Reykjavík Grapevine - 08.01.2016, Blaðsíða 17

17The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 1 — 2016
Surprisingly enough, choosing AL-
BUM OF THE YEAR 2015 proved the
easiest decision of the bunch. Basi-
cally, as soon as Tonik Ensemble was
mentioned, our panellists started rav-
ing about ‘Snapshots’, seemingly try-
ing to one-up each other in their dec-
larations of love. “I wish we could give
Tonik Ensemble the award in every
category,” one of them noted as the
lovefest peaked, succinctly summa-
rizing the group’s collective feels. “But
is it album of the year?” asked the
moderator. “Tonik. Right on. Agreed.”
And that was that.
With a decision in the bag, our panel
was far from done heaping praise on
‘Snapshots’. Some select quotes:
On how ‘Snapshots’ rewards repeat-
ed listening: “I heard it for the first time
and thought it was good, probably one
of the year’s best. Almost a year and
dozens of listens later, my conviction
has only grown. It’s album of the year.”
On Tonik’s remarkable artistic
growth: “I’ve always liked Tonik’s stuff,
but never like this. There is a sincere
and powerful aura hovering above the
album, bittersweet, soulful and beau-
tiful. It gets better with every listen.”
On how ‘Snapshots’ serves as a
testament to Tonik’s professional ap-
proach and attention to detail: “He
just knows what he’s fucking doing.
It’s evident from listening that he has
an encyclopedic knowledge of elec-
tronic music’s history, along with be-
ing up to date on the latest trends. The
sprawling and unique nature of ‘Snap-
shots’ is the result of Tonik’s undying
enthusiasm for music, and years of
dedicated experimentation. He lays
the album’s foundation by infusing his
own, carefully crafted style with ele-
ments of 90s rave and IDM, and then
sprinkles a plethora of rewarding little
references all over it, which imbue the
album with life and serve to provide
context and points of departure...”
Worth noting is the fact that the per-
son responsible for last year’s Album
Of The Year, Hörður Már of M-Band,
plays a pivotal role in ‘Snapshots’, his
gorgeous vocals lending soul and lus-
tre to its mechanics.
2014: M-band – ‘Haust’
2013: Sin Fang – ‘Flowers’
2012: Hjaltalín – ‘Enter IV’
Sometimes, “dance music” goes be-
yond its implied mission of moving
people’s feet, and moves them in
other ways, too. Grapevine’s album
of the year 2015—Tonik Ensemble’s
’Snapshots’—does just that. An edu-
cated, simmering take on house-
techno-pop, it’s a lush production
of cello, saxophone and various dif-
fering styles of vocals, all laid over a
rich base of synth pulses and languid
rhythms with a dark, emotional tint.
The album was made through an
impressively long-term investment
of time and effort from its creator, the
mild-mannered and quizzical Anton
Kaldal, who’s a graphic designer by
day (full disclosure: he’s sometimes
jumped in and designed issues of The
Reykjavik Grapevine. Keep in mind
that our awards panel was wholly
unaware of the fact, not that it would
have affected their verdict). After a
decade-long process of developing his
style under the Tonik moniker, Anton
expanded his sonic palette consider-
ably for the ‘Snapshots’, resulting in
his most ambitious collection to date.
“Snapshots is a turning point,” he
says. “It was an evolution over time,
but the big difference from what I’d
been working on previously was the
inclusion of vocals. What I like about
using vocals is that you could take
the most difficult noise track in the
whole wide world, but if you put a
vocal on it, all of a sudden you have
this bridge to a wider audience. It can
almost trick people into listening to
something they might not normally
listen to. That’s what the human
voice does for the listener—it’s very
powerful.”
Electro-scholar
Anton talks in an almost scholarly
style about contemporary music. He’s
a voracious and ever-curious listener
and follower of new developments,
from mass-cultural pop stars to cult-
ish niches and from neo-classical
composition to the ever-evolving tro-
posphere of dance sub-genres.
“I’ve always been framed—or framed
myself—in the electronic scene,” he
says. “But I don’t label myself either
as pop music, or not. I’m a huge fan
of all music, and some of that is very
mainstream. I like catchy music and
hooks. Pop has certainly gone into in-
teresting directions lately. When you
have someone like Arca producing
pop acts like FKA twigs, then we’re in
interesting times. There’s always the
bland stuff of course, but there’s also
substance to a lot of pop music now.”
‘Snapshots’ took several years to cre-
ate, and Anton watched music change
around him during that period. “It’s
interesting to see how certain sounds
that appeared a couple of years ago
can still break into the mainstream,”
he muses. “When I started making
the album, I was transitioning from
synth-heavy electronica into a more
retro ‘80s sound, and also into a darker
palette. I’d been listening to yacht-rock,
disco, post-dubstep… electronic music
like Jon Hopkins and Trentemøller. I
became very fixated on a cinematic feel,
and wanted to take it further.”
Musical trolling
As well as expanding his palette of
sounds and his range of collaborators,
Anton pushed himself in other ways
during the creation of ‘Snapshots’.
“I put myself into a playful mode
for this record,” he explains. “On the
technical side of things, I went out of
my comfort zone with song structures…
but I was also almost thinking of doing
some ‘musical trolling’, by doing things
like starting the vocal four minutes into
a track. I was reminded of this the other
day when I heard that particular track
on the radio. The host played four min-
utes of the song, and started introducing
the next track—but at the very moment
she was going to push the button, the
vocal began.” He laughs mischievously,
finishing: “She paused, and said “In-
teresting! Let’s stick with this...” and
just left it running. So I got to hear the
‘trolling’ happening in real time, on live
radio.”
But along with the playfulness and
experimentation, the album has a dark
and at times sombre sound. “I lost a
close relative around the time I started
writing it,” he reflects. “It coloured the
whole album. The lyrics deal with that,
and I think it subconsciously slipped
through into the sound, as well. One of
the reasons for the jazz elements on the
album—other than liking jazz—was that
the relative was a big fan of jazz, so the
saxophone parts were a small tribute.”
Made of solid gold
One of the most striking contributions
from Anton’s expanded Tonik Ensemble
comes from Hörður Már Bjarnason,
also known for his work as M-Band—
perhaps not coincidentally, the winner
of Grapevine’s album of the 2014 award
for his debut LP, ‘Haust’. Hörður’s rich
tenor voice brings a spine-tingling spiri-
tuality to inner landscape of the album,
swirling amongst the strings, saxo-
phone and synth arrangements with
artful sensitivity.
Having been impressed by M-Band’s
first EP, Anton first asked Hörður to join
him onstage at the Extreme Chill festi-
val in Snæfellsnes. “It was a late-night
slot,” he recalls, “so I’d made some vi-
suals, and asked Hörður to join me as a
surprise vocalist alongside the cello.” He
pauses at the memory, his eyes lighting
up. “Little did I know his live skills until
then.”
“All of the musicians and vocalists on
this record brought something that ele-
vates the whole piece to another level,”
he continues, “and Hörður did make a
big mark on this record, as you can hear
on the opening track onwards. His voice
has an unusual quality—almost Arthur
Russell-like. He also studied piano for
a long time, and although he doesn’t re-
ally know it himself, his way of working
is very impressive—fluid, and natural.”
The homeland success of the album
has left Anton pleasantly surprised. “I
think the word is humble,” he smiles. “I
had prepared myself for it to go totally
under the radar in Iceland, because the
PR was in the UK, and label was in the
Netherlands. So it’s humbling to get
some recognition, especially for some-
thing as personal about this. Although
I might sometimes talk with a design
vocabulary about music, it’s a very per-
sonal album. It totally reflects what I
was going through during that time.
And that makes the recognition even
more special.”
a space of colour
tonik ensemble's
music is rich and
intoxicating
By john Rogers
Album of the Year:
Tonik Ensemble - Snapshots
“I lost a close relative
around the time I started
writing ‘Snapshots’. It
coloured the whole album.
The lyrics deal with that,
and I think it subcon-
sciously slipped through
into the sound as well.”
A
T