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MP3 Trettioariga Kriget - Elden av ar- Fire of years
8 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Progressive Rock, ROCK: Psychedelic
Details:
Trettioåriga Kriget(Thirty Years War) was formed in 1970 in Saltsjobaden, a seaside resort 20km southeast of Stockholm. They were at the time all around seventeen and still in high school. The schools main hall was in the beginning used as the rehearsal room. This first lineup of the band was a six piece with two drummers! It included Stefan Fredin- bass guitar, vocals, Pocke Ohrström- guitar, vocals, Dag Lundquist- drums, Olle Thornvall- harmonica, guitar, Dag Kronlund- piano and Johan Gullberg- drums. 1971 Pocke, Johan and Dag K. left and Robert joined on vocals and guitar. 1972 Olle quit playing harmonica to concentrate on the lyrics, leaving the band to consist only of Stefan, Dag and Robert. They decided they needed a good guitar player and started to audition some guitarists. Through these auditions they found Christer who joined the band in summer 1972. The band rehearsed intensively for a year and a half and developed a style of their own quite unlike the main trend in Swedish rock during the Seventies.
Early 1974 they got a record deal. Also at that time they got a new rehearsal room in Saltsjöbaden. An old underground disco which they called "Grunden". There they would remain for a long time....An album was recorded that summer and released in august 1974. The album was named only "TRETTIOARIGA KRIGET". The musical talent and originality of the group was duly recognized in the reviews. The album was an instant classic and is often considered as the first Swedish heavy rock album. They also now started to tour extensively in Sweden and also did several live performances on national Swedish radio.
The second album "KRIGSSANG" was recorded in the summer of 1975 though it was not released until early 1976 . It is commonly regarded as TKs "masterpiece". The second side is totally devoted to the long suite "Krigssang II".
The band continued touring and gigging in -75 and -76 .
In October -76 they left for an extensive English tour from Croydon in London to Cardiff in Wales to Sunderland near the Scottish border. They went down very well and the then leading English music magazine "Melody Maker" chose them as one of the most promising bands for -77, speaking enthusiastically of their "intense gripping songs" and saying that "the power of the music is tremendous"!!! Back home again however they got the boot from their Swedish label, who apparently hadn´t heard any news from abroad.
TK then chose to sign for a small Swedish independet label called Mistlur. The first album on this new label was called "HEJ PA ER".It was recorded in summer1978 in "Grunden", the rehearsal room, with mobile recording facilties. By this time Mats had joined on keyboards and saxophone too. The album was very well received and was to that date their best selling album. The album was seeing the band moving to a more simple songformat and is seen as the last album in the trilogy starting with the first album. The band continued to tour extensively during this time around Scandinavia.
In the summer of 1979 the band recorded "MOT ALLA ODDS" also at "Grunden". It is largely regarded the bands least successful album though it has its moments, i.e. the title song. This was the last album with Robert who left in autumn 1979 leaving the vocals to Stefan.
In 1980 the band played the Roskilde festival in Denmark and continued the extensive touring. And they also recorded their fifth album at "Grunden" called only "KRIGET".
In May 1981 the band made a farewell concert broadcasted
on Swedish radio and disbanded..
The story then jumps to 1992 when Stefan, Robert and Dag played an accousitc set at a releaseparty for the CD-release of "Krigssång". And then in 1996 to coincide with the release of their mostly live album "WARMEMORIES", the band decided to do two reunionconcerts in Stockholm...
In 2002 Stefan, Dag, Chris and Olle decided to start rehearsing again to try out new material. These rehearsals were such a success that the band decided to enter the studio once more and record a new album. In the studio, Robert and Mats also joined. The album was named "ELDEN AV ÅR" (Fire of Years) and was released January 2004. It was amazingly well received. Many describing the album as the bands best and even one of the best reunionalbums ever released. Liveshows also followed in 2004 with the classic lineup of Stefan Fredin, Dag Lundquist, Christer Akerberg, Robert Zima and Mats Lindberg. In September 2004 the band made their US debut playing the Progday Festival in North Carolina and also for the first time in over 30 years did a show in their homevillage of Saltsjöbaden, Sweden.
Later that autumn their first two albums, "Trettioåriga Kriget" and "Krigssång" were re-released with bonustracks. In March 2005 the bands third album, "Hej på er" (Hallo everybody) was also re-released with bonustracks. In June 2005 they played Swedens biggest rockfestival, Sweden Rock, and in March 2006 they played the Baja Prog Festival in Mexico.
2007 saw the band release their 8th studioalbum "I borjan och slutet" and touring to support the album. They played both Brazil and France for the first https://www.tradebit.coms shows in
in Sweden.
2008 will see the band continue to tour to promote the new
album. Shows are planned in Sweden, Norway, Spain, France
and South America.
DISCOGRAPHY ALBUMS:
Trettioåriga Kriget- 1974/2004
Krigssång-1976/2004
Hej på er- 1978/2005
Mot alla odds- 1979
Kriget- 1981
War memories- 1992
Om Kriget kommer (compilation)- 1996
Glorious war-recordings from 1970-71- 2004
Elden av år- 2004
I början och slutet- 2007
Review from https://www.tradebit.com
TRETTIOÅRIGA KRIGET – “ELDEN AV ÅR”
Released: 2004
Label: Mellotronen
Cat. No.: MELLO CD 010
Total Time: 48:01
Reviewed by: Stephanie Sollow, September 2004
Hands down, one of my favourite CDs for 2004 is this one, and one that I have been listening to a lot - a lot (really A LOT!) - over the past couple of months is Trettioåriga Kriget''s Elden Av År, a concept album of sorts, a reflective album about the band themselves, whether literally or by reference. I just can''t get enough of listening to it and I will tell you now, you must, MUST buy this. In fact, just as I sat down to write this, "Elden Av År" started going through my head. Damn this is terrific! It is an album that hits you right there, where you get it on a emotional level, where each note speaks to your senses. So much so, that although everything is sung in Swedish – TK are Swedish, after all – sometimes I think I understand it anyway. I can''t explain it… This album is the audio equivalent of high art… and album that in Gnosis parlance, it''s a 15 – at least my ears. And you''ll see I''ve given it that rating over there.
By the way, as I write this review (at least the first draft), TK are playing at ProgDay at the same moment, about one-half hour into their set at this moment (assuming things are on schedule). I didn''t plan it that way, but darn if it didn''t work out that way. Well, yes, I meant to review this CD in time for ProgDay, so that was planned, but the exact moment I queued it up wasn''t. I love these kind of cosmic coincidences in my life (others, not so much). So though I again couldn''t get there – ProgDay - this year, I can imagine. TK are there promoting this album, their first release since 1981, and their 7th or 8th overall.
Trettioåriga Kriget, which means Thirty Years War, formed in 1970, releasing their first album, Trettioåriga Kriget in 1974 through what was then CBS Records Sweden (now Sony). Their second release Krissång followed in 1976. Having been dropped by CBS, they signed to independent label Mistlur and released Hej På Er in 1978. 1979 saw the release of Mot Alla Odds, and in 1980 their (at the time) last album Kriget. Over the years, the line up did change, with vocalist Robert Zima and guitarist Christer Äkerberg joining the band before the debut release, while at the same time Olle Thörnvall quit to concentrate on lyrics. Zima left after 1979''s Mot Alla Odds. Though members reunited in 1992 for the CD release of Krissång and again in 1996 for the release of the mostly live album War Memories, it wasn''t until 2003 that the band began to work on new material... this album.
Anyway, the whole package is great – and I mean that literally, because we must include the digipack (a duo-fold design) and booklet (fold-out poster style). The album''s artwork suggests a darker album, though it isn''t dark; but that doesn''t mean that TK are a light and flighty band either. No, this is solid music, built on strong foundations without being overly aggressive (though never meek, either). Elden Av År, which in English means "the fire of years," is a treasure trove of guitars, bass, drums and percussion, organ, piano and mellotron. These are played by Äkerberg (stellar), Stefan Fredin (great), Dag Lundquist (terrific), and Mats Lindberg (excellent) respectively. The lyrics were composed by Thörnvall. Their "folkiest" moment is on the acoustic, balladic "Molnbudet" (The Cloud Messenger). Their "artiest" moment is on the darkly swirling atmospheric "Night Flight -77," very unlike the later composed track "Night Flight." But, what they do capture is the sense of night (the dark sound) and of flight (the gently throbbing bass and rippling guitar). It is I this track that you can hear how later Swedish prog bands like Lanberk, Anglagard and Anekdoten got some of their influence. Even though not by this track specifically, as this marks its first appearance. So, too, can we say this of the more recent composition "Gnistor" (Sparks) which has very dark and heavy Pink Floyd feel about it … except maybe the slide guitar work. They even sound great when things get a bit chaotic here in this piece … impassioned, rather than chaotic really.
I love each and every moment of this CD, from the crisp drumming and fat bass that kicks things off with the excellent new composition "Ljuset" ("the light" and "the candle;" about today''s Stockholm) to the slide guitar solos that finish off the album with "Gnistor" (Sparks; about the band''s history from day one). I don''t think I have been this satisfied with an album from start to finish ever … okay, maybe not since Marillion''s Misplaced Childhood, which this sounds nothing like.
In fact, I find that vocalist Robert Zima, who has a smooth, warm voice that is very pleasant to the ear, sounds like Kurt Maloo… um, he''s the vocalist with Double, the Swiss duo who hit it big in 1986 with um, "Captain Of Her Heart."* This especially on "Möte" (Meeting). Of course, TK''s sound only bears the occasional soft jazz moments, and frankly I love those moments just as much as I love their rockier moments. While there is a hint of the soft-rock of the 70s (a hint, I say, so don''t get up in arms!), there is also a folk rock element, where the rock element dominates. Hard to really describe that … sort of mid-west jazz by way of Sweden. There''s a mellower, jazzier element to their sound with just a tad bit of a twang in guitar phrases. In fact, the title track features "sketches of songs from the spring of 1977," the band write in the liner notes, where one part, the instrumental "''Night Flight -77'' actually was recorded then."
What characterizes most of these pieces is a long instrumental opening. In fact, only "Night Flight – 77" is entirely instrumental. Äkerberg can play both chiming broad leads, and get down to expressing himself in note by note fashion – chorus vs verse, as it were. The title track is a good example of this dynamic, and in fact, it is the chiming notes that do accompany the sung choruses (I can almost "sing" along to it, though only phonetically (and badly at that)).
My absolute favorite moment (among many favourite moments) is the guitar playing on "Night Flight." Äkerberg''s sweet, sharp, crying tone cuts right to the heart. But more than that, it''s each and every note… and each rings out clearly, definitively. At times, Äkerberg''s style recalls David Gilmour''s in mid-to-latter day Pink Floyd. It is stunning throughout this mellow piece, especially when set against the "throatier" high-energy rocker "Lång Historia" ((a) long story or long history; about the band''s return to music after a long absence). Here "Night Flight" is the twilight song, reflective, warm, and inviting. Looking at the liner notes again, we see that this piece is about "a girl [in the] here and now […] although the point of view is retrospective…" Well this is captured perfectly.
Well, I think this review has become a rather chaotic jumble as I flit from thought to thought, but it gets down to where I began: Elden Av År is absolutely, 100% fantastic from start to finish and you must buy it.
Rating: 5/5
People who are interested in Pink Floyd Rush King Crimson should consider this download.
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