Farväl Falkenberg

"Farväl Falkenberg" could be the soundtrack to rural anywhere, but it’s not.

The album from Stockholm-based composer, Erik Enocksson, has all the ingredients of eerie, woodland-influenced sounds (see: chiming bells, heavy organ use, perpetual dusk) as well as enough ethereal vocals to bring rustic porch culture to anyone’s mind. That being said, it is also an album with an undeniable sense of “home”.

Released by Kning Disk, a Göteborg, Sweden based label which specializes in limited edition releases by similarly inventive composers, "Farväl Falkenberg" reverberates with the sounds of small town Swedish life. Influenced by the coastal, southwestern area of the country, the record has more than enough woodsy magic to carry the listener well through the finely crafted, brambly sounds and out to some porch in the middle of nowhere with your father and a hunting rifle.

The soundtrack to the recent film by the same name, which has been receiving numerous accolades both in Sweden and abroad, "Farväl Falkenberg" is a compilation of ten tracks containing songs recorded during the shooting of the film as well as impressive, sweeping instrumental compositions added later in Enocksson’s apartment.

Complete with breezy, intermittent whistling and the sounds of Enocksson’s old pump organ wheezing in the background, "Farväl Falkenberg" achieves many things at once. As often as the tracks are hushed and deliberate, they are never begging for climactic mood. No, quite the contrary — having not only created a lush record full of thick, backcountry piano and raw, acoustic guitar waltzes, Enocksson has more importantly produced an album that effortlessly translates the feeling of isolation (both geographically and emotionally) in an intensely personal way you don’t often come across.