Instrumental, Swedish vocals
International relevance: ***
An exceedingly rare album on Imperial Record subsidiary Californa, with eye-catching cover art by Tage Åsén (known for his artworks for most notably Samla Mammas Manna). Uppsala's
Renhjärta featured future members of Panta Rei (bassist Cary
Wihlma) and Arbete & Fritid and Ramlösa Kvällar (sax player Ulf
Wallander). Only four tracks feature vocals, leaving the lion's share
of the album instrumental.
An undeniably competent piece of work straddling the line between blues rock and prog,
it does suffer from an insufficient, unnecessarily understated
production. The dry and flat sound affects Tjompe Johansson's drums
in particular, making them sound cardboardy and intrusive instead of
powerful and propulsive. The mix in general is on the unbalanced
side, subsequently making the album sound oddly buried and bereft of
its potential impact imposed by the crafty guitar work of Stenne
Moberg and singer Lasse Hoflund, and Cary Wihlma's bouncy bass.
From a strictly musical standpoint, the
vocals are the albums weakest link; adequate but a bit dull, why the
vocal tracks – including a cover of Traffic's ”Medicated Goo”,
the Dave Edmunds sounding ”Blue Monday”, the pedestrian ”My
Friend” and the boring ”Leaving Blues” – further emphasize
the feeling of ”Glitt-glitt” being an unfulfilled promise.
Full album
Full album
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