Musikk til poesi

The short review (headline “Musikk til poesi”, Østlendingen, 27 April 2010, page 25, in a box of record reviews next to Roky Erickson, Elin Ruth Sigvardsson and Besnard Lakes) introduces “the Scottish Jackie Leven (60), once a member of Doll by Doll”. He delivers at least one album every year, after having been “down in the darkness” for a period in the Eighties. (Leven turned sixty in June 2010; he was 59 when the review appeared.)

His lyrics can be regarded as pure poetry, and his characteristic voice and vibrating way of singing give the words extra sting and life. At the same time he has a gift for setting melodies in exciting and unexpected frames; he “twists and turns the conventions” and conveys dark moods in his own highly personal way. Gothic Road (Cooking Vinyl/Tuba) has some captivating high points that must be played again and again. Finally “Ralph McTell himself”, the man behind “Streets of London” (known in Norway as Finn Kalvik's “En tur rundt i byen”), turns up on “Cornelius Whalen”. A rating is not legible in the OCR, and the attribution of the author's name in the multi-column box is uncertain.