All praise to the digital realm! Festen på Gärdet (Party on the Farm –link below–) will placate any migratory woes, especially for those of you not in reach of any analog material like here in Buenos Aires. This inaugural disinter was animated by maestro Jeff Conklin, DJ and music pundit who can be heard at WFMU The Avant Ghetto. His unsolicited and complete digital guidance was our gateway to disinterring into the Nordic psychedelic happening of 1970 in Gärdet Sweden. Grace be granted to this fresh squint, as the festival documented below will show both the bands and festival bout for protagonist and progenitor of the vibrant Nordic music scene in the late twentieth century. Today, many of the bands at this festival, among them one of the organizers of the festival Träd Gräs Och Stenar (Tree Grass and Stones), are catching the ears of listeners in countries like Japan and the US making a proverbial comeback. The Festen på Gärdet challenges a rather frigid perception of Nordic culture, setting a precedent for music and culture in Sweden and beyond, while encouraging gregarious and free form gathering to counter many manifestations of the mainstream expression of human experience; past present and future.
This lo-fi documentary follows the innovative field festival featuring clips of dancing toddlers, various SWE psychedelic bands, archaic ritual, and visual Nordic bucolics. A sonorous attack of bleating establishing the score which develops into collage of sound as the film moves from natty opaline sheep to illustrations and subsequently footage from the happening and performances of the bands. Understanding Swedish is not indispensable since it is all narration over the images. Plus, just like in the music; foreignness, cadence, and the musicality of the Swedish language is music in and of itself. Moreover, its union with the images sustains a dynamic and folksy film. A spectacular performance by dint of language; linguistic inflections, pastoral soundscapes and the interpolated psychedelic music exerts a consistent sonority that questions- at what moment does language become psychedelic? The more listens and views one makes of these videos, the more self debriefing will be needed. The film ends with the visually puerile element of dancing around a fire. Here the lighting of the fire with Nordic toe-heads circumnavigating around it summons the archaic rituals of yore when it was odd to separate song and dance from sacred ritual. Calling upon these videos will suffice for partying on the farm today and move you into a digital fire dance ritual, indeed.
This lo-fi documentary follows the innovative field festival featuring clips of dancing toddlers, various SWE psychedelic bands, archaic ritual, and visual Nordic bucolics. A sonorous attack of bleating establishing the score which develops into collage of sound as the film moves from natty opaline sheep to illustrations and subsequently footage from the happening and performances of the bands. Understanding Swedish is not indispensable since it is all narration over the images. Plus, just like in the music; foreignness, cadence, and the musicality of the Swedish language is music in and of itself. Moreover, its union with the images sustains a dynamic and folksy film. A spectacular performance by dint of language; linguistic inflections, pastoral soundscapes and the interpolated psychedelic music exerts a consistent sonority that questions- at what moment does language become psychedelic? The more listens and views one makes of these videos, the more self debriefing will be needed. The film ends with the visually puerile element of dancing around a fire. Here the lighting of the fire with Nordic toe-heads circumnavigating around it summons the archaic rituals of yore when it was odd to separate song and dance from sacred ritual. Calling upon these videos will suffice for partying on the farm today and move you into a digital fire dance ritual, indeed.
PART I
PART II
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