?HRN, JOSEFIN + THE LIBERATION - Mirage (CD)

Taking their moniker from the notion of 'Liberation Upon Hearing In The Between' from the Tibetan Book Of The Dead, JOSEFIN ?HRN + THE LIBERATION took little time to make their mark on the wider world, brandishing a radiant sound that stands effortlessly apart from the increasingly staid and often paradoxically predictable world of modern psychedelia. Having already been nominated for a Swedish Grammy with their debut EP, "Diamond Waves", their full-length 2015 debut on Rocket Recordings, "Horse Dance" marked out a territory in which beguiling repetition could sashay with sweet pop suss, melodic flourishes with experimental intensity, and it was summarily rapturously received on arrival and earning them appearances at Roskilde Festival and Eindhoven Psych Lab. Yet clearly this was only the beginning of a journey of discovery, and few would have guessed how the band's sound would quickly evolve into still more enchanting and enlightening strains. Their second effort "Mirage", which follows a mere year after its predecessor, sees the band sculpting sprawling, hypnotic jams into elegant nocturnal serenades. True to form, "Mirage" sees the band taking a chic tradition of avant-pop that extends all the way from Serge Gainsbourg and Fran?oise Hardy to Broadcast and Saint Etienne, and warping it mercilessly to their own darker ends. Whilst the brooding yet sultry "Sister Green Eyes" is no less than a sharp slice of velveteen motorik-pop and "Looking For You" reinvents three-chord garage-rock attack with mighty finesse, The Liberation are just as comfortable dealing out the heavy-lidded and electronically-driven "In Madrid' or the dive in the hallucinatory deep end of "Circular Motion', on which they're aided and abetted by Lay Llamas' Nicola Guinta. The seductive splendour of these ten songs manifest a parallel world of disorientation and deliverance in which one would be a fool not to want to languish adrift.