Intermission

[credoimprobus]

The second part of this week's Hitz from Finland will be delayed on account of everything not havng been uploaded in time, so in the meantime, have a not-HfF post that could just as well be one:

So one of my favourite artists in the universe, Jori Hulkkonen, has a new album out. (Which as a side note has been released on cd only in Finland; everywhere else in the world gets it as digital and vinyl exclusively. The next to last question in this interview touches on the reasons for this move, should anyone be wondering what that's about.) Anyway, Jori's second collaboration with the legendary John Foxx, Never Been Here Before, is the first single, and pretty utterly amazing in an understated way.

(Ignore the fact that the video is dreadful and just focus on the song, eh?)

And to stop myself from doing two massive primers in a row in HfF: from one of my favourite artists in the universe to my FAVOURITESTEST OF FAVOURITES (as attested to by my last.fm stats, haha); one of the things I love the most about CMX is the fact that instead of mellowing the further into their career and the older they get (which, after two decades and 12 albums is starting to be quite a bit!), they just get ever more experimental. To wit: their last album, released last year, is a SCI-FI ROCK OPERA CONCEPT ALBUM, consisting of one single movement in twelve parts. And also is a complete work of genious. Instead of a traditional lead single there was a "trailer", using the movement's eighth part, Punainen komentaja:

Obv this is going to be far from every poptimist's cuppa, but I figure some of you might like this kind of thing as well. :D

Comments

(I can has discreet "whoo!")

[credoimprobus]

Oh good lord -- I just want to say "ALL OF THEM" but that would hardly be helpful, ahaha. I suppose a good place to start might be 2003's Aion, which overall has the most similar sound to the above example (and also up until Talvikuningas was imo their best). For a broader look at the kind of things they do, 2000's epic Dinosaurus Stereophonicus -- or for a serious crash course, the two huge 3-disc singles/b-sides/misc stuff compilations Cloaca Maxima and Cloaca Maxima II (from 1997 and 2004 respectively). I don't know how easy they'd be to get a hold of outside of Finland, but if need be I can rec some stores that deliver abroad. :)

Also: as a preview of sorts, a pertinent youtube related-search -- lots of singles from over the years!