Specifically created for and performed, perhaps for the only time, at the music and arts festival EKKO in Bergen September 26, this new effort from Norwegian folk-rock outfit Real Ones is a great and surprising addition to the band’s output. The latter since it’s, as the title suggests, an instrumental album.

Built on long jam sessions which was later shaped in to song form, but without loosing the pleasingly loose, repetitive feel of a jam, ‘EKKO (instrumental opus 1)’ is unmistakably Real Ones. However, here the 1960s psychedelic pop and (prog-)rock that served more as spice on their latest “regular” album, ‘All For The Neighbourhood’, is predominant, using folk and country as, well, spice.

It’s pretty far from every day that instrumental albums by rock bands hit the shelves – and for a good reason. It is a massive challenge to make it interesting (without distributing recreational drugs with the album, which you can’t in most countries), but it is one more than met by Real Ones on ‘EKKO (instrumental opus 1)’, and I for one wouldn’t mind a second opus from these Norwegians.

Genre: Rock
Who: Real Ones
Album: EKKO (instrumental opus 1)
Label: Warner Music
Year: 2009
Country: Norway
Language: N/A
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Recommended tracks:
Bulken – Ulriksmasten – Floyten – Blomstersaft