Interview: Korallreven
It's that time of year when we all begin clinging to "summer music," rejecting the changing of the seasons with a breezy pop tune. When viewed in that light, Korallreven self-titled debut is just about perfect -- an album packed with summer breezes, with just a hint of the wistfulness of autumn.
For Marcus Joons the act of making music begin with as a bid to recapture the ephemeral feeling of a vacation in the South Pacific. Enlisting The Radio Dept.'s Daniel Tjäder (who became an equal collaborator), Joons infused tropical percussion and wind instruments with synths, guitars and a pervasive sense of melancholy. The result, as Joons describes it, is an album that takes the listener, "from the highest high to the lowest low." It's a Trap! caught up with the Stockholm-based musician to talk seasons, Swedish translations, and Taken By Trees.
How did your project come to be named Korallreven? I assume there aren't many coral reefs in Sweden.
There's actually some coral reefs on the Swedish west coast, for real. They will, as everywhere else in the world I'm afraid, die pretty soon. Anyway, I named it Korallreven because it's easily one of the most beautiful words in the Swedish language. Also because it's pretty close to the Samoan word for spirituality.
As you seem to know, Korallreven all started in my mind when I was in Samoa three years ago. And though I wanted us, Korallreven, to make pop songs that were spiritual like the local Samoan Catholic church choirs, hypnotic like the breathtaking tropical nature and above all a feeling of finally reaching the other side, it felt kinda natural to call it like this. I know that it might be hard to learn to pronounce for you outside of Scandinavia, but since you all learned how to say smorgasbord I guess that you at least could give it a try, right?
It seems like you knew Daniel Tjäder (who is also a member of The Radio Dept.) for a while before collaborating. At what point did you realize you were musical kindred spirits?
Yeah, we've been close friends since like seven or eight years back or so. I think that I told Daniel about my vision just when I came back from Samoa and we had both moved to the same city, Stockholm. I told Daniel and he understood exactly what I meant and took it even to a higher level than I ever could have dreamt of.
Are you a vivid dreamer -- as suggested by "Keep your eyes shut"? Has dream imagery ever been a part of the songwriting process for you?
Yeah, I guess that I am a vivid dreamer. Or, it's not really dreams that you have when you are asleep but daydreams. I mean, when we recorded the album both of us were yearning, not just for another place, but also another state of mind. We just wanted to go somewhere, you know.
Is there a spiritual element to making music? Do you think music has the power to contain universal or bigger truths?
I believe so, for sure. It cleanses me better than any run, soap, or pill. Even though I feel that it more than anything else helps you to escape and forget about universal big truths.
Other than her appearances on tracks, "Honey mine" and "As young as yesterday" what do you consider to be collaborator Victoria Bergsman's finest musical moment(s)?
I think that "Watch the waves" from her last album "East of Eden" is one of the most beautiful songs that has been recorded here in Sweden. It's so yearning, my favorite feeling when it comes to music.
Have you been back to the South Pacific Island that inspired this album? If so, does it hold the same fascination for you since you've emotionally explored it in your music?
I haven't. It's just sooo far away. It took like 24 hours to go to Australia and then some 8 more to get there. But as I said before, Samoa just opened up my mind. The record is more about this mindset than the island itself. South Pacific countries are often in the top when it comes to lists on "The World's Most Happy People." I can understand why and I just wanted to fill the music with that carefree feeling.
What do you think it is about the Balearic pop sound that makes it appealing to so many Scandinavian bands? I'm hard pressed to think of any U.S. band that's successfully adopted the sub-genre.
I don't have a clue, sorry.
How would you describe the emotional content of your music to someone who was deaf? Is there some kind of visual you would use to help get the idea across?
A fresh but spiked smoothie perhaps? Like a hyper-organic treat meets a hyper-artificial trippy trip; from the highest high to the lowest low and leaves you speechless.
Does any other form of art speak to you the way music does?
No, but movies can definitely take me on some serious rides. I have an extremely good memory when it comes to music but a really lousy one when it comes to movies, and always have a really hard remembering movie titles and actors. The only ones that stick are the ones from the series I watched when I was eleven.
Do you consider yourself to be a nostalgic person? Is there an era of your life you'd like to revisit?
No, I even have a friend who used to remind me of how shamelessly historyless I am. Historyless in the sense that I don't have any respect for the history and that I live here and now. I don't know if it's true, but it might be.
Since you've created the ultimate summer soundtrack, let's pretend the weather is still warm for a moment: what is your favorite summer memory?
As said I'm not that nostalgic, but I truly loved the summers that I had in the small beachside village Varberg on the Swedish west coast. I don't remember so much of what I use to do more than playing football (soccer), catching butterflies, and daydreaming about one day windsurfing like the young cool windsurfers with the most beautiful girls hanging around them in the bay. Everything felt so endless back then. The beach felt like it was as endless as the (as I remember it) endless summer.
Your remix of Britney Spears' "Till the world ends" has gotten a lot of blog attention. Was the project a guilty pleasure, or based on a legitimate appreciate of the song writing? Do you believe in the idea of guilty pleasures?
It was out of deep respect. We liked the song but thought that it could be a little more like how Britney's life seems to have been recently. It seems so chaotic. Maybe she should try to come down with our album, don't you think? Or does she feel better now? Anyhow... we just wanted to show how we would indulge in Britney's voice if we'd ever get a chance to produce a song for her.
Who would win in a fight: Korallreven or The Tough Alliance?
I guess that we would win on walk over since The Alliance does not exist anymore.
Interview by Laura Studarus