If you like your post-pop rock to be angsty, folksy, dramatic and lovely all at the same time, then ioktember, have recorded some songs in the basement of an old mental institution, that should get your hairs on the back of your neck standing on end.I was ear wigging a conversation, during my weekly supermarket shop at the weekend, between a security guard and the till assistant. They began discussing and analysing their attempt to chat up two Swedish ladies, who had chanced upon the checkout of these budding romeos, which became the highlight of their day. The gist of the conversation was based on how the guys' charm and smarm could have been more finely honed, as their tactics evidently bombed. The opening gambit of asking the girls "where are they from?" quickly followed by a "Where's Sweden?" then culminating with the killer lines "Isn't that the country full of trees? no wait! are we confusing it with the the land of lakes?" the outcome of this charm offensive was a miserable strike out and the guys were left ruing their opportunity and lack of geography knowledge, as they contemplated the rest of day processing the meagre food rations of hordes of poor, disposed, music blog writers and middle class credit crunch refugees. I yearned to interject, that Sweden actually should be currently be known as 'the land the great bands' and here's another one..
Hailing from Stockholm, ioktember, risen from the remnants of a previous incarnation known as Infinite Regress and have leanings towards the big commercial sound of say Snow Patrol with the finely crafted songwriting of The Blue Nile and finely wrought offerings of This Mortal Coil.The band list My Bloody Valentine, Godspeed you! Black Emperor, Sigur Ros, Joy Division, Wu Tang Clan, Johnny Cash, Chris Isaak, Einsturzende Neubauten and The Pixies, so as influences go, you can see an interesting mix going on there.
The collective names of ioktember are Emil Henricson,Johan Augustsson, Daniel Andersson, Hanna Eklöf, Hannes Holmqvist and Max Håkan Holm. They describe themselves as "People gathered behind the old dumpster, randomly at first, to play the organ and have themselves an occasional sing-song" Actually, judging by the songs on their myspace.com/ioktember site, they're creating something very mournful but marvellous.
There are just the four tracks up on this website: Shine, Be There, For The Last Day Of Spring and My Love Something, of which the latter is the stand out tune for me, making good use of the boy/girl duet vocals singing an emotionally wrought tune, with a with a lilting horn arrangement.
The only significant blips on the blogging radar so far come from http://meadowmusic.se/en/?p=261 and http://absolutnoise.blogspot.com/2009/05/from-old-mental-institution.html
http://ioktember.com/
http://www.myspace.com/ioktember
