Album Details

• Artist: Rhythm Kingz Of Bushel Finland
• Album: Rhythm Kingz Of Bushel Finland
• Label: Majmua Music
• Year of Release: 2008
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: patchen on 2008-08-16

Using an off-kilter sense of the blues as a base, Rhythm Kingz of Bushel Finland take the listener down a warped path. Alternating electric and acoustic guitars drive songs that are steps away from falling apart, or succumbing to their own lack of focus. But on this self-titled debut, the trio lead by Keijo Virtanen (previously a solo act) manages to keep ts worst impulses at bay.

"Rattlesnake Pan Soup" and "Swamp Thing" use blues riffs to help them teeter off into something a bitmore experimental, ideas that become more (un)focused on tracks like the skronky "Threatening Moods." While the band builds off the same delta-pysch of a lot of freak folk, they avoid the preciousness and pretentions of those acts by their sheer wierdness. Often, they are not so much trying to achieve wiedrness as truly winging it. That faith in being able to pull something out of nothing is what makes art art.

The trio format provides just enough of a structure to reign in a complete collapse; Hanu Pelkonen and Jarmo Saarti help Keijo remember the framework they need to fall back on. "Cahd Chap Hoo" and Panty Hose Roll" inparticular need even that loose connection to the blues to survive. This self-titled release shows The Rhythm Kingz of Bushel Finland to be a band willing to fall apart in front of you, and convince you that that is the only way to be.

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