, but I’d just like to note a couple of things. The rating given would’ve been higher if not for one reason, and that’s that I feel Teksti-TV 666 has a lot more potential than they’re showing here. Coming of a 3-EP run, this is their debut album that feels like a short (it’s only 30 minutes) exercise in what they’ve learned thus far before climbing greater heights. I can see them refining their sound further, adding catchier hooks, more memorable moments and further experimenting with moods and styles. In this sense, I wish the band all the best and look forward to their future endeavours. But even for now, there’s fun to be had. The devil that lurks behind teletext page 666 is a great hooved demon wearing a headdress, tie-dye and that big dumb smile you get from smoking hella weed. All he wants to do is talk about nature, music and dropping acid. Satan’s a hippie now, and he’s a pretty chill dude.
Rating: 7.5/10
Tracklist:
1. Turbo-Mondeo
2. Aidattu Tulevaisuus
3. Rauhankone
4. Severny
5. Katko
Total Playing Time: 31:41
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