Sleepyard - 2022 - Head Values

(45:20; Apollon Records)

Track list:
1. Klinkekule 2:33
2. Peace Voyage 5:10
3. Wild Rain 2:15
4. Dream Solution 6:38
5. Black Butterflies 3:56
6. Falling in Love 5:24
7. Neon City 3:04
8. Theme from Slow Earth 3:59
9. Green Heaven 5:09
10. Rust and Stardust 5:54
11. Holy Day (Reprise) 1:18

Line-up:
Oliver Kersbergen - guitars, keyboards, vocals, bass
Jerry Jones - sitar
Svein Kersbergen - keyboards, piano, vocals
Kjetil Manheim - percussion
Mark Refoy - guitars, percussion
Sandy Dedrick - vocals
Katje Janisch - vocals, flute, cello, stylophone, melodica, clarinet, field recordings, lap har, bowed glock
Gaute Storsve - guitars, bass
Edvard Andreas Feed - guitars
Paul Livingston - guitars
Stefan Persson - keyboards
Jan-Morten Iversen - keyboards
Bo Chung - theremin


Norwegian band Sleepyard have a history that goes back to the late 1990's, and over a period of almost 25 years the band have released half a dozen studio productions. "Head Values" is their sixth studio production, and was released in the spring of 2022 through Norwegian label Apollon Records.

While the PR blurb may well state otherwise, the manner and tradition I feel categorize this album better than any others is ambient music. As the band name well may be an indication of, this isn't material that comes with any dramatic edges to it. Not that it lacks in mood and atmosphere, but the compositions here tend to stay on the more careful side of manners.

For my sake I found some of the opening creations here to be perhaps the most intriguing, with drones and instrument textures combined with sounds that to my ears at least came with associations to Norwegian folk music. Which did add a longing, melancholic quality to these excursions. Be it with cosmic type sounds and effects present or not, as well as with or without the ethereal, beautiful vocals that is a distinct presence on many of the cuts.

Those vocals are applied on the one track that is the hardest left turn on this album too, a song with stronger connections to piano ballads with something of an Americana feel to it. And while this one was a creation of lesser interest for me, this song will also be the one with the broadest potential reach on this album I gather, with qualities that will make it a possible song of interest well beyond the audience primed towards various instances of ambient music.

Following a small handful of creations that didn't strike me as all that special the album picks up on the nerve and tension level again towards the end, with dark drones, an interesting use of drones and electric guitars and finally a slight return to the drone and folk music tinged landscapes again too, with the final three creations here covering extensive and very different types of more or less ambient landscapes.

For me at least "Head Values" strikes me as a well made production within the ambient universe, a production that is expressive within its context and orientation. While the music is often beautiful, haunting or both it is rarely if ever uninteresting and at times both dark and somber. A production that merits a check by those with a fascination for the more expressive aspects of ambient and music.

Olav M. Björnsen, May 2022

Links:
http://www.sleepyard.com/
https://www.apollonrecords.no/