MetalKult interviews Sonic Ritual

MetalKult has a great new interview up with Henrik Palm of Sonic Ritual: http://www.metalkult.com/metalkult-qa/notes-from-the-underground-sonic-ritual/

Another Swedish summer day with you

Though we may be getting pretty close to fall, The Lemur Blog has just posted a new Swedish summer-themed mixtape for download: http://thelemurblog.com/2010/09/01/another-swedish-summer-day-with-you/

Immortal - All shall fall (video)

OMG! Immortal's first brand new video in 15 years (!!!) is now posted for streaming at their website: http://www.immortalofficial.com/ASF/asf.html
As easy as it would be to poke fun, it's important to remember that Immortal pretty much invented all of the ridiculous BM stereotypes that seem so goofy now. Yes, they were goofy 15 years ago too, but it was also new and kind of exotic back then and besides, no one rocks out harder on the side of a glacier than Immortal.

The New Wine - Delete, rewind

Norwegian synthrock hype The New Wine have a new track up at myspace: http://www.myspace.com/newwinemusic

In Flames, the whiskey

Ridiculous, but I don't doubt that the dudes in the band are stoked: Scottish distillery Glenfarclas has teamed up with In Flames for their own specially branded whiskey. Read more (in Swedish) at the band's website: http://www.inflames.com/News.aspx

Scraps of Tape touring Germany in November

Scraps of Tape will be doing a few German dates in November:

11/10 - AZ Conni, Dresden
11/11 - Schokoladen, Berlin
11/12 - Cairo, Würzburg
11/13 - Steinbruch, Duisburg

Oh Land to tour w/Mates of State

Danish/now-relocated-to-Brooklyn artist Oh Land will touring the US northeast as support for Mates of State:

09/22 - The Monkey House, Winooski, VT
09/24 - SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME
09/26 - Paradise Rock Club, Boston, MA
09/27 - The Met, Pawtucket, RI
09/29 - Webster Underground, Hartford, CT

Listen to some new sample tunes at SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/ohland

Presenting: SONMOI

Check out SONMOI (State of Norway Ministry of Information), an experimental music collective and record label with a new quadruple LP boxset housing most of the group's recordings for the past eight years: http://www.sonmoi.org/
There's a ton of samples on the "releases" page and I highly recommend checking it out -- lots of varied and interesting sounds; sometimes noisy, sometimes droney, sometimes almost cold wave..

This week's top 20 Swedish album chart

This week's top 20 Swedish album chart:

01. Darin - Lovekiller
02. Drifters - Stanna hos mig
03. Robyn - Body talk pt.1
04. Oskar Linnros - Vilja bli
05. Kent - En plats i solen
06. Lisa Nilsson - 20 - En jubileumssamling
07. Melissa Horn - Säg ingenting till mig
08. The Playtones - Rock'n roll dance party
09. Mikael Wiehe - Ta det tillbaka!
10. Lasse Stefanz - Texas
11. Timoteij - Längtan
12. Fancy Dan - Teenage sunset
13. Eric Saade - Masquerade
14. Brolle - Best of
15. Eddie Meduza - Rockabilly rebel
16. Lars Winnerbäck - Tänk om jag ångrar mig och sen ångrar mig igen
17. Takida - The darker instinct
18. Kalle Moraeus - Underbart
19. Salem al Fakir - Ignore this
20. Eric Gadd - Rise up!

Solander on tour

Swedish act Solander will be touring Europe again in October:

10/19 - Café Video, Gent (BEL)
10/21 - Feinkostlampe, Hannover (GER)
10/23 - Café Galeo?, Stuttgart (GER)
10/26 - Stadtgarten, Erfurt (GER)
10/27 - Scheune, Dresden (GER)
10/28 - Ricarda-Huch-Haus, Jena (GER)
10/29 - Kreativfabrik, Wiesbaden (GER)
10/30 - Hafen 2, Offenbach (GER)
10/31 - Café Nun, Karlsruhe (GER)
11/01 - Südstadt, München (GER)
11/02 - Rhiz, Vienna (AUS)
11/03 - The Office Pub, Graz (AUS)
11/05 - Kraftfeld, Winterthur (CH)

They'll be travelling with Dutch filmmaker Iris Piers, director of the band's "Narcissus" video, who will be presenting live visuals with the band on stage.

Absolut Noise talks to BQ

Absolut Noise talks to Matti and Calle of The Bear Quartet about their forthcoming album "Monty Python" and also has a new mp3 for free download: http://absolutnoise.blogspot.com/2010/09/monty-python-interview.html

Röyksopp - The drug (video)

Pitchfork has the premiere of Röyksopp's new video "The drug": http://pitchfork.com/tv/#/musicvideo/8357-royksopp-the-drug-mute

Warmer Climes interview at Vice

It's only very tangentially related to Scandinavian/Swedish music, but Vice has an interview posted with Vlad of the blog Warmer Climes: http://www.viceland.com/music/2010/08/being-a-gay-romanian-hipster-is-lonely/
Worth reading, if only for revisiting Vlad's JJ and The Embassy confrontations.

Junip album preview

Junip's new album "Fields" is currently streaming in its entirety at NPR's website: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129284979

Dag för Dag present Releases

As promised, here is a new 5-song from Dag för Dag posted for free download: http://www.dagfordag.com/releases/