Ef – Mourning Golden Morning
Record Label: And The Sound Records
Release Date: April 1, 2010
Who?
Ef are one of those bands that just get it. It changes from band to band and scene to scene, but if you’re talking about Swedish post-rock, then that it is clearly an ability to draw emotion out of the abstract.
How Is It?
Mourning Golden Morning is Ef’s third, and best, full-length. Released to the acclaim of those much more trustworthy than I, Mourning finds the band mixing its crescendo-heavy arrangements with twee-influenced singing. The vocals rarely overshadow the band’s galaxy-sized swells, yet they may be what sticks with you longest. On “Sons of Ghosts,” the horns, pianos and bouyant energy work hard and work well, but it’s the delicate male-female harmonies that allow us to enjoy the song’s forceful climax. It’s Beauty and the Beast if the Beast was actually a Beauty himself.
While Mourning Golden Morning is something of a mish mash (look at the army march opus of “K-141 KYPCK” for proof), it works as a powerful, singular statement. “Longing For Colors” has a Swedish twee influence, sort of as if Sigur Ros got lost in a field of dandelions. Heck even the eerie electronic flourishes of sorta-interlude “Fyra” help to flesh out the dream world that Ef calls home. Although it’s not my place to posit on what Ef’s statement is, I’d like to think it’s something about how a genre is but a roof; everything is connected underneath, but there are rooms aplenty to explore. Mourning Golden Morning never sits still, and is probably one of the more fidgety post-rock albums you’ll hear in 2010. But by creating such a rollercoaster ride, Ef have left us with a post-rock album that works beyond the confines of “sleep tunes” or, ugh, “study jams.” It’s an album that changes moods as often as us, which is a devastatingly hard thing to achieve.
Recommended If You Like: Sigur Ros, Balmorhea, You.May.Die.In.The.Desert.
Short but good to the point review. Although I think "I am Responsible" is their best, but that's each to his own. I think it has more lasting value. My favorite songs on this record is Longing for Colors.
Like in every thread about postrock. If you like Swedish Post Rock like Ef, check out "Jeniferever".
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