by.Larm 2013

Between acoustic melancholia and the straight up rock that rules the roost in Stavanger there is a band who have taken it upon themselves to continue the city’s proud pop traditions. Arlie Mucks have, unlike their peers, cast an eye across The North Sea to Britain for musical inspiration. Reference points include the like of Radiohead, Oasis, The Smiths and Arctic Monkeys with a melodic mix of 90s brit-pop and noughties indie being the result.
When they first began to play locally in 2009 the local music scene embraced them with open arms – finally a proper pop band from Stavanger they extolled.
With a number of sold out local shows under their belts the band moved up the coast to Bergen in 2011 where the band became heavily involved in the local music scene and where their on stage prowess did not go un noticed. The major regional daily, BT, noted after one particular show “Arlie Mucks, originally from Stavanger but now luckily settled in Bergen… intricate and melodic indie rock played by boys with long fringes and short guitar straps, a band we are very much looking forward to hearing more from.”

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/13022

VERDENSROMMET started in 2011 as a songwriting project of two school friends Andreas Høvset and Vetle Vik Gundersen, who were both entering their final year at high school in Telemark. After recording a demo, they decided to give it to Matias Tellez at his band, Young Dreams’ gig in Oslo that summer. He liked it, and invited Andreas and Vetle to Bergen to record the songs in his studio.
It was love at first sight when the 19-years-olds arrived in the west coast of Norway. Finishing high school normally means moving out to make it in the world, and it was no different for Verdensrommet. Bergen had to become the home base for them. The relationship with the music scene in the city and newly established Skogen Studios with Matias Tellez producing, 600 kilometers away from the established music business in Oslo, meant a lot to them.
The potential of the songs blossomed into a beautiful double-punch of space pop with Norwegian lyrics and they were joined by some of their best friends to make a complete band: Verdensrommet is now a five-piece band ready with an EP that is a serious letter of intent. Songs like “Sidelengs” and “Nytt” depart into a dream world where texture and timbre is as important as their trademark catchy hooks.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/11091

Hello. I am Noonie Bao.
It took me five years to complete my debut album, “i am noonie bao”. Why did it take so long, you may ask? I think I know why. Music needs time to grow, and I needed to experience a lot more in my life to enable me to get to this point.
My day job was to write songs for others. EMI Publishing signed me as a song writer in my late teens. Writing about myself in the way I’ve done on “i am noonie bao” was a very frightening process for me. Sitting by myself with these songs – I had not thought about other people listening to them. This was only something I became aware of gradually. Like for instance when I met Niek from the Belgian band Das Pop and he told me he wanted to release one of my songs. This lead to the single receiving top rotation on National radio in Belgium and some live shows around Europe, including one at David Lynch’s club Silencio in Paris. This was only last year and it didn’t take very long for Swedish National radio, blogs and major festivals to start picking up on my songs. Suddenly, I was being listened to by more people than just those I knew.
Who is Noonie Bao? – How do you answer a question like that?
In many ways, music is all I know. When I was really young I went on a lot of dates. Not my own, but my friends dates! Because all my friends thought I sang so sweet, they would bring me along with them to the woods, where they would make out with boys and I would became their soundtrack. This is where my interest in singing began.
“i am noonie bao” is therefore, in many ways, my own personal soundtrack over the last several years of my life. A soundtrack that I hope will touch you in a similar way to how the experiences I’m singing about have affected me.
Regards,
Noonie Bao
I AM NOONIE BAO will be released on Hybris on the 31st of October 2012.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/12147

On the back of single releases "Garbo, Astrid & Taube " and ”Diamant”, Lorentz & Sakarias played their first shows in over two years this past Autumn. On November 9 they released their long awaited new album which is the follow up to the critically acclaimed, gold-selling “Vi mot världen” which came out in 2009. The first single “Garbo, Astrid & Taube” featured a guest appearance from Duvcho and was produced by Vito Grosso alongside Lorentz & Sakarias themselves and was subsequently A-listed on P3.
Lorentz & Sakarias officially started life as a band in 2007, but in reality they had been working on lyrics together since the tail end of the 90s. Starting out with mixtapes the band quickly picked up fans with their debut “Vi mot världen” coming in 2009. The record was an unqualified success and featured guest appearances from the likes of Marit Bergman, Parken, Newkid. The record hailed in some quarters as the future of Swedish music; “This is fresh. Everyone loves it.” said Vice magazine of the release. The album went gold with the two singles eventually going on to sell double platinum. The band toured the record heavily including dates at most of the major festivals including Arvikafestivalen, Hultsfredsfestivalen, Putte i Parken, Storsjöyran and Piteå Dansar & Ler. The band have been nominated for several Sweish Grammys P3 gold and one Rockbjörn gong as well as numerous other awards.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/13275

In 2007 guitarist Alex Meek and pianist Benjamin Giørtz started playing together in their spare time. This turned out to be the foundation of a long lasting collaboration. Whilst experimenting with both multiple different musical genres and different band-members, they settled upon the pop/rock-sound they have today. The first two people to join the duo were vocalist Elizabeth Wu and bassist Håkon Carlin, although playing guitar at the time, through a school project. In August 2010 the temporary quartet with no name met up with drummer Jakob Bechmann and guitarist Even Steine forming the band “Made in China”. After much debate following the fact that there already existed a band under the same name, the name was changed to Kid Astray.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/13040

From the woods surrounding Råde and Moss come five punks who give it 100% every time. The boys have played together for many years, but with Bits Between they’ve made the step up to the premier league. After a year of solid rehearsing and recording, their debut album “Chosen Death” is now ready. Everything is now primed to launch themselves into the wider world.
The band reference the American hardcore scene, old-school so-cal punk and 80s thrash, creating a mixture of filthy punk riffs, muscular thrash and melodic hardcore and have already earned high praise indeed from key domestic rock show Pryo on NRK P3 – http://p3.no/pyro/pyro-stereoen-januar-2012/
The songs are powered by catchy riffs and peppered with sing-a-long choruses, Bits Between are first and foremost a live proposition. These are boys who want to play and play and play, as much as possible.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/11669

Solen plays pop music. The music smells of 90s pop music and does not try to cheer anyone up. There’s not much to say about Solen than it’s the sound of indifference. Four 20ish-year old men living in Stockholm, not knowing what they want to do with their lives. The members are all ex-jazzmusicians who got tired of playing jazz and on arty clubs and wanted to do the opposite. Well they didn’t really want anything at all but they had to try something else. And the result is Solen. Fuck it.
They have played at every single club/venue in Stockholm in a two years period. This Summer they held an illegal concert (Solen as the only band) under a bridge in Stockholm and more than 800 people came. I think that says a lot of how popular we are in Stockholm.
They have recorded two albums and one EP in Dubious Studios (Moneybrother, Håkan Hellström, Markus Krunegård, Those Dancing Days, etc). The second album “Ossians sånger” is being mixed as we speak by Max Måns Wikman (Those Dancing Days etc).

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/12770

Helsinki-based Black Twig are about fuzzy guitar-driven pop songs, shoegaze, folk & droning rock songs. Their debut album “Paper Trees” was released early 2012 on Soliti records and has received praise the world over. It was described by the influential NRGM blog as one of the finest indie albums ever and the band was picked by several media outlets as new band of the year. Black Twig will release the follow up to “Paper Trees” in Autumn 2013.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/13259

MF/MB/ is countryside and city streets, it’s woods and concrete, cigarettes and alcohol, hope and despair, clubs and saunas and motorways, MF/MB/ is sex and celibacy and endless studio sessions. It’s rock music that wants to be techno, like techno that wants to be rock music, like anything that wants to be anything else anywhere else and there was nothing wrong with that.
MF/MB/ is self confidence and bad conscience. Lack of money, good looks, mental breakdowns and forgiveness. Never looking back, always doing the same mistakes.
MF/MB/ is guitars, two drumkits, bass, synthesizers, vocals and computers, but most of all it’s Victor Nilsson, Joakim Lindberg, Sebastian Hedberg, Christine Björk, Kristoffer Bäckström and Erik Nilsson, making the best music they know.
Their debut album “Folded” was released in 2010 to high critical acclaim, both in Scandinavia as well as in Germany and North America. Tours followed, with countless gigs all around in Europe. They’ve now recorderd a new album that will be released in February worldwide, the album is called Colossus and its recorderd live in a total analog studio at the countryside.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/12142

“It’s extraordinarily good. A fantastic debut.” – 5/5 Niklas Wahllöf (DN) on Winhill/Losehill’s debut “Swing of Sorrow”.
The songs on their album “Swing Of Sorrow” are paeans to grief, and it’s process. It’s about losing a parent, love and loss and the will to continue to live in the face of heart stopping dispair.
’"What is happening [on stage] is remarkable. Weaknesses turn into strengths, lows into highs and the epic becomes minute. Winhill/Losehill are a complete package, confident, tight and yet there is room for them to take it even further." – 4/5 Po Tidholm (DN) on their Debasser Stockholm show.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/12144

Colleagues, is the kind of music you never want to stop listening to. A sound that is swept up in their seductive voices, their flowing guitars and soaring synths, all in an epic festivalesque maelstrom. They inhabit a world of sound, somewhere between Foster The People and Bon Iver, a land of eternal Summer, populated by spry songs of late nights ahead. In spite of not having released any material officially, music has already spread on blogs and Youtube. The band was formed in the Summer of 2012 and look forward to an exciting Winter with much more to come in the new year.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/13120

Heksed deliver intense metallic hardcore in the same vein as Converge and Trap Them and perhaps not to far from the likes of Gallows or Gehenna are doing: for fans of drum acrobatics and pugnacious guitars.
In the Autumn of 2011 they released their eponymous debut which was followed last year with and EP in November entitled “Plague Embrace” on UK label Thirty Days Of Night, both attracted rather favourable reviews.
Heksed have played shows over the last year in Sweden, Denmark, England, Belgium and at home in Norway alongside bands such as Integrity, Dead Swans, Oathbreaker and Allocation.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/11336

As well as his solo career Fela also makes up one quarter of Oslo band Breaknecks and one half of duo Degos. His debut album “D.U.R.E.” was released on October 12 2012 by Break Records in partnership with EMI Norway.
The first single “WPYTM” (or Who Passed You The Mic) was released in January of last year and found plenty of love at radio not least from NRK’s Lydverket show as well as picking up some healthy stats on Youtube. The follow up “Damn” featuring BadCase also did rather well, not least in part due to its rock crossover sound and hilarious video.
With his backing band – BadCase – Fela makes for a pretty spectacular live proposition, effortlessly switching between serious songs and party tunes that get the room really moving. This is a show that the audience won’t be forgetting any time soon!

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/12213

Haraball are a punk band from the Kongsberg / Lampeland area comprised of mebers from newer bands such as Mirror Lakes and Bungalow Ranchstyle as well as old school hardcore bands Tiebreak and Fairfuck. Haraball have released two four track seven inches on the respected Fysisk Format imprint and have an LP and European tour in the works for 2013. They played two night time shows during Øya last year and have recently supported Turbonegro at Sentrum Scene as well as a show with hardcore heroes Negative Approach at Revolver.
“This 7” is a testament to how wonderful music can be when when young men reach expert level in stupidity and aggression and nail it with 100% precision and taste." – Fysiskformat.no

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/11388

VITHR (or “Viðr” which means “tree” on old-norse) are a black metal band from Bergen who’re from a forgotten time when nature was something that we respected and feared. Musically the band are disciples of the Norwegian black metal school, but have their own take on the genre incorporating a range of elements that give a truly norse aesthetic. On their debut album “Hedensk skikk og tro” the band effortlessly combined old and new ideas, well crafted songs and powerful production to create a record that showcases Norwegian black metal at its absolute best.
Kuldegys founded the band in 2008 and soon recruited members from bands like Krakow, (X) Arvas, Beinkjør and Among gods. Vithr in a short, intense period have put together an immense debut album with the help of Bjørnar Nilsen (Vulture Industries / Blackhole Generator), played Inferno Festival, and opened for the likes of Kampfar and Spellemann nominees Taake.

http://bylarm.no/nor/artists/11446