The Moonjune Records label continues its quest to deliver challenging music from around the globe to its customers. And here we have the second Dwiki Dharmawan (Indonesia) album Pasar Klewer on offer. The first one got reviewed here by the end of last year, so this, a double disk nonetheless, is arriving pretty quick after that. Again with a lot of guests, with amongst them several artists from the label, like Mark Wingfield and Nicolas Meier.
But where I was very excited with the previous release, because of it’s melodies and accessibility, this album proved to be a lot harder to get into. Especially the long songs (no less than 4 pass the 10 minute mark) are very free in form, with lots of improvisation. Make no mistake, all these guys are very capable musicians. It is just that for me, those songs lack the hooks to quickly attract me to them.
On the other hand, songs like Forest, Bubuy Bulan, Frog Dance, Life Its Self and Purnama still have that magic touch that makes me want to hear them over and over. Forest even has vocals and lyrics! A song like Spirit Of Peace is the best of both worlds. It has some wonderful melodies and couples that with another demonstration of musical display from the instrumentalists.
So for me, one disk with the songs mentioned would have been another hit. Now it leaves me a bit twisted. Maybe over time, after even more plays, I will get the whole of it…
