Various Arists - If we were oceans (Tract)
Tract Records really knows how to put together a pretty good split and by doing it with four artists they really know how to maximize the releases' potential. It begins with two stellar contributed by Kristofer Åström , who gives two solid tracks (on top of the four he'd already realesed this year). I had come to the conclusion long ago that this man should be releasing albums whenever he wants, and this gives him the oppotunity to. Stylistically, Racingpaperplanes is the perfect segue into the rest of the split, with a beautiful acoustic number right after KÅ 's numbers, followed by more fleshed out efforts, but still retaining the soft, somberness. Boy Omega brings all to the table with perhaps the album's most spectacular track in "Fool around" . The composition of this song is absolutely gorgeous with its subdued melody, but by contributing four songs, one feels like maybe it's a little heavy ( "For I cannot breathe" could have been dropped, mainly for continuity purposes). Two Times The Trauma closes out the session with two rather moody electronic-influenced tracks and an acoustic number in the middle, yet the acoustic track makes the most sense on this album and in my eyes is the far superior of the songs.
- Matt Giordano

Smuggle this group to Appalachia, sneak them on after Will Oldham, and no one will suspect they aren't Kentucky-born. Gothenburg, Sweden, is a hotbed for more unlikely musical scenes than you can name, and thanks to Racingpaperplanes, that list now extends to alt-country. Warm acoustic guitars, rootsy lead licks, and husky, intimate vocals put this duo at the head of the movement.

Racingpaperplanes is a Swedish band/solo project from Richard Wilson. The band seems to have gone through many stages, with Wilson always remaining the constant. Their sound reminds me of Jason Molina (Songs:Ohia, Magnolia Electric Company) Neil Young, with a touch of Will Oldham. Acoustic guitar and soft, lonesome lyrics help propel Racingpaperplanes to the forefront of what I am currently listening to. Not only do we have well put together songs, but we also do get some great solo guitar work that furthers the comparrison to Molina and company. Their website is quite extensive on providing the inquisitive viewer an overlook and sampling of the band. They also have a blog which can be found here . The band's current release is Self Sleep Service and can be purchased through Tract Records here .

Sometimes I follow a different strategy in reviewing new cd's. Headphones
on, relaxed listening and after that I find out who or what the artist is.
With RPP I was sure it was an American Band. The hanging bridge at the back
of the booklet reminded me of San Francisco. and this fitted my idea of the
music. Relaxed, but still a bit restless. "Sun Kill Moon" of Mark Kozelek is
not faraway. Still Country, but not traditional. Lofi, but not Will Oldham,
nor Songs Ohia. Surely not Nashville, nor Austin.
Some songs, like Melt to One, have solid guitar solos (like swell used to
have them) and other songs slowslide by. Big was my astonishing when I found
out that the group is from Gothenburg. Gothenburg Sweden, not Nebraska.
Still it stays unsure if the group is completely Swedish. Glen Gilbert is
American, and the name Richard Wilson is to cosmopolitan to be derived to
one country. Tomas Adolfsson (keys) seems to be a real Swedish.
All 11 numbers are written by Gilbert and Wilson, with exception of "She'll
Stay" where Tjeerd van Erve takes the lyrics for his part. And this again
doesn't sound like a swedish. SSS has become a beautiful record for the lovers.
Jan Vollaard wrote in NRC (a liberal dutch paper for intellectuals, I happen
to read, for it comes in the midday and not in themorning, when I have no
time to read the paper) after the record of Jens Lekman: "Love them or hate
them; Scandanivian that make better American Music then the americans
themself." And this could also be the case for RPP.

 

racingpaperplanes "self sleep service" (tract records 2004) Available:
Now. RPP are chums of The Soundtrack of Our Lives, come from
Gothenburg and really do sound a fair bit like Red House Painters;
comparisons with Songs:Ohia and Neil Young are informative but perhaps
over-egging it a little. They can be filed under gentle but restless,
slightly regressive but mellow, difficult but moving, mellow and
poppy. There are genuinely beautiful and attention-grabbing songs on
display here, and talent abounds, unafraid to be shiny and happy or
for that matter, dark and dissonant. MP  6 out of 10

MORNING SCARS CD

Title:Morning Scars
Artist: Racingpaperplanes
Label: Tract-003
PS, US Melancholy Americana orchestrations from Richard Wilson, who hails from Gothenberg Sweden (hint hint). File him under singer/songwriter with a twist, an unlikely cross of David Bowie and Neil Young! Well, it's damn good. And, several songs feature guest appearances from members of (of course) The Soundtrack Of Our Lives: Kalle Gustafsson (bass, production, etc) and Martin Hederos (strings, piano). For fans of the most plaintive Mark Kozelek's RHP, those Oldham Bros, Neil Young, Nicolai Dunger, etc.

by Ivan Carballido (translated by Carlos Diaz)

 

 "Morning Scars" | Tract Records

Richard Wilson has a honorable surname in the confines of the pop universe and a name that says to us little or nothing about its place of origin, that far from being a dry and inhospitable town of the center of the States, is the cold and somewhat closer Sweden.  This accidental European, taken cover after the inspiring name Racingpaperplanes, is one of the three bets, compilations aside, that Tract Records has put to date in the market, and is probably the kindest proposal of the label of Thomas C.  Heath.  The eleven pearls that conform its debut, Morning Scars, are a more luminous reading of the musical and lyrical courses traveled by Mark Kozelek and his Red House Painters, being also very legitimate the parallelisms with contemporary geniuses of the lo-fi emotional strip such as Will Oldham or Jason Molina.  Watering the legacy of these important bands with the classicism of Neil Young, compositions like Evening Stars, The Eye Can Spot a Lie or Red Suede put together the right amount of melodrama, instrumental wealth and lyrical specific weight, so as to be aligned with the finest of new folk, new country and from time to time even new Americana. All in all, a good companion for our private moments of emotional breakdown and for those long walks in which we intend to reformat the foundation of our lives or, to put it in another way, an enormous record with which to sit down for a moment and keep account of how uncompensated is our balance of damages received and damages inflicted.  Curative.

"God Knows I' ve Tried" | Tract Records

Backing his new recording according to more austere parameters -compared to his previous album-, and strengthening even more the regression to the swampy and radical depths of lo-fi thanks to the exclusive cassette format, Richard Wilson offers in this God Knows I've Tried a good portion of new compositions and a series of more than worthy versions of the little Canadian genius Neil Young and of one of its more advanced pupils, Jason Molina of Songs: Ohia.  Giving an absolute prominence to his vocal exercise and to the not excessively complex strum of his guitar, Wilson only adds to these new songs occasional rhythmic arrangements of marked minimalism, giving birth to an easier, more linear work that adds a certain hypnotic flavor to the trademarked emotional depths of his past work.  On the B side Wilson delivers surrenders of Only love can break your heart, Harvest and Like a hurricane by Neil Young, and a moving version of Love leaves its abusers, one of the many jewels included in that wonderful Songs: Ohia record called Axxess & Ace (Secretly Canadian; 1999), all of which add points to the final score of this God Knows I've Tried, a silky and dreamy artifact that has made me friend again of my cassette deck after years of absolute distance

© 2001-2006 Racingpaperplanes/Tract