BJ Nilsen & Stilluppsteypa Drykkjuvisur Ohljodanna CD HMS 008 Touching Extremes by Massimo Ricci January, 2007 There is something about this record that activated my anguish-detecting alert in such a way that I was forced to go back and listen to it again and again, searching for those entrapments of being in which vital forces fall, only to remain forgotten in total obscurity. BJ Nilsen, Sigtryggur Berg Sigmarsson and Helgi Thorsson created five magnificent darkscapes in response to the "drunken thoughts" deriving from "their collective lust for alcohol" (apparently a huge problem all over Scandinavia). The foundations of Drykkjuvisur Ohljodanna are muffled-sounding loops, a series of relapses into a world where everything moves in spirals towards a never ending regret, usually wrapped by a hazy stupor. Slow parabolas of disembodied voices and perennial descents to hellish quarters are reminiscent of the most mesmerizing pages from the Nurse With Wound book - once again Salt Marie Celeste could be a good term of comparison - but, bizarrely enough, there are a few passages where the suspensions and the unsettling surroundings are not too far away from Roland Kayn's majestic self-regulated procedures. Elsewhere, an acrid distortion gradually morphs into a once-celestial-now-damned constellation of revengeful low frequencies and warped funereal choirs dragging our struggle in a quagmire of disillusion. The more I listen to this album, the better it sounds to my ears; as far as this genre is concerned, I'd call it a milestone without hesitation.