April 7, 2009

Album review: Storsveit Nix Noltes

Royal Family - Divorce

8 / 10 Eleven Icelanders playing instrumental Bulgarian and Balkan folk songs with a psychedelic post-punk lilt? It’s marvellous. A furious pace is set with an inferno of trumpet and crashing snares on opener ‘Wedding Rachenitsa’, only to be doused by the melancholy of ‘Atmadja Duma Strachilu (Revolution Song)’. Like fellow Balkan burglars A Hawk And A Hacksaw and Beirut, SNN sound both massively new and old. The horns, accordions and strings are all accounted for, but the doom-filled electric guitar fuelling ‘Elenska Rachenitsa’ and ‘Winding Horo’ create a gloriously post-rock noise more akin to Liars or Godspeed than
a traditional foot-stomper. Iceland’s economy may be in crisis, but its music has never been richer.

Tessa Harris

More on this artist:
Storsveit Nix Noltes NME Artist Page
Storsveit Nix Noltes MySpace

Rate this album

Average rating

To read all our reviews first - days before they appear online - check out NME magazine, on sale every Wednesday

For the latest music videos and backstage interviews, check out our sister site, NME Video.