Elias Krantz :: Night Ice (Country & Eastern)

If you are always in search of exotic sonic bliss, then put this album in your high priority shopping list. Night Ice will be a lovely addition to any eclectic collection of music. Strange beautiful streams of passion.

[Release page] Floating in the mysterious fringes of the musical spectrum, Elias Krantz is a musician, multi-instrumentalist and producer from Sweden with a unique sound and style, and Night Ice is his sophomore album—released in 2011. A lot of good music was released in the last few years, and during this kind of blessed sonic floods our radars bound to miss some great releases. Here is an album I’m sure slipped under some radars, it surely slipped under mine, but fortunately I came across it recently, grabbed a copy and been hooked ever since.

Psychedelically retro and originally contemporary—Night Ice is a wonderful and alluring blend of krautrock, indietronica, post-rock and surf-dream-pop. All the ingredients were very well put together, and there’s a gentle experimental scent to it all. The compositions are multilayered, groovy and propulsive yet filled with some sort of mystifying, spooky tranquility that induces a dreamy cinematic ambience. That said, the themes are very catchy and get stuck in your head for days. The guitar, bass, and drums lead the way most of the time, but there is also use of synthesizers, organs, violin, vibraphone; and the exotic kora.

Drawing inspiration from the past but also from the current, and with some help of a few other talented fellow players; Elias Krantz delivered a colorful mosaic that contains nine intriguing sonic tales that stimulates the mind and soul. If you are always in search of exotic sonic bliss, then put this album in your high priority shopping list. Night Ice will be a lovely addition to any eclectic collection of music. Strange beautiful streams of passion.

Night Ice is available on Country & Eastern. [Release page]