Slussenanalys
Aquila Helvetos Asfaltos
The most Swedish noise-rock of today comes, surprisingly, from Finland. The vivid images of decadence portrayed in Slussenanalys' lyrics are rich in biblical symbolism and existential pondering. The words are set to music that evokes the hopeless frenzy and uneven hobbling of a hobo with a law-enforcement bullet lodged in his leg. Vocalist/lyricist Esko Lonnberg paints a bleak-yet-poetic picture of a Stockholm with no light and no future, while the band behind him conjures a rocking wall of noise that leans towards the Chicago of the '80s. It is a picture of a city in which an immigrant child with a broken home is predestined to spend his days either on the street or behind bars, his nights filled with the sounds of shattering storefronts and the barking of police dogs, ever closer and closer. The future seems dark for all involved in the stories of Slussenanalys' Aquila Helvetos Asfaltos. Despite all the despair and low expectations for a better tomorrow, the songs manage to find nobility among human wreckage and hope in the dark shadows of the gray concrete cubes that line the streets of an urban maze of alcoholics and addicts. Slussenanalys aims to reverse the seemingly unending downward spiral of life, to rise above the suffocating smog and to bask in the light of pure inspiration.