Pitchfork Jens

My love affair with Jens Lekman continues (not literally) with the release of his new EP on Tuesday. I was gonna write a review, but Brian Howe at Pitchfork did such a good job, I figured I'd just link his review. For all its faults, the site packs a cadre of damn good writers. Choice quote:

The modern lingua franca is an abstract slipstream of memories, slogans, admonitions, and impressions, as if emotional states were free-floating entities, unmoored from specific experiences. This mode is ideal for self-projection and introspection, both valuable quantities. But Lekman's music makes me think more about other people than myself. For all of their polished mannerisms, his songs are uncommonly free of pretenses-- they're about people, places, and things that happened or could happen in the world; about how we spend our time and how we talk to each other. Against a backdrop of enigmatic universalism, musicians who undertake the ticklish business of pinning down the minutiae of human affairs are very dear.

Well said. Well said.

Watch Lekman playing a song about Kirsten Dunst.

New Jens Lekman: An Argument with Myself



The man of eternal whimsy, Jens Lekman, is releasing a new EP on September 21 and a new LP sometime later in the year. I fully recommend everything he's done to every one I know. Despite wit, intelligence and a seeming awareness about the shitty state of the world, Jens's music is somehow instilled with an eternal sweetness and optimism. Over the past few years, he's strayed from his indie-pop beginnings sound into amazing sound kaleidescopes that take the whistful yearnings of young love and adventure and deftly move them into the realm where Daft Punk meets Otis Redding.

You'll find the title track of the EP, An Argument with Myself, here.

The photo is by Erlend Öye, taken from Jens Lekman's Smalltalk blog.