Tallinn Music Week - Day One
With the majority of the British music industry, including a healthy selection of up and coming Welsh artists, currently in Brighton for The Great Escape, or the “International Urban Music Festival” New Skool Rules happening in Rottedam, it might be surprising that I opted instead for Tallinn Music Week and spent last night watching a selection of Baltic and Scandinavian folky bands. Thankfully I stand by this decision, it’s such an awesome city and almost certainly the best place to be right now!
I’m here til Sunday and I only really recognise 3 acts on the line up: Trad.Attack! possibly the only Estonian band I knew previously; or Bemz and Chef The Rapper, representing Scottish rap music’s current crop of great artists. Oh there is also the Bazzookas who I met last night. I'd been talking to their agent about a Boomtown gig for a while. That’s it though, for the rest I’m kinda flying blind.
I hadn’t managed to get more than a 20 minute power nap between the Allergies gig on Wednesday night and arriving here yesterday afternoon, so sadly I didn’t get to see everyone I’d intended to before crashing last night. After the opening reception at Tallinn Art Hall (very much worth a visit for any modern art lovers), I kept it relatively easy and stuck between two venues, F-Hoone which was hosting the Folktronica Stage and Erinevate Tubade Klubi, or the Club Of Different Rooms, where the Fenno-Ugria showcase represented various artists from the Finno-Ugric countries of Finland, Estonia and Hungarian. I had thought that there were a number of similarities between the Estonian acts and the fantastic artists I’d seen in Finland last year, but hadn’t quite realised the shared cultural background.
My favourite act from that particular selection was Duo Ruut, two Estonian women playing a zither (in their words “a wooden box with 40 strings”) between them, either plucking and tapping or with drumsticks (I missed if they brought out a bow but I’ve seen pictures). Their music was both fairytale-like and melancholy, as if they’d been trapped in an enchanted woods for centuries. It was a sound very much built on traditional folk music but it had an almost ambient pop edge to it. Their songs included a couple of spells, including one “to keep the cold northern winds away” - which worked a treat, the weather has been stunning - and were mostly in their own tongue aside from one beautiful rendition of The Nightingale, which they wrongly credited to being an Irish folk song, though fair enough because some of the best renditions do certainly come from there.
The Folktronica stage is relatively self explanatory, although also widely open to interpretation as the sheer breadth of different artists proved last night. The highlight for me was Symbio, a duo from Sweden playing an accordion and a hurdy gurdy, which is one of the most satisfying instruments to watch being played. They also had a stomp box which is where the electronic side came in, as they played sweet soaring Scandinavian melodies over a stomping 4/4 beat. Not to all tastes I’d wager, but something I am very much here for.
The other acts I enjoyed were: the sharply dressed and seriously somber quartet 6Hunesseq; another stomping, though somewhat subtler folk duo, Hurja Halla; and the percussion heavy global fusionists, Hands In Motion. Acts I’d hoped to catch but missed were Ingrid Lukas, Tintura, Post Coal Prom Queen, Jinj, Venga Venga, Kitty Florentne, Oopus and Evaya. If you managed to see them, do leave a quick review in the comments.
