Jens Lekman- Night Falls Over Kortedala

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMAml2wdwQ4

sweet

surprised i couldn't find more footage of you together. Great memories of the Toronto Great Hall show.

he’s just posted ‘maple leaves - out tomorrow’ on his ig story

https://open.spotify.com/album/44Wa9N8w6M2VFRddtbnbX3

not just maple leaves, the entire oh you're so silent jens remake has gotten a surprise release!

now titled the cherry trees are still in blossom, it adds some interludes, a recording of "eureka" which looks to be a track he played live but never released, a new version of "julie" titled "the cherry trees are still in blossom", and an acoustic version of black cab, but removes the second version of "maple leaves"

hmm really do not know how to feel about the new "maple leaves", he's reworked it as an acoustic ballad with strings. it's gorgeous but as a replacement for the original and the only version widely available, it's totally disappointing. if this was a bonus track i'd love it but where's a version that's anything like the original! where are those propulsive drums!

new "black cab" is wonderful though! slightly different but totally does it justice

oh crazy! i just posted the julie video on another thread, didnt realise the whole album was out. listening now...

hmm showing up as all grayed-out tracks for me. Are you all in europe?

australia

his voice on the new black cab seems weird?

ufo OTM re: "Maples Leaves". Though it was always going to be a high-degree-of-difficulty move when the original versions were like the canonical How To Fruitfully Sample Stuff For Pop Songs, non-hip-hop/dance music division lol. (In my tiny brain anyway.)

i don't have any doubt he would have been capable of suitably recreating "maple leaves" though, even if the arrangement had to be tweaked a bit.

kind of a weird project where some of the tracks are barely changed from the original (only a tiny sample at the start of "sky phenomenon" removed otherwise it's the original recording) but a lot of tracks are totally re-recorded so there's pretty wild fluctuation in recording fidelity track-to-track. think he said it was due to some of the original master tapes being available but others were lost or too sample-dependent, but it's means it's not quite here or there

his voice on the new black cab seems weird?

yeah it sounds a little deeper, might just be the passing of 19 years idk

wow the new "black cab" ... never heard a version of this song that wasn't absolutely perfect

the new "maple leaves" is perfect in its own way i made peace with its existence before the second verse

"the cherry trees in blossom" is maybe the best thing here, easily the best version of that song & the new lyrics posing it as a sequel to the original "julie" are a nice touch

https://boomkat.com/products/the-linden-trees-are-still-in-blossom

reworked Night Falls Over Kortedala out in two weeks too!

it has 6 tracks added on the end:
Your Beat Kicks Back Like Death - Scout Niblett cover for a compilation
Our Last Swim in the Ocean - demo included on pre-order bonus EP Kalendervägen 113.D
A Little Lost - Arthur Russell cover for a compilation
Radio NRJ - B-side to "Friday Night at the Drive-In Bingo"
The Linden Trees Are Still In Blossom - probably a sequel track like "The Cherry Trees Are Still In Blossom" but I don't think there's an obvious lyrical link
When I'm Swimming - no idea what this is either

Finally a streamable version of “I saw her in the anti war demonstration” I love that song, can’t really hear a difference on this version and the original one, but it’s been years since I last heard it.

No idea why he didn’t become one of the most important and popular figures in indie pop/rock. There’s so many brilliant songs in here.

"i saw her in the anti-war demonstration" is one that i'm not sure has been changed or re-recorded at all

it seems like he probably was pretty well-positioned to reach a higher level of success after night falls over kortedala but that didn't eventuate due to him taking 5 years to release i know what love isn't, which got a relatively underwhelming reception. he's also just been not very prolific in terms of actual albums since nfok. his output is a bit higher if you look at all the other weird little project he's done like postcards, but it's still not that substantial.

& he still puts out a bunch of stuff in weird ways that ensures that no one except the true heads ever hear it. looking at his website just now i found this wonderful 8 minute track he put out in 2019 exclusively as an mp3 download there.

http://jenslekman.com/IWantToBeInvaded.html

there's all sorts of other stuff... "wwjd" and "i remember" which were exclusive to a mix he made on soundcloud... he really needs to put out a rarities comp!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyQIen0MRSU

still love "wwjd"

probably prefer the old “maple leaves,” but i kinda like how the new version removes a lot of the things that stamp it firmly in 2004, including that breakbeat and the choral samples

"i want to be invaded" is really so good how does he let something like that just be a throwaway on his website!

guh these self-covers/remakes are SO disappointingly sweet
reminds me of why i haven't been much interested in lekman's music in the past decade

too much light and glint and prettiness, ugh - the special of the old stuff was partly the dust and grit

this is on u.s. spotify now too

i'm just starting to listen to it but i'm inclined to agree with sean gramophone. i lost interest with jens bc his songs got so sappy and produced and arranged.

i don't hate this new maple leaves but it really feels like a cover, it's so reverential and slow

https://www.stereogum.com/2184655/jens-lekman-re-recording-classic-albums/interviews/qa/

interview here, he confirms nfok was indeed taken down due to legal issues with samples. also has two new albums in progress and one will be finished 'soon by his standards' so hopefully in the next year or so...?

Gotta agree with sean, I thought most of these sounded “too clean”. They’re still awesome songs but they sound even amateurish with this antiseptic treatment.

“I saw her in the antiwar demonstration” sounded pretty good to me, but maybe that one didn’t get changed? The last part did sounded different to my ears, but again it’s been awhile since I played the original songs.

Ok just compared it to the original version from a yt video from 4 years ago and it’s definitely the old version. That’s why that one sounded particularly good to my ears.

the linden trees are still in blossom is more like what i expected from this project, still very much the original album just a lot of the samples have been replaced with new overdubs. some stuff doesn't quite work or he wasn't able to recreate it properly, like the "sipping on the sweet nectar" instrumental break. biggest change is "kanske ar jag kar i dig" which has a new extended intro

obviously inferior to the original but a suitable replacement at least, works better than the more inconsistent approach of the cherry trees.

night falls over kortedala really is probably the absolute best indie pop album there is though

new fully-arranged version of "our last swim in the ocean" is lovely, it's the most essential from the bonus tracks. "when i'm swimming" was previously unreleased in any form as far as i know and it's quite nice too.

"the linden trees are still in blossom" is a "postcard to nina" sequel but unlike the "julie" sequel the new arrangement isn't revelatory

would have been nice to include some more of his other rarities from the era like the "opposite of hallejulah" b-sides

what is it with the samples suddenly? is anything else that has flown under the radar this long getting busted now?

i have no idea how he got away with it on this album for this long, but he did claim to have cleared some of the samples on it originally and that the rest were just recreations with session musicians (that part was obviously a lie)

but judging by what's been changed here he sure sampled a ton of uncleared stuff, much more than you can find listed on whosampled or anything

also not sure how he hasn't run into trouble over when i said i wanted to be your dog at all either, he was asked about that in a recent interview and said he couldn't answer

creative sentencing. he's agreed to be the rightsholders' dog.

just heard the new "Black Cab" and sorry guys, it sounds like it's for a detergent commercial now :/ (people who are like what's wrong w that shuuuut up)

Ew! Still cute but definitely worse

saw him last night in williamsburg. beautiful show. performed with a youth orchestra and created some beautiful arrangements of his classics. the stage banter was very funny. for the encore, he brought out the tracks for some of his more danceable songs, and while i’m happy he wasn’t using them for the whole show, it worked at the end.

the crowd was super super polite, for the most part. i was singing along a bit til i felt embarrassed cause i was the only one lol

He's apparently playing everywhere with youth orchestras on this tour.

Pretty bummed out about this new "Black Cab"

the old one is still around...

i love the new “black cab.” i love the clean guitar lines and the depth of his voice, texturally it feels new in a way that really works for me

yep, still hate nu-"Black Cab"

oh no goddamn