Comforting, dramatic, and all aquiver, The Bridge Between Life and Death has the pacing and variety of a matinée for the whole family, bound by the congeniality with which he marries the acoustic instruments to his beaming electronica.
Spun from the raw wool of field recordings made in Iceland, whose unique landscape and ridiculously rich music scene have charmed and inspired him for years in distant Bristol, Zoon van SnooK weaves a splendorous, intricate tapestry. With its name borrowed from a bridge connecting a nursery and a cemetery, The Bridge Between Life and Death runs from cradle to grave, subsuming notions gleaned from epic Greek and Nordic poetry, Biblical tales, and the unseen elves with which every Icelander knows their island teems.
Picking up material from the centre of Reykjavik to the edges of southwest Iceland’s canyons and hot springs, basing pieces on the Old Norse “Snorri’s Saga” and a friend’s shaggy dog story, he also took the opportunity to collaborate with local musicians, including the endlessly talented Amiina. Intriguingly, he informs us that “all the glitch rhythms on the album are created from…unintentional background noise or static.” A true locavore.
The album opens like a children’s pop-up book, a colorful tinker-town of wind-up toys and ticky-tack cottages, seguing into an elegant piano and trumpet duet, as if time had passed from childhood to dotage in the wink of an eye. On “The Verge of Winter,” he brings the whole family together, as it were, as grandpa cello warms the room and the kids dance on the bars of a glockenspiel. Comforting, dramatic, and all aquiver, The Bridge Between Life and Death has the pacing and variety of a matinée for the whole family, bound by the congeniality with which he marries the acoustic instruments to his beaming electronica.
You can tell this guy likes people and takes joy from being around them. In my review of his debut album, (Falling from) the Nutty Tree, I called Zoon van SnooK one of the smartest guys in beat music. I suspect he’s also good company sharing a few snootfuls of brennevin.
The Bridge Between Life and Death is available on Lo.
