I think I’ve said previously that if I wasn’t writing about Nordic stuff, I’d probably run a website exclusively aimed at post rock influenced music. But then again I also claim that I was part of the winning team in the 2003 World Crop Circle Championships, and that I run a business selling 2nd hand jetpacks, and given that only one of those is true maybe I’m not always to be believed.
There’s no doubt however that I get pretty excited when anything close to that musical genre gets sent my way, and Swedish band Covered In Snow definitely fit the bill, not just by having a name that sounds like a post rock band, but having the most post rock sounding opening to a song I think I’ve ever heard – just listen to the 1st 5 guitar chords and you’ll understand what I mean.
But here’s the catch, Covered In Snow are not really a ‘pure’ post rock band at all, they’re actually a dream /synth pop duo based around Stockholm based Tom Hedlund and Mikael Engström, and they’ve had a few releases including an EP in 2019 entitled ‘Collateral Damage’.
Ahead of a new EP that’s planned for 2021 they’ve released this one off single ‘Romeo’ influenced by a variety of alternative rock bands I suspect, and the words explaining the song are rather nice. “Almost everyone gets badly affected by the pandemic. Perhaps the most affected are the ones who were in really a bad place even before it broke out. When you’re stuck behind great walls they're getting even bigger when you get cut off from the small connections you have.”
It’s certainly true, and puts my trivial problems dealing with internet issues whilst working from home into perspective.
The song itself is quite striking, with melancholy vocals and atmospheric guitars and electronica, and those vocals build with powerful, emotive phrasing. It doesn’t crescendo or climax quite like a classic post rock song, and it probably needs to be 15 minutes longer and send half of you to sleep to be truly in that category, but yeah I like it.