BSI
Sometimes Depressed… but Always Antifascist
(Tomatenplatten/Cargo)
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REYKJAVIKIANS Silla Thorarensen on drums and vocals and Julius Pollux Rothlaender on bass guitar and toe-synths are the duo BSI, whose debut album Sometimes Depressed… but Always Antifascist both intrigues and rewards.

Despite a nod and a wink to punk, musically their influences are drawn as much from Nordic ballads as skald traditions.

Thorarensen’s dreamy, crystalline voice defines the mood throughout as it ebbs and flows effortlessly, accompanied by its own subtle echos and minimalist instrumentation.

Rothlaender’s capital guitar work, vigorously employed to initiate songs, soon fades and is limited to accentuate numbers such as the beautifully evocative Old Moon or the alluring 25Lue.

The agitprop comes with the invigoratingly metronomic My Knee Against Kyriarchy, while a punked-up Donakallalagid sees all caution thrown wonderfully to the wind.

It’s early days for BSI but there’s a rich promise evident in their work.

Dal:um
Similar & Different
(Glitterbeat)
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SOUTH KOREAN duo Dal:um (“Different”) comprises Ha Suyean, who plays the gayageum — a 12-string plucked zither dating back to the sixth century — and Hwang Hyeyoung on the six-string geomungo that originated two centuries before then.

Both are large wooden instruments, hence their sound resonates with extraordinary sonority and clarity.

Dal:um’s music roots are traditional —  both are still members of the Seoul Metropolitan Youth Traditional Music Ensemble —  but the soundscapes they conjure are modern and mellifluous as they harmonise staccato phrasing with mesmerising melody.

Trace, The Waves and particularly Collapsing Time make the hair stand on end.

Much here depends on the definition of internote spacing that allows recovery between sequences of shifting tempos with breathtaking, tight-knit themes.

“Dal:um’s music comes from ‘emptiness’,” says Hyeyoung but the energy and grace of the homophonic textures is anything but.

Davie Furey
Haunted Streets
Davie Fury Music
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THE use of a rock vocabulary elevates Haunted Streets by providing an energising muscularity to Davie Furey’s troubadour instincts.

The lyrical Secret Light, pulsating Flames on the River, mournful Fire and Gold and pounding The Final Frontier have all reached number one as singles, with good reason.

The distinct melodies, in succinct arrangements of changing tempos and moods, are delivered with terrific musicianship by master instrumentalists on top of their game, with a formidable musical symbiosis.

Furey’s familiarly reassuring voice draws the listener irresistibly into every narrative, with each song a singular poetic vision.

The Magic of the Ocean is a dolorous political jeremiad on the worldwide ecological disaster brought about by predatory human behaviour.

Part accusatory, part pleading, part despairing —  “Out of sight out of mind/It’s bringing me down” — it is of our time and directly validates and lends support to environmental activism.