Send "Efterklang " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Drownedinsound |
 Bands that eschew the traditional guitar / bass / drums / synths line up are often paraded as innovators, or something special. Witness Beirut, or Patrick Wolf, both of whom started off without guitars (although Wolf has since reneged on that), and focused on ukeleles and accordions and other marginalised instruments. It certainly works as a way to draw attention to oneself, as a conscious rejection of the dominant paradigm of the music world.And that is, perhaps, why Efterklang's previous record proper, Parades was on the receiving end of one of those ever so rare and prestigious DiS 10/10 ratings. Or perhaps it was because it was one of those special albums that doesn't obviously draw on anything that came before, but instead carved its own path through subtle shifts of mood, and intricate arrangements that withheld their secrets for several listens. It had that rare quality of 'newness', much like Beirut and Patrick Wolf did when they first appeared. Hopes are thus high for this third set....full text |
| Musicomh |
| Until now Efterklang have largely been regarded as an electronic band, but the recent success of Performing Parades suggests the Danish tunesmiths have had their heads turned to the redemptive powers of acoustic instruments. As a result Magic Chairs is billed as 'a new Efterklang sound'. It marks the start of a new chapter, being their first album for 4AD - itself recognition of the fact that people are starting to catch on to their sound. If a soundbite were required to describe it, they're a band to complement the Arcade Fires of this world. Part of the reason for this is that Magic Chairs is beautifully orchestrated, showing just how much they've taken from the live orchestral experience in its beautifully woven parts for strings, brass and harp, which dovetail with vocals and percussion. It suits their sound extremely well for Thomas Sjöberg and Linda Drejer Bonde to be making their largely plaintive observations to such colourful accompaniment, and the drums operate with a commendable restraint - though when they are let loose they largely retain the punch of their previous outings....full text |
| Bbc |
| Efterklang’s third long-player opens with a song so exquisite, so alluring of textural depth and enveloping of divine ambience, that all else fades away. Tunnel vision of the senses, peripheries blurred and spiralled into a Turner-style canvas-drama on the cornea. It’s intoxicating, Modern Drift, a song that stills the rush of a modernity that structures its time around the comparative triviality of necessity. It’s exemplary escapism. It’s where this record puts its first foot wrong. Because where now? Efterklang achieved great things with 2007’s Parades, but that was a set neatly segued, a complete picture that revealed itself gradually across episodic tracks. Magic Chairs is their ‘pop’ record, relatively speaking; any narrative is fractured, the songs standalone, constructs shorn of company and context. As gorgeous as Alike, which follows the Danish outfit’s seductive opener, is, it marches to an independent beat. The cohesion of the past, which made Parades so magical and saw several critics acclaim it as a Funeral-beater, is absent. As such, Magic Chairs feels like a comparative regression, devolution where its makers could have soared from the heavens to realms wholly otherworldly. But, should Parades mean nothing to you, this makes for a superb introduction to one of the world’s most uniquely-minded bands. Where other ‘indie’ acts stick a violin atop a standard-issue rock-stomper and call it an anthem, Efterklang assemble their arrangements from classical-forged fragments. The sweep of a graceful string or brass passage is as vital to the overall cohesion of a piece as the guitars and drums, which rumble and rattle in a most wonderful unison. I Was Playing Drums is one example of this astute balancing of elements, penultimate show-stopper Mirror Mirror another; elsewhere, though, things don’t play so smoothly....full text |
Efterklang lyrics
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