From our man in Helsinki we received two new CDs by Jussi Lehtisalo, the talented fellow from Circle and Pharaoh Overlord. We also heard his talent for electronic instrumentals in 2020 on two tapes he made as Oric for the Ruton Music label. Fans of the more conventional rock moves of Circle / Pharaoh Overlord may be puzzled by Rock Boat (EKTRO RECORDS EKTRO-147), a set of six very quirky tunes and instrumentals which seem to feature synths, drum machines and even some guitar lines, but have been deliberately sabotaged by the mischievous creator Jussi with moments of distortion and overload – as if he’d made them on a malfunctioning PortaStudio, or played them back through a transistor radio. This tactic might tend to seriously impair your listening pleasure, but I think it’s quite ingenious how his playful spirit dances down this merry experimental path – and the original tracks are very inventive too. If he dreams of being produced by the ghost of Mark E. Smith, he might have come up with this, but there’s a wispy pixie-like sprite lurking under these unnatural grooves and ditties. Exemplary cut is ‘Atollit’, which isn’t much more than a 10:23 guitar-amp drone where the distorto swipes and interference signals are the elements that form the basis of the melody – such as it is – abstracto-scuzz marks being forced to carry the tune. Even the cover art conveys something of the joke, with our man in ludicrous mirror shades struggling to keep a straight face as he poses with axe in front of backdrop of a tall ship.
Same offbeat humour on cover of I Might Be Stuck (EKTRO-148) where he appears (still in mirror shades) with trench coat and dog on a leash collaged onto a panelled interior probably lifted from an old Ikea catalogue. These 11 cuts, we are informed, were composed for a cinema performance at a festival in 2022, said film directed by my favourite experimental Finn, Mika Taanila (who sent me these CDs). Lively and rich instrumentals which may appeal to you more if you don’t get the joke of Rock Boat above (if indeed there is one). Expertly realised and executed by Jussi and also succeeding in conveying something of the movie’s thematic flashes and suggestions. Let’s hope it’s an experimental piece of cinema with many confusing and disconnected images with a rapid editing style, even if early cuts on this album suggest more conventional travelogue fare, and some of themusic may even work for a low-budget action-adventure yarn. But click onto ‘Don’t Stop’ for something more experimental, unsettling, and relentless in its attack (though even this one gives up the ghost and yields to melodic sweeps from the keyboard banks). As with his Oric exploits, I am struck today by similarities to Jean-Michel Jarre, but this time it’s a self-sabotaging android version of the very successful French electronic act, one who can’t resist blowing up his equipment, and then himself, in a finale of sparks of smoke.
Both arrived 31 October 2022.