LP – 7 tracks – 48 minutes
Vinyl version edited and remixed in Berlin, July 2007.
Track listing:
A1. Front
A2. Finisterre
A3. Pole of Inaccessibility
A4. Viking, Cromarty…
B1. Black Light
B2. Icing Station
B3. Viking North
Using location recordings, weather, birdsong and radio, BJNilsen continues to map and explore uncharted territory.
A follower to 2005’s Fade to White [Touch # TO:65], BJNilsen develops his work further, based on field recordings and electronics. This time he adds harsher yet clearer harmonies with musical elements to the compositions, creating a beautifully complex and detailed study. Recorded in 2006-7 with mostly analogue equipment, using up to 50 year-old tapemachines, filters and generators that end up being the soft cushion in these cold location recordings.
Location recordings from Mälaren, Stockholm, Sweden; Coombe Gibbet, Berkshire, England and Landakot, Vatnsleysuströnd, Iceland.
Telefunken M10 and M5, Studer B67, Ferrograph Series 4, Bruel and Kjær Sine-Random Generator and Frequency Analyzers. Also Monowave, Sequential Circuits ProOne, Korg MS20, Esq1, MOTU 828MK2, Ableton Live, Logic Audio 6
Morin khuur on Black Light played by Hildur Ingveldardóttir Gudnadóttir
Reviews:
Norman Records (UK):
What we say about The Short Night, by BJ Nilsen
This record left our Phil feeling ecstatic.
BJ Nilsen I’ve not heard of before. I was wondering what the BJ stood for? I do hope it’s not rude. Anyway ‘The Short Night’ is an older piece of work by him which originally came out on Touch in 2007 on CD only. Now it gets the ultimo primo wax treatment and now you can get it on black DJ friendly wax with a brand new sleeve. It looks nice. It sounds good too. Very good in fact!! Subtle hums, drones and tones blend perfectly to make some of the most deliciously excellent atmospheric music I’ve heard in a while. It’s somewhere in between Biosphere and Machinefabriek I reckon. It could sound a wee bit dark ambient at times but there’s plenty going on even if it’s just the most miminal noises here and there they seem to occupy the space perfectly. There’s an underlying tension in the music which bubbles under and I think that makes it even more compelling. Really quite excellent!!
Aquarius (USA):
Now available on vinyl! However, it’s apparently a totally different mix than the original cd version, the review of which (and associated sound samples) we’ve included below…
Benny Nilsen is a man perfectly content living in the northern regions of Europe, having grown up in Sweden and living no further south than Berlin. For while the long nights of winter can gnaw at one’s soul, the long days of summer are something to look forward to. If his collaborative albums with Stilluppsteypa were the existentially grim albums of drunken wintry behavior, then The Short Night is his portrait of the summer time dreaminess of sunflecked, arctic nights. Having been such champions of Nilsen’s work back when he was recording as Hazard for Ash International, we find it a little strange that so many people have qualified The Short Night as ‘dark.’ True, if you were to compare this album to the lilting work of Colleen or even to fellow label mate Biosphere, The Short Night would appear quite dark; but in the context of Nilsen’s entire discography, The Short Night is a dramatically colorful piece of work. Sure, Nilsen’s sustained low frequencies and a few moments of growling noise do have their devilish undertones; but throughout the album, Nilsen punctures these impressionist clouds with elegant electronic chorales of ethereal melodies that are surprisingly beautiful for BJNilsen. There is a melancholy to Nilsen’s work, but melancholy isn’t always synonymous with dark, as is the case here. In many ways, Nilsen has found himself trekking into the territories previously ventured by Fennesz and Machinefabriek, creating a transcendent sound through the tension between shoegazing / drone-based driftwork and subtle discordant agitation. This record is highly, highly recommended!
Boomkat (UK):
Touch are a label that always put quality control above all else. They don’t release much, but you can guarantee that when they do release something it’s of an almost untouchable standard, and their small but perfectly formed group of artists are a testament to that. They first welcomed Swedish experimental artist BJ Nilsen into the fold in the late 90s, when he was writing under the name Hazard, but since then Nilsen has developed and ‘The Short Night’, his latest full length record, is for me his most coherent and enjoyable album to date. Nilsen has been busy in the last few years, contributing to the incredible ‘Storm’ album with field recording veteran Chris Watson and also to ‘Second Childhood’ with cellist Hildur Gudnadóttir and Icelandic trio Stilluppsteypa but ‘The Short Night’ feels like the masterwork these records were building up to. Utilising his tuned ear for field recording, Nilsen blends environmental sounds collected in Sweden, Iceland and England and layers them above and beneath some quite stunninelectronic parts. Taking vintage equipment (Sequential Circuits Pro-One, old Scandinavian generators, Korg MS20 etc) and recording and mixing using modern computer technology he comes up with a sound that owes as much to early innovators Popol Vuh and Delia Derbyshire as it does more recent ambient-darlings Biosphere and Deathprod. The mood is one of grim, crust-laden darkness, something akin to being trapped in an abandoned building as the Phantom of the Opera plays mercilessly in a sewer below – but while the mood is shadowy the sounds never become oppressive. Maybe it’s due to the hypnotic nature of the compositions that draw you in and take hold of you entirely or possibly the actual character of the vintage generators used but the sounds float in and out of your consciousness with a wool-lined ease. Even as the album draws to a tremulous close with the incredible organ-drenched ‘Viking North’ and the amps reach eleven it is still washed with a veneer of melancholy and a palatable sheen that takes it above and beyond so many albums lumped into the same category. Touch have done it again then and thrown out yet another high water mark for the genre and a shining beacon in a mire of mediocrity. Huge recommendation.
and about the vinyl edition:
*STRICTLY LIMITED VINYL EDITION OF THIS AMAZING ALBUM – EDITED AND REMIXED IN BERLIN* Touch are a label that always put quality control above all else. They don’t release much, but you can guarantee that when they do release something it’s of an almost untouchable standard. They first welcomed Swedish experimental artist BJ Nilsen into the fold in the late 90s, when he was writing under the name Hazard, but ‘The Short Night’, his latest full length record, is for me his most coherent and absorbing album to date. Nilsen has been busy in the last few years, contributing to the incredible ‘Storm’ album with field recording veteran Chris Watson and also to ‘Second Childhood’ with cellist Hildur Gudnadóttir and Icelandic trio Stilluppsteypa, but ‘The Short Night’ feels like the masterwork these records were building up to. Nilsen blends environmental sounds collected in Sweden, Iceland and England and layers them above and beneath some breathtaking electronic parts. Taking vintage equipment (Sequential Circuits Pro-One, old Scandinavian generators, Korg MS20 etc) and recording and mixing using modern computer technology, he creates a sound that owes as much to early innovators Popol Vuh and Delia Derbyshire as it does more recent ambient-darlings Biosphere and Deathprod. The mood is one of grim, crust-laden darkness, something akin to being trapped in an abandoned building as an orchestra plays mercilessly in a sewer below – but while the mood is shadowy the sounds never becomes oppressive. Maybe it’s due to the hypnotic nature of the compositions, or maybe it’s the actual character of the vintage generators used, but the sounds float in and out of your consciousness with a wool-lined ease. Even as the album draws to a tremulous close with the incredible organ-drenched ‘Viking North’, the sound is still somehow washed with a veneer of melancholy and a palatable sheen that takes it above and beyond so many albums lumped into the same category. It’s just so nice to have this amazing record finally available on vinyl.
ESSENTIAL PURCHASE.
Rough Trade (UK):
this vinyl version of the highly acclaimed cd album ‘the short night’ was edited and remixed in berlin in july 2007. it was cut by jason at transition, london, on a neumann vsm 70 in april 2009. these tracks have been radically remixed and presented for vinyl. a follower to 2005’s ‘fade to white’, bjnilsen develops his work further, based on field recordings and electronics. this time he adds harsher yet clearer harmonies with musical elements to the compositions, creating a beautifully complex and detailed study. recorded in 2006-7 with mostly analogue equipment, using up to 50 year-old tapemachines, filters and generators that end up being the soft cushion in these cold location recordings from malaren, stockholm, sweden; coombe gibbet, berkshire, england and landakot, vatnsleysustrond, iceland. the short night falls into an area of experimental electronic music somewhere between murcof, stars of the lid, biosphere and pan sonic. what it lacks in obvious melody, it more than makes up for in mood and atmosphere. even at its most serene, there is an air of threat, and yet at its most threatening there is also a calm constancy at the centre. like the aforementioned artists, nilsen is pushing music into areas where environmental and generated sounds are becoming indistinguishable. a kind of back-to-nature, earth science electronica if that makes any sense.