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gravityzine · 8 years ago

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The Saddest Joy

On the release of Viktor’s Joy “I used to be clean”, a few words about the album, and a few more words with song writer Kaarel Malken...

Having been tipped off by a musician friend from Herefordshire, I went to see Viktor's Joy play in a pop up bar in some nondescript corner of Berlin when I was there last year. The walls were scoured and mottled with patches of paint over bare plaster, the lighting dim. Viktor's Joy are led by Kaarel Malken (guitar, vocals). He played fingerpicked guitar with a gentle but technical drummer (Jim Good) on a stripped down kit. As we waited for them to come on music from Leonard Cohen's first album set up the ambience, an obvious precedent. I think it is probably lazy journalism to write soundbites like “Viktor's Joy are Estonia's answer to Leonard Cohen”, but the restraint of the music and depth of the lyrics encourage such behaviour. Another comparison is Elliott Smith, particularly evident on the poetic and wearily lilting Parade Song #2, which even the title appears to be a conscious nod to the dear, departed American singer, sounding reminiscent of something off Either/or. The gig was beautiful, and swept us away. At the end of the gig I spoke to Kaarel about his music, and he was kind enough to give me a pre-release of the album in a handmade cover for review in SCree. I looked forward to playing it at home, and have played it sporadically since. The album is out now, and I recommend you hear it, particularly if you are keen on melancholy folky singer songwriter stuff as I am. Some music you hear seems to pose with miserable depth as a kind of sad expression forced to convince of profundity. This music speaks of genuine experience, and seems to talk of growing up in Estonia and life experiences that transcend the specifics of their birth. All the Promises Ever Made talk of the perils of addiction and how easily we fall into smoking, drinking, drugging. There is a nostalgia to it as well as regret. The refrain “never again” speaks of our brief determination to avoid destructive behaviour that is so easily forgotten. The music sits in a rolling groove that has something of the Velvet Underground in the swooping electric guitar part. There is variety on this record as well as coherence, in the instrumentation as in the arrangements. The following track The Taste I remember, She Became a Ghost, is woven through with fast picking and tells a story effectively and evocatively. It is haunting, ethereal and worn with a weary strength. The guitar playing is almost Spanish classical style, particularly in the interludes. He makes use of repetition to effectively show the tide of passing time. Even more Spanish is the virtuosic opening lick to Lake Ontario, which is a short flourish before the cyclical picking comes in. Again, there is an anecdotal narrative to it which is poetic and evocative. Characters are introduced alongside the places they live. Glacial vocals echo between verses. The production is reverb-heavy and deep. It sounds like it was recorded in an empty building. The closing track Sisters ends on a slightly different note. There is a warmth in the recording that offsets the wistfulness. Like the bittersweet end to an eventful journey.

A few questions:

When did you first pick up the guitar?

Growing up in a small town, surrounded by nothing but Soviet block houses, derelict playgrounds and a seemingly endless fields of peat, there were really not that many options. Either you take to kicking around a ball or you take to kicking around other kids, most seemed to prefer the latter. Luckily my sisters, being ten years older than me, saw the last of MTV and VH1 . By the time I got there the funeral procession was over and the burial was about to end - the music industry, wearing shorts, was filming the open grave for a new reality TV show. I was the social experiment, the kid brother, the one who had to wear "Guns n' Roses" T-shirts and grow his hair long - during a time of shaved heads and garbage disco music. In the late nineties my father got offered a job, in Moscow, as a warehouse keeper. A few times a year he'd return with a trunk full of shovels, power drills, hammers, saws and other tools he had managed to steal from the warehouse. Everything spray painted red to fool the Russian customs into believing they were used. There had been a snowstorm the night before my dad arrived. An endless carpet of pure white. I was leaning over the sill, looking out from the kitchen window. My eyes were watery from the cold, but my excitement got the best of me. He parked his Lada and from the backseat he would lift out a large cardboard box, with the words "Dolby Surround" printed on its side. Little did I know that the content of that very box would affect my day to day existence to an almost unhealthy degree. During the following years our collection of pirated cassette tapes and compact discs grew with albums from Nirvana, Offspring, Dire Straits, Korn, Kino etc. Anything the shopkeeper in Moscow could copy on a CD-R and send to my sisters. Perhaps it was the sub-woofer that ignited my obsession to become a drummer, perhaps not, but by the time I turned ten I had begun taking lessons in the local music school. My teacher was a middle aged marching band percussionist with a serious boozing problem. The four years under his tyranny taught me more about the side effects of binge drinking rather than drums. "For Christ sake boy, you keep missing the f*ing beat train!" : something I'll remember for the rest of my life. I called it quits after failing to perform to a handful of Sunday afternoon pensioners, my mother and my teacher, in the city hall. Years later, on my way to university, I walked past a plate glass window of a small music shop. The sign said : "20% off all instruments!!!" in big bright letters. With the little I had saved, working night shifts as a receptionist in a hotel, and with the help of my parents, I scraped together enough to buy a blue XS plywood guitar. I composed my first song three days later. A two chord, short lived disaster. Last time I saw the guitar, hung by its neck, behind a plate glass window of a pawn shop - once more, discounted.

What have you been doing up until now? Do you have any other interests beyond music?

I've worked as a dishwasher, pastry chef, phone agent, engineer, as an extra in low budget German TV-movies. In other words, you name it - I've done it. Right now I'm sitting in a cafeteria a few blocks down the street from my house. I've been coming here for years to read and write. The bohemian life.... you know. These days the place is full of prams and crying toddlers. One of them is drooling on my pants sleeve, as we speak. I find this drone of life calming.

How did you find recording the album?

Although the process started off in a proper studio, under the guidance of a fantastic sound engineer, Martin Fiedler, I decided to continue by myself in the comfort of my bedroom - for the larger part. I suppose I felt intimidated by the expensive Neumann's and the professional approach, deeming myself unworthy. In the long run, the positives outweighed the negatives and I learned how to use the equipment I had bought or borrowed from my friends ( mainly from my good buddy and band member Jim Good), during the years I've lived in Berlin. I guess the hardest part was recording the drums. I used an old Russian Oktava that Jim brought back from Estonia a few summers ago - the only one that seemed to yield results. Jim is a subtle player , not a 4/4 rock drummer, and getting the sound I was looking for wasn't as easy as I expected. It all worked out thanks to Jim's infinite patience. Along the way Michael Brinkworth came to my aid with his beautiful 70's Fender (I'm sorry if it wasn't a Fender, Michael) and his ideas. Always a few hours late and out of breath - always passionate. He's the most prolific songwriter I know and his input was more than welcomed. Some of my guitar tracks and vocal takes were done in a rehearsal room that used to belong to Nina Hagen (something the locals seemed to take a lot of pride in). A damp basement full of old carpets and stale air. I spent a few weeks locked behind that massive metal door singing the same lines, over and over again. It was the following Autumn when I met Mauno Meesit from Grainy Records. He was in the midst of recording his own album and was in need of a classical guitar. Our mutual friend, who knew I had one, got him to come to one of my shows. We barely spoke after the gig but in a couple of days I received an E-mail and from there on we got to speaking. Turned out he liked the show and was enthusiastic about the album I had been recording. Soon enough he proposed me to join his label and I accepted without hesitation. I saw how serious he was about his own music and my mind was made up even before he asked. I'm not the easiest person to work with but Mauno's, Buddha like, calmness bridged our way. The result is on my table, boxes full of it. Who could have imagined...

What was the inspiration for the songs? I consider "I used to be clean" a concept album. A retroperspective glimpse into my childhood and how it was to grow up in the East during a time of despair and poverty as well as unity and love. I'm sure these themes will carry on into the future of my lyrics. Inspiration is an entity. Some sort of an astral being that enters and exits one's body whenever and wherever. During these times I'm nothing but a medium in a state of unconscious effortlessness. Many of my songs are not born out of inspiration. These are the ones I'm never fully satisfied with, the conscious ones, the ones I labor over. The beauty of these songs lies in their ability to grow and change as I do. I'm learning how to work without inspiration yet remain open to it - it's not that easy.

How do you go about writing?

My day kick-starts in the afternoon after a few cups of coffee. I try to write something in my diary every day. Sometimes it's a poem or a short story, but mostly it surmounts to nothing more but everyday uneventfulness. It takes me weeks, months, at times even years, to finish a song.

Lately I feel as If I'm in dire need of a break. Someplace quiet, outside this metropolitan cesspool. Someplace small where people go to sleep when the sun sets. Someplace where people talk about ordinary things, sit by a card table, eat canned sausages and drink clear spirits. Any place considered "culturally inactive" according to metropolitan standards.

Where can we hear it? www.bandcamp.com/viktorsjoy or www.grainyrecords.com

Where can we hear you play?

The album release show, in Berlin, will take place in Neue Nachbarn on the 5th of April. https://www.facebook.com/events/1879058472306213/1879252808953446/?notif_t=like&notif_id=1490094469947888

What are your plans for the future?

Organize a couple of shows in Estonia and focus on writing and recording new tracks.

#music #folk #indie #singer-songwriter #viktors joy #album review #interview #SCree #Berlin #estonia #I used to be clean

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