There’s a certain irony to calling your debut album Quiet Is The New Loud when all around is the likes of Eminem, Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park, but Kings of Convenience – Norwegian duo Eirik Glambek Bøe and Erlend Øye – chose it quite deliberately, their music reflecting hazy late sixties folk, the vocals sometimes soaring gently like a bird on a twilight California thermal.
That was 2001, when it felt like along with fellow countrymen Röyksopp the pair could rewire our senses and help everyone to uncover their inner Nick Drake. Since then however whilst Øye has enjoyed a modest solo career they’ve collectively been fallow for the most part, to the extent that Peace Or Love is only their fourth album and their first in twelve years.
For his part Bøe has said part of the delay was a process which saw it re-recorded several times, but there are few signs of trauma on what is largely business as usual, despite the worthwhile presence of Feist on the slightly more urgent Catholic Country and the mournful Love Is A Lonely Thing. During the long gap between records both the protagonists turned 40, a landmark they use self mockingly to effect on the otherwise superb Angel with ‘Angel, no doubt an angel/Though she might be just slightly promiscuous’. It’s one of a handful of less comforting moments amidst the mirror-smooth coffee house ambience, collectively suggesting that darkness might be the new light.
You can read the full review here.
The Voice Of Unreason 