| Of all the things that Sweden has given the world, combinations of outstanding instruments and
Helena Sundin are definitely a few of the best on the list. Taking on the hardships that
encompass making a solo album, Helena has taken her ideas and made a diary that posted her
desires, questions, and wonders and made an album that expresses all of those to the masses. I
must admit, when I Daydream, it is about Cake most of the time, lets see if it is this time.
Cherub rock is an understatement as the classical and tangible "Come On Rainbow" rings and chimes
its way in my ears. This album seems to want to spill its guts on everything, in all of its
Technicolor dreaminess. Don't get me wrong, I love elevator music and this album seems to form
around the cheery strings of sounds that elevators pump out to sooth your trips in their small
dimensions. Tracks like "I Guess I Was Daydreaming" and "Sparrow Parade" continue
with a fermented beat that repeats in the background and then has a piano to strengthen its over
tones, as a beautiful songstress mends gorgeous amounts of melody and rhythm into each note and
section. "Franciose" introduces a certainly more calm beat, not like the beats before this were
crazy or anything, but this has more of a tedious tone to it with sound bytes of all kinds. The CD is arranged with many short thoughts all put together to make one big combination
of ideas and beliefs. Songs such as "Lost Friendship" give their brief glimpses of gentle bright
lights and create lullabies that swoon us to a relaxed sleep and let you slip out of any sense of
time. When your music takes on an art form of its own, you know you have created something
extremely creative like the stage production of Stomp or something by The Sounds of Animals
Fighting. With songs like "Slowly, Slowly" the music seem to make more sense and even with their
nontraditional formations, they allow for a amazingly soothing song. The album also ends well
with the gentle kisses that "English Music" and "The One I Say Goodnight To" oblige us with. Their
waves of positive energy seem to be more effective than any thick therapy massage as the sweet Swedish
vocals melt over your thoughts and stay with you the many times this CD enters your stereo.
You can't seem to do wrong when your music brings a metaphorical magic and relaxing feelings to
the people that listen. To that end, this album feels like one big song, as although there are
many variations in the way that many of the songs are put together, the over all sound and theme
remains the same for a large quantity of it. This by no means makes this a bad album, and if
anything by the repeating the great sound we are able to truly appreciate it. And in the end, if
something isn't broken, why fix it?
~ Pernell
December 16 2006 |