Keith McDougallSince I Left Gothenburg: Swedish Indie-Pop and the Avalanches
May 19th 2008 03:38
While we're talking Swedish indie pop, we may as well talk about Jens Lekman. On a beautiful sunny day mid-last year, when I was in love, I heard his 'Your Arms Around Me' on the radio for the first time. I was so blown away that I waited in my parked car to find out what it was, and then immediately tracked it down when I got home. Not the kind of thing I usually do, and not the kind of thing I'm usually into, but love does strange things to people I guess.
In many ways, Lekman's a pretty typical singer-songwriter, with pure, pretty folky songs about love, life, loss, loneliness and all that. So you wouldn't think he'd have much in common with crazy ravers like The Tough Alliance and Air France. But then it turns out that TTA are his favourite Swedish band, and he sampled their 'Take No Heroes' in his 'I'm Leaving You Because I Don't Love You'. Apparently he also plays tennis against them! Like TTA, Air France and Studio, he's from Gothenburg, on the west coast of Sweden. And just like his fellow Gothenburgians, his music seems inappropriately bright and sunny for a town with such a name, in such a cold, dark part of the world.
And 45 seconds into his 2007 album, Night Falls Over Kortedala, something familiar starts to emerge on the horizon, like the good ship Deja Vu. "Hang on", I say, reaching for my telescope. "Isn't that dramatic crescendo of horn stabs the same one that the Avalanches used in the final track of Since I Left You, 'Extra Kings'?" And then check out track two, 'Sipping on The Sweet Nectar', and 2004's 'Maple Leaves' - with their strings and flutes and funky grooves they're both dead ringers for Since I Left You's title track, only with a crooning indie kid instead of a chipmonk.
So it seems that Air France aren't the only Swedes ripping off "Melbourne's own" the Avalanches. Usually I'm of the opinion that patriotism is for morons, but often when local boys do good, I find myself experiencing pangs of pride against my will. In this instance, I'm tempted to get all defensive. I mean, who the damn hell do these Viking invaders think they are?
But let's not get carried away. As I pointed in my last post on Air France, the distinctive sound of the Avalanches' one and only album wasn't just dreamed up out of thin air - it was pieced together from pre-existing sounds, 900 of them apparently, so can we really claim that it's an Australian invention? Don't get me wrong, I'm not questioning the legitimacy of sampling as an artistic practice. Rather, I'm just wondering whether this sound that seems so distinctly Avalanchesque is really the property of the Avalanches. I mean, maybe the Swedes are just on the same wavelength because for some weird reason Swedish bargain bins are full of the exact same records as Australian ones.
To get to the bottom of this problem, we must first define what the Avalanches sound actually is. They may not have released an album in seven years, but somehow this issue seems relevant right now. And hopefully we can think about it when they release their second album before the end of this year. Listening to the awesome Gimix, from 2000, which you can hear if you register at www.theavalanches.com, I'm tempted to say that the Avalanches sound is, er, just about anything that has that Avalanchesy vibe. This mix combines Avalanches tracks with not only stuff you'd expect like De La Soul and Michael Jackson, but also surprises like Bob Dylan and the Smiths. Stuff that, come to think of it, makes it make a lot more sense that a singer-songwriter like Lekman is so into them.
It's called Gimix because like a 2Many DJs set, it's full of wacky mash-up gimmicks like combining Bob Dylan with Madonna, gimmicks which don't seem anyway near as impressive as they did back then. But these songs aren't chosen just because they're incongruous and unexpected. 'Like a Rolling Stone' and 'The Boy With the Thorn in his Side' fit into the mix perfectly because:
1. the sweeping, soaring, uplifting quality of their vocals is totally Avalanches, totally 'Since I Left You' (the song), and
2. because their tinny jangliness meshes perfectly with all the Avalanches' high-pitched strings and flutes and whatnot.
Since I Left You (the album) doesn't contain as many gimmicks as Gimix. The generic palette is broad, but a bit more restricted. I don't think my knowledge of music history is sufficient enough to be very confident in the following assertion, (someone correct me, please) but I think most of the samples are from either:
1. late 70s/early 80s disco and electro-funk. Significantly, not the whiteboy electro-pop that's been so popular this decade, and not the James Brown-style funk or jazz-funk that fills a million hip-hop producers' collections. ..........(although come to think of it, those flute riffs are pretty jazzy)
2. kitsch bargain bin crap from the 50s and 60s: Hollywood soundtracks, exotica, lounge music, MOR, orchestral pop, spoken word.
So can their sound be reduced to the sum of its parts?
No, because using this same combination of source materials, lesser producers of the era would have come up with a lame big-beat, turntablist or French house record, which would sound very dated in 2008. Instead, the Avalanches created something unique and timeless. They can be distinguished from their peers by their fixation on particular high-pitched sounds (soaring strings, flutes, sopranos, bells, whistling, horses, birds) which they fuse together into a big swirly glistening light show, their love of sounds that evoke visions of paradise (choirs, harps, exotic sounds), and perhaps most importantly of all, their emotional investment in their samples.
To prove this last point, you only need to compare Since I Left You to their earlier stuff. The El Producto EP (1997) contains many of the same kitsch high-pitched sounds that are listed above, but in a completely different context. This is a nerdy whiteboy rap record, so the samples are used in a Beastie Boys-ish sort of way, not for emotional effect at all, but to sound goofy. Combined with giant crashing beats and backpacker raps, and with the DJ scratching the shit out of them, the samples draw attention to themselves as crappy old records, as if the Avalanches are saying "Hey check out this corny shit we dug up! See how we turn it into a dope beat?!"
On the Undersea Community EP (1999), they lose the rappers and become more of an instrumental hip-hop group. They start cultivating the tropical island vibe that they will explore further on Since, but the result is even more gimmicky than before. Halfway through 'Slow Walking', a beautiful string section appears over the exotic percussion, and suddenly we're in heavenly Since I Left You territory. We're all ready to get carried away to a tropical island, but then some dorky goofball goes and ruins it by singing about how he wishes he was with his "birdy", and the melody from 'Sugar Sugar' appears, turning the track into a big joke.
Apart from the lame 'Frontier Psychiatrist' and some other comic moments, Since I Left You is light years away from this. Like The Tough Alliance, here the Avalanches are utterly sincere in their corniness. The emotional content of the samples is never undermined. In fact it is milked to its full potential, resulting in an incredibly moving album. It's this emotionalism that endears the Avalanches to "corny indie fuxx" like Jens Lekman.
Which brings me back to where I started.
Of course Lekman's got the right to do whatever he wants with the Avalanches' record collection, but like a true patriot, I must declare that comparing the way he uses it to the way "our boys" did doesn't do him any favours. Lekman and the Avalanches both use the aforementioned brass sample to create a massively majestic dramatic build-up. But in Lekman's 'And I Remember Every Kiss', it is the instrumental focus of the entire song, whereas in the latter's 'Extra Kings' it is one small piece of a giant puzzle. Like the expert DJs that they are, the Avalanches tease us by threatening to let the sample climax, like a wave about to break. But just as it reaches its peak, it's cut off, and we surf smoothly onto the next wave of samples.
In Lekman's hands, the sample is not cut short. He makes the mistake of letting the horns run through to their overblown finale, to accompany his overblown chorus, "I would never kiss anyone who doesn't burn me like the sun!" The Avalanches version goes "dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum", while Lekman's goes "dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da DAAAAAAAAA!!!"
So what's wrong with this? Well, I don't think a guy like Jens can get away with a gesture this bold, especially on the first track of his album. (The Avalanches wisely save it for the final act) You have to be Shirley fucking Bassey to do justice to something so absurdly over-the-top. The way I see Jens, his schtick is all about his cuteness, which is either sickeningly twee or utterly adorable depending on your mood or your personality. He's a shy, sensitive, innocent little dude who every girl wants to have a long meaningful relationship with so they can make cute private jokes and reminisce about cute little adventures they had together. His 2005 album is called Oh You're So Silent Jens, because that's what they all say to him, until they bring him out of his shell and realise how romantic he is.
'Your Arms Around Me' is basically Jens saying "Honey, remember that time when you crept up on me in the kitchen and hugged me from behind, and I nearly sliced off my finger, and I had to go to hospital?! Ha ha ha, I love you so much!" I may sound cynical, but really it's a wonderful song, because it describes a little everyday crisis that is a mere trifle next to how the characters feel about each other. With its strings, harp and ukelele, the production is lush and heavenly, and the beat is pretty funky in a subtle way, but nothing sounds like a sample. An "organic" backing like this is perfect for a realist singer-songwriter like Lekman. The lyrics in 'And I Remember Every Kiss' are cute too - they're about Jens's first kiss - but he's trying too hard to be melodramatic. I'm just not convinced that there's enough soul or angst or seriousness in Jens to warrant the bombast of the horn sample.
Come to think of it, Air France don't stand up very well when compared to the Avalanches either. But that's enough Swede-bashing. 'Ladyflash' by the Go! Team, who aren't Swedish, is an Avalanches rip-off that kicks arse. I think they have actual singers and rappers, but the way they're buried in the mix, they may as well be samples. I suspect the performers may actually be pretty lame, but that doesn't matter at all, because they're swept up in a giant explosive maelstrom of drums and strings that absolutely kills me. It grabs me by the heart and throws me around, and then I can't wait it for it to do it again.
And back to the Swedes. Samples are not the only things that they've borrowed from the Avalanches. On a more conceptual level, the Tough Alliance and Air France share the Avalanches' idea of holiday as liberation. Despite its apparent lack of pretentiousness, Since I Left You can be read as a loose concept album conflating three different ideas of travel or "getaway":
1. literal travel, to exotic, sunny locations.
2. leaving, as in breaking up with someone and changing your life.
3. the idea of music "taking you on a journey". Like a great DJ mix, all the songs are welded seamlessly together and form a perfectly structured arc, but the recurring themes and motifs, plus the over-stuffed Sgt Pepper/proggy orchestration of the thing, mark it as a concept album rather than a mix CD.
Sampled voices and sounds refer to flights, cruises and journeys to Jamaica, Miami and Honolulu. Madonna's 'Holiday' is sampled. The album is not only a journey, but also a party. Its crowds of voices, its "crowds" of grooves, melodies and sound effects, its lyrical references to champagne and going to the disco, and the bits where the beat sounds like its coming from another room, all help to make this record the sound of a party, rather than the soundtrack to one, like a decadent de-politicised version of Public Enemy's sound of a riot.
So perhaps this is a party on a boat, a hedonistic adventure. But the title track and the emotional temperament of much of the album imply that this is more than just mindless, meaningless fun. Drowning your sorrows is more like it. The 'I Will Survive'-style lyrics "since I left you, I found a world so new" conjure up an image of a heartbroken drunk girl doing karaoke in the ship's packed ballroom. Tears stream down her face and ruin her makeup, but she remains defiant, determined to be carefree and independent and venture into the unknown. Sure, I'm being damn corny and probably reading too much into it, but maybe the album is the story of this girl's journey. The ending is perfect, but sad: the lyrics "I tried but I just can't get you, ever since the day I left you" indicate that, if you'll excuse the lame Bono-ism, she still hasn't found what she's looking for. It is time, not distance, that can mend a broken heart.
References to travel abound in Air France's On Trade Winds EP too, and The Tough Alliance's ambient album Escaping Your Ambitions announces its mission to "take you on a journey" with track titles running from 'Setting Sail' to 'The Lagoon'. For more details on this holiday aesthetic, check out TTA and AF's label website, http://www.sincerelyyours.se, which you'll find emblazoned with the slogan "demand adventure", and full of images of Swedes exploring and partying in picturesque locations.
So, one may wonder, how can these Gothenburgians so convincingly claim to be so real and sincere and all, while beaming out such sunny escapist music? Although TTA love hip-hop and have a song called 'My Hood', Sincerely Yours's brand of authenticity is not about representing their hometown, nor even their physical environment. In 'Babylon', Gothenburg is the corrupt world from which they "can't adjust, can't break away". 'Hold On to Me, Baby' by Air France (who seem more and more melancholy and discontent with physical reality the more you listen to them) describes the disappointment of coming home from a summer holiday: "Going home to nothing but snow, just don't know how to fit in".
Perhaps an explanation can be found in the hilariously pretentious Situationist-inspired statements on their website, eg "Sometimes the aim for reality feels too unrealistic. Sometimes you have to indulge in sweet distractions, gentle escapes and beautiful illusions to be able to stand this excuse for an existence. Sometimes you're just too young."
A good summary of the Sincerely Yours worldview can be found in YOURS0026, not a record but a fan letter to TTA from a Gothenburgian named Isak, who tells of how he rebelled against his working class background by living a life of indulgence, exploring all kinds of places, foods, music, women, crimes, drugs and sports. Isak felt "rootless", unable to identify with his origins or the people around him. He "found no understanding nor pity for [his] behavior" until the day he first heard the Tough Alliance, who became the soundtrack for his life.
For these Swedes, "it's not where you're from, it's where you're at." If Gothenburg is Babylon, then Zion is the sunny higher reality that we can escape to through travel or music. Like the Avalanches, they don't see a holiday as just a holiday. Like so many before them, these rebellious youngsters invert the values of their parents, escaping their "ambitions" by ignoring the pressure of having to do something with their lives. As TTA put it in 'Koka Kola Veins', "We never feel as good as when we make believe... We tell ourselves there's nothing to achieve."
In many ways, Lekman's a pretty typical singer-songwriter, with pure, pretty folky songs about love, life, loss, loneliness and all that. So you wouldn't think he'd have much in common with crazy ravers like The Tough Alliance and Air France. But then it turns out that TTA are his favourite Swedish band, and he sampled their 'Take No Heroes' in his 'I'm Leaving You Because I Don't Love You'. Apparently he also plays tennis against them! Like TTA, Air France and Studio, he's from Gothenburg, on the west coast of Sweden. And just like his fellow Gothenburgians, his music seems inappropriately bright and sunny for a town with such a name, in such a cold, dark part of the world.
And 45 seconds into his 2007 album, Night Falls Over Kortedala, something familiar starts to emerge on the horizon, like the good ship Deja Vu. "Hang on", I say, reaching for my telescope. "Isn't that dramatic crescendo of horn stabs the same one that the Avalanches used in the final track of Since I Left You, 'Extra Kings'?" And then check out track two, 'Sipping on The Sweet Nectar', and 2004's 'Maple Leaves' - with their strings and flutes and funky grooves they're both dead ringers for Since I Left You's title track, only with a crooning indie kid instead of a chipmonk.
But let's not get carried away. As I pointed in my last post on Air France, the distinctive sound of the Avalanches' one and only album wasn't just dreamed up out of thin air - it was pieced together from pre-existing sounds, 900 of them apparently, so can we really claim that it's an Australian invention? Don't get me wrong, I'm not questioning the legitimacy of sampling as an artistic practice. Rather, I'm just wondering whether this sound that seems so distinctly Avalanchesque is really the property of the Avalanches. I mean, maybe the Swedes are just on the same wavelength because for some weird reason Swedish bargain bins are full of the exact same records as Australian ones.
To get to the bottom of this problem, we must first define what the Avalanches sound actually is. They may not have released an album in seven years, but somehow this issue seems relevant right now. And hopefully we can think about it when they release their second album before the end of this year. Listening to the awesome Gimix, from 2000, which you can hear if you register at www.theavalanches.com, I'm tempted to say that the Avalanches sound is, er, just about anything that has that Avalanchesy vibe. This mix combines Avalanches tracks with not only stuff you'd expect like De La Soul and Michael Jackson, but also surprises like Bob Dylan and the Smiths. Stuff that, come to think of it, makes it make a lot more sense that a singer-songwriter like Lekman is so into them.
It's called Gimix because like a 2Many DJs set, it's full of wacky mash-up gimmicks like combining Bob Dylan with Madonna, gimmicks which don't seem anyway near as impressive as they did back then. But these songs aren't chosen just because they're incongruous and unexpected. 'Like a Rolling Stone' and 'The Boy With the Thorn in his Side' fit into the mix perfectly because:
1. the sweeping, soaring, uplifting quality of their vocals is totally Avalanches, totally 'Since I Left You' (the song), and
2. because their tinny jangliness meshes perfectly with all the Avalanches' high-pitched strings and flutes and whatnot.
Since I Left You (the album) doesn't contain as many gimmicks as Gimix. The generic palette is broad, but a bit more restricted. I don't think my knowledge of music history is sufficient enough to be very confident in the following assertion, (someone correct me, please) but I think most of the samples are from either:
1. late 70s/early 80s disco and electro-funk. Significantly, not the whiteboy electro-pop that's been so popular this decade, and not the James Brown-style funk or jazz-funk that fills a million hip-hop producers' collections. ..........(although come to think of it, those flute riffs are pretty jazzy)
2. kitsch bargain bin crap from the 50s and 60s: Hollywood soundtracks, exotica, lounge music, MOR, orchestral pop, spoken word.
So can their sound be reduced to the sum of its parts?
No, because using this same combination of source materials, lesser producers of the era would have come up with a lame big-beat, turntablist or French house record, which would sound very dated in 2008. Instead, the Avalanches created something unique and timeless. They can be distinguished from their peers by their fixation on particular high-pitched sounds (soaring strings, flutes, sopranos, bells, whistling, horses, birds) which they fuse together into a big swirly glistening light show, their love of sounds that evoke visions of paradise (choirs, harps, exotic sounds), and perhaps most importantly of all, their emotional investment in their samples.
To prove this last point, you only need to compare Since I Left You to their earlier stuff. The El Producto EP (1997) contains many of the same kitsch high-pitched sounds that are listed above, but in a completely different context. This is a nerdy whiteboy rap record, so the samples are used in a Beastie Boys-ish sort of way, not for emotional effect at all, but to sound goofy. Combined with giant crashing beats and backpacker raps, and with the DJ scratching the shit out of them, the samples draw attention to themselves as crappy old records, as if the Avalanches are saying "Hey check out this corny shit we dug up! See how we turn it into a dope beat?!"
On the Undersea Community EP (1999), they lose the rappers and become more of an instrumental hip-hop group. They start cultivating the tropical island vibe that they will explore further on Since, but the result is even more gimmicky than before. Halfway through 'Slow Walking', a beautiful string section appears over the exotic percussion, and suddenly we're in heavenly Since I Left You territory. We're all ready to get carried away to a tropical island, but then some dorky goofball goes and ruins it by singing about how he wishes he was with his "birdy", and the melody from 'Sugar Sugar' appears, turning the track into a big joke.
Apart from the lame 'Frontier Psychiatrist' and some other comic moments, Since I Left You is light years away from this. Like The Tough Alliance, here the Avalanches are utterly sincere in their corniness. The emotional content of the samples is never undermined. In fact it is milked to its full potential, resulting in an incredibly moving album. It's this emotionalism that endears the Avalanches to "corny indie fuxx" like Jens Lekman.
Which brings me back to where I started.
Of course Lekman's got the right to do whatever he wants with the Avalanches' record collection, but like a true patriot, I must declare that comparing the way he uses it to the way "our boys" did doesn't do him any favours. Lekman and the Avalanches both use the aforementioned brass sample to create a massively majestic dramatic build-up. But in Lekman's 'And I Remember Every Kiss', it is the instrumental focus of the entire song, whereas in the latter's 'Extra Kings' it is one small piece of a giant puzzle. Like the expert DJs that they are, the Avalanches tease us by threatening to let the sample climax, like a wave about to break. But just as it reaches its peak, it's cut off, and we surf smoothly onto the next wave of samples.
In Lekman's hands, the sample is not cut short. He makes the mistake of letting the horns run through to their overblown finale, to accompany his overblown chorus, "I would never kiss anyone who doesn't burn me like the sun!" The Avalanches version goes "dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum", while Lekman's goes "dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da-dum dum, da DAAAAAAAAA!!!"
So what's wrong with this? Well, I don't think a guy like Jens can get away with a gesture this bold, especially on the first track of his album. (The Avalanches wisely save it for the final act) You have to be Shirley fucking Bassey to do justice to something so absurdly over-the-top. The way I see Jens, his schtick is all about his cuteness, which is either sickeningly twee or utterly adorable depending on your mood or your personality. He's a shy, sensitive, innocent little dude who every girl wants to have a long meaningful relationship with so they can make cute private jokes and reminisce about cute little adventures they had together. His 2005 album is called Oh You're So Silent Jens, because that's what they all say to him, until they bring him out of his shell and realise how romantic he is.
'Your Arms Around Me' is basically Jens saying "Honey, remember that time when you crept up on me in the kitchen and hugged me from behind, and I nearly sliced off my finger, and I had to go to hospital?! Ha ha ha, I love you so much!" I may sound cynical, but really it's a wonderful song, because it describes a little everyday crisis that is a mere trifle next to how the characters feel about each other. With its strings, harp and ukelele, the production is lush and heavenly, and the beat is pretty funky in a subtle way, but nothing sounds like a sample. An "organic" backing like this is perfect for a realist singer-songwriter like Lekman. The lyrics in 'And I Remember Every Kiss' are cute too - they're about Jens's first kiss - but he's trying too hard to be melodramatic. I'm just not convinced that there's enough soul or angst or seriousness in Jens to warrant the bombast of the horn sample.
Come to think of it, Air France don't stand up very well when compared to the Avalanches either. But that's enough Swede-bashing. 'Ladyflash' by the Go! Team, who aren't Swedish, is an Avalanches rip-off that kicks arse. I think they have actual singers and rappers, but the way they're buried in the mix, they may as well be samples. I suspect the performers may actually be pretty lame, but that doesn't matter at all, because they're swept up in a giant explosive maelstrom of drums and strings that absolutely kills me. It grabs me by the heart and throws me around, and then I can't wait it for it to do it again.
And back to the Swedes. Samples are not the only things that they've borrowed from the Avalanches. On a more conceptual level, the Tough Alliance and Air France share the Avalanches' idea of holiday as liberation. Despite its apparent lack of pretentiousness, Since I Left You can be read as a loose concept album conflating three different ideas of travel or "getaway":
1. literal travel, to exotic, sunny locations.
2. leaving, as in breaking up with someone and changing your life.
3. the idea of music "taking you on a journey". Like a great DJ mix, all the songs are welded seamlessly together and form a perfectly structured arc, but the recurring themes and motifs, plus the over-stuffed Sgt Pepper/proggy orchestration of the thing, mark it as a concept album rather than a mix CD.
Sampled voices and sounds refer to flights, cruises and journeys to Jamaica, Miami and Honolulu. Madonna's 'Holiday' is sampled. The album is not only a journey, but also a party. Its crowds of voices, its "crowds" of grooves, melodies and sound effects, its lyrical references to champagne and going to the disco, and the bits where the beat sounds like its coming from another room, all help to make this record the sound of a party, rather than the soundtrack to one, like a decadent de-politicised version of Public Enemy's sound of a riot.
So perhaps this is a party on a boat, a hedonistic adventure. But the title track and the emotional temperament of much of the album imply that this is more than just mindless, meaningless fun. Drowning your sorrows is more like it. The 'I Will Survive'-style lyrics "since I left you, I found a world so new" conjure up an image of a heartbroken drunk girl doing karaoke in the ship's packed ballroom. Tears stream down her face and ruin her makeup, but she remains defiant, determined to be carefree and independent and venture into the unknown. Sure, I'm being damn corny and probably reading too much into it, but maybe the album is the story of this girl's journey. The ending is perfect, but sad: the lyrics "I tried but I just can't get you, ever since the day I left you" indicate that, if you'll excuse the lame Bono-ism, she still hasn't found what she's looking for. It is time, not distance, that can mend a broken heart.
References to travel abound in Air France's On Trade Winds EP too, and The Tough Alliance's ambient album Escaping Your Ambitions announces its mission to "take you on a journey" with track titles running from 'Setting Sail' to 'The Lagoon'. For more details on this holiday aesthetic, check out TTA and AF's label website, http://www.sincerelyyours.se, which you'll find emblazoned with the slogan "demand adventure", and full of images of Swedes exploring and partying in picturesque locations.
So, one may wonder, how can these Gothenburgians so convincingly claim to be so real and sincere and all, while beaming out such sunny escapist music? Although TTA love hip-hop and have a song called 'My Hood', Sincerely Yours's brand of authenticity is not about representing their hometown, nor even their physical environment. In 'Babylon', Gothenburg is the corrupt world from which they "can't adjust, can't break away". 'Hold On to Me, Baby' by Air France (who seem more and more melancholy and discontent with physical reality the more you listen to them) describes the disappointment of coming home from a summer holiday: "Going home to nothing but snow, just don't know how to fit in".
Perhaps an explanation can be found in the hilariously pretentious Situationist-inspired statements on their website, eg "Sometimes the aim for reality feels too unrealistic. Sometimes you have to indulge in sweet distractions, gentle escapes and beautiful illusions to be able to stand this excuse for an existence. Sometimes you're just too young."
A good summary of the Sincerely Yours worldview can be found in YOURS0026, not a record but a fan letter to TTA from a Gothenburgian named Isak, who tells of how he rebelled against his working class background by living a life of indulgence, exploring all kinds of places, foods, music, women, crimes, drugs and sports. Isak felt "rootless", unable to identify with his origins or the people around him. He "found no understanding nor pity for [his] behavior" until the day he first heard the Tough Alliance, who became the soundtrack for his life.
For these Swedes, "it's not where you're from, it's where you're at." If Gothenburg is Babylon, then Zion is the sunny higher reality that we can escape to through travel or music. Like the Avalanches, they don't see a holiday as just a holiday. Like so many before them, these rebellious youngsters invert the values of their parents, escaping their "ambitions" by ignoring the pressure of having to do something with their lives. As TTA put it in 'Koka Kola Veins', "We never feel as good as when we make believe... We tell ourselves there's nothing to achieve."
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