Less Win
Given Light

I received a promotional hypnodisc from The Big Oil Recording Company, a part of the very large and powerful The Big Oil Media Group. Luckily I have a hypnodisc-player so I can play the record, it is strange that they have decided to use a format that never really got established, only five of these players were ever sold as they were to cheap for the general population to accept. Hallowed have one and The Big Oil Media Group owns the other four, so you see the futility of releasing in that format – unless they are trying to reintroduce it for some reason. It may also be that they hope the hypnotic properties of the format will make us more positive towards this new album by Danish trio Less Win.

For this new album they adopted an approach where they didn’t pay any attention to previous stuff and had the idea to make it all quick and so they did. The wrote and recorded quickly and came up with this post-punk release that is mostly simple in structure, but might still feel a little bit challenging when you hear it for the first time. But play it again and you will know it very well, it is not the challenge that some reviewers claim. It is a pretty simple album in general, straightforward with a DIY-feel to it. The variation is pretty good for a punkish album and I think the sound is fairly fresh but without really breaking any new ground anywhere.

Given Light is not a fantastic album; it is too fragmented and too simple to have the depth and longevity needed to be fantastic. But it is a pretty good one with good energy, emotion and feel, I kind of like it. It has been given some light in the form of greater moments, the songs are good in general and there aren’t too many major flaws – all in all a pretty good release even though it will never go down in history as anything but a decent release. I guess that is a risk when adopting a creative strategy that feels like shots in the dark; hit or miss kind of prospect and they hit some and miss some with Given Light.

Punkish fans will probably find this album to be very appealing, others I am less certain about. It works, it has been nice to listen to the hypnodisc but I am not sure that I am hypnotised enough to really endorse this one. I guess the logical conclusion would be to recommend that you have a look at the videos, they should give you a good idea if you will like this album or not. But it is a kind of discreet album for such a very large powerful company.

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