The Phoenix Network:
 
 
 
About  |  Advertise
Adult  |  Moonsigns  |  Band Guide  |  Blogs  |  In Pictures
 
CD Reviews  |  Classical  |  Live Reviews  |  Music Features
ted-kennedy-memorial-1000

A history of violins

The bigger, better sound of Dungen
By MICHAEL ALAN GOLDBERG  |  October 23, 2008

081024_dungen_main
LISTENERS’ DIGEST: “I love music and make music and I eat a lot of music to be able to shit a lot of music,” says Ejstes.

To paraphrase (very loosely) Ben Franklin, wherever you go in this world of ours — and that includes Sweden, native land of Dungen mastermind Gustav Ejstes — nothing is certain but death, taxes, and being picked on mercilessly if you’re a kid who plays the violin.

“It’s definitely not socially acceptable,” Ejstes says over the phone from Stockholm before bursting into laughter and recalling his efforts to conceal the instrument he took up at the firm behest of his fiddle-playing father. “I used my father’s case, which was totally rectangular, so it looked better — it didn’t look like a violin. I remember I went to the record store when I was 11 or 12 — that’s when I was first buying my own records, like Public Enemy and Pete Rock records — and I had my violin with me. I had 20 minutes before my lesson, so I was hanging out, and a guy there was like, ‘Oh, you play an instrument? What’s the instrument?’ I was like, ‘Uhh, yeah, it’s a synthesizer. . . . ’ ”

A bit older and wiser now, the late-twentysomething singer and multi-instrumentalist is nothing but proud of his violin, and thankful of the path it put him on. Years studying classical music and traditional Scandinavian folk songs attuned his ear to the intricacies of melody, structure, and arrangement. At the same time, hip-hop — which Ejstes first gravitated toward as a means of rebelling against his violin studies — helped him discover funk, soul, and jazz, then rock (especially Hendrix), and ultimately a slew of obscure ’60s and ’70s Swedish prog and psych-rock bands.

Formed in 1999 by Ejstes, who writes all the music, sings, and plays virtually all the instruments (guitar, drums, violin, bass, flute, keyboards, etc.) on the band’s studio recordings, with some help from the three other touring members, the Dungen project brings all that knowledge and influence together, perhaps no more breathtakingly than on the newly released 4 (actually Dungen’s fifth full-length). Within songs that feel epic and carefully arranged yet crackle with first-take energy and vitality, fuzzy, searing guitar lines and feedback rub against cascading pianos, delicate woodwinds, dramatically swaying strings, and exuberant drum fills. Meanwhile, Ejstes’s dreamy, yearning voice (he sings in Swedish) hovers over a tapestry of sound that occasionally alludes to the quirky psychedelia of Syd Barrett–era Floyd, the retro-psych freakouts of the Bevis Frond, the mannered jazz rock of Steely Dan, and, in its more casual moments, vintage Swedish porn.

“I love music and make music and I eat a lot of music to be able to shit a lot of music,” he laughs. “All this music I put into myself and I hear since I was a child — I listen to music as a way of learning. Like, ‘What about this part? How are the drums played? What are those, the harmonies? What is the code, what is the language?’ That has been my music listening. Even with hip-hop — of course I can’t relate to a lot of the lyrics, but the atmosphere is very hard and tough. It’s like a marching band for an army.”

Although his artistic successes have earned Dungen global acclaim, and Ejstes continues to tour the world as much as possible (the band will play Great Scott next Thursday), he still considers his project more of a hobby than a path to fame and fortune. “Since our last tour, I got a day job and a totally different kind of life, and I pretty much got used to that, so when I made these songs, I really, really didn’t have any intentions or expectations. I’m not rich, but I’m happier than ever because I have made a new record and it sounds good and it feels good, and I want to tour with it and play for people. I live cheap and that’s rich for me — to have all the time in the world to play and create new music.”

DUNGEN + HEADDRESS + BIG BEAR | Great Scott, 1222 Comm Ave, Allston | October 30 at 9 pm | $14 | 617.566.9014 or www.greatscottboston.com

Related: Swede stuff, Dungen | 4, Feel-good hits of summer, More more >
  Topics: Music Features , Entertainment, Hip-Hop and Rap, Music,  More more >
  • Share:
  • Share this entry with Facebook
  • Share this entry with Digg
  • Share this entry with Delicious
  • RSS feed
  • Email this article to a friend
  • Print this article
Comments

Best Music Poll 2009 winners
BMP_WINNERS_AD
Today's Event Picks
--> -->
ARTICLES BY MICHAEL ALAN GOLDBERG
Share this entry with Delicious
  •   SUITE RELIEF  |  June 10, 2009
    For Longstreth, the pressure's been ratcheted up following the online leak a couple of months ago of Dirty Projectors' fifth LP, Bitte Orca (Domino) which is finally, officially out this week.
  •   BIT PLAYERS  |  June 05, 2009
    What do you get when you cross NYU music-technology majors just out of their teens, vintage Nintendo Entertainment System and Game Boy gear, traditional rock-and-roll instruments, a mysterious, robot-building fellow named José with half a middle finger on one hand, and a shadowy underground network of info-spreading Swedes? No.
  •   BUZZ BAND?  |  April 13, 2009
    "The rise to the top is the best part," says Natalie Portman's Shaved Head multi-instrumentalist/vocalist David Price. "That's what Tupac said in the Biggie movie."
  •   SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE  |  March 16, 2009
    In the event of thermonuclear war, only two things will survive: cockroaches, and the smiles on the faces of Matt Johnson and Kim Schifino.
  •   THE ELECTRIC COMPANY  |  February 02, 2009
    We all know how in 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, the previously all-acoustic Bob Dylan took the stage with an electric guitar, plugged in, enraged fans, and destroyed the folk-music scene forever.

 See all articles by: MICHAEL ALAN GOLDBERG

MOST POPULAR
RSS Feed of for the most popular articles
 Most Viewed   Most Emailed 



  |  Sign In  |  Register
 
thePhoenix.com:
Phoenix Media/Communications Group:
TODAY'S FEATURED ADVERTISERS
Copyright © 2009 The Phoenix Media/Communications Group