There’s a whole host of incredibly talented artists releasing material on Svart Records right now and continuing that trend is Mikko Joensuu, who is getting ready to release his album Amen 1, which is the first part of a three-piece solo debut (with the second being promised in late 2016 and the third in about a year).
Billed as the most delicate and fragile sounding of the three albums, it’s certainly a good description because it’s a very gentle and overall very soft piece with some absolutely beautiful vocals coupled with lush instrumentation, and there’s just this all-round nice vibe to the piece.
Despite it being a fairly simplistic piece instrumentally, it’s musically very strong and the storytelling is second to none. You can feel the passion in both the vocals and the instrumentation throughout, and a particularly good example of this is in the track Take Me Home, Oh Lord. The piano coupled with the acoustic guitar sounds beautiful, and when the vocals join in, it’s like the icing on the cake and although there’s nothing tremendously complex about the song, it doesn’t need to be – the stripped-back sound allows the passion in the delivery to shine through.
As a whole, this is a great album and serves as a good standalone piece whilst simultaneously teasing the listener with what they may be able to expect with parts two and three of the album. Nicely done.
8/10
