Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Stealpot's Indian Salon (PL)

Finally this 2007 is becoming something quite interesting on this side of the Vistula (Wisla) river.

After six months of releases that did not surprise that much, when compared to last year's offer, this Summer has arrived with some of the most interesting releases we might see this year. Rock, pop and especially electronic music are making the wonders to all those listening to the new sounds of Poland. If not, just have a look at new releases by Apteka, Kasia Nosowska, Digit-All-Love, Mr. S and Stealpot, with its second album Indian Salon, released on Vivo records.

Szymon 'Stealpot' Folwarczny released his debut album back in 2005. By that time, Mass Mess.Age caught everyone by surprise. An unknown young artist, hailing from Katowice, had just released one of the freshest albums of the year. By then the album gathered several good reviews and made it to countries such as Germany, England or Japan.

This year young Szymon is back with the always difficult second album. After the debut Mass Mess.Age expectations were high for his next chapter. Indian Salon has just arrived and not only it stands up to our expectations, it is a big step forth towards its predecessor.

For this release Szymon brought together, again, Kasandra Adebowale, on vocals, and Gosia Warszawska, on flute, two artists that collaborated with him on his debut album. Anna Ruttar, on vocals, Junko Nashimura, from the French/Japanese band Mondialito, Damir Radic, Piotr Czyja, Jaszczur and many others joined this second adventure. All together, they brought a brand new sound to Stealpot.

The music now is full of life, rhythm and energy. There's space for electronic pop, nu-jazz and downtempo. The instruments sound so real. Well, they're real now. Percussion, bass, double-bass, hammond organ, rhodes, piano, guitar, a string quartet with two violins, a viola and a cello, and trumpet. All these take part on Indian Salon.

The album opens with On Time, a track that breathes low-fi and calm jazzy textures. Anna keeps this her vocals running smoothly under the trumpet radar. One of my favourites.

Going through these 12 tracks is like embarking on a trip all around the world. The tunes and melodies sound as coming from everywhere but Poland. The fact that the album is sung in four different languages (Polish, English, Croatian and Japanese) also gives a little hand. Among these songs, there's space for some instrumental tracks, especially for Jazzcore in The Rock Opera, a great music exercise where percussion, trumpet, bass and guitar all get together in a true sound jam. Highly recommended.

Worth mentioning the highly seductive Step Into Another Reality, the spacey Indian Salon and the delicate oriental pearl Kimi Na Oto, with Junko whispering, softly, so many words, in so many different colours and shapes.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome Indian Salon, Music@PL.PT's favourite album for this 2007 so far, and our album of the week.

You can buy this record on the following stores:

Vivo Records (Poland)

Darla (USA)

Amazon.jp (Japan)

Juno Records (UK)

Penny Black Music (UK)

Shiny Beast (The Netherlands)

Plegion (Russia)

In order to listen to some more of this Indian Salon, check Stealpot's MySpace , Last.fm or next, with the following previews:

On Time

Na Poludnie/Viaje Al Sur

Tiho I Lako

Jazzcore In The Rock Opera

Step Into Another Reality

Indian Salon

Kimi No Oto

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posted by SKL @ 1:57 PM  
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