Riot on an Empty Street

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   ノルウェーはベルゲン出身のアコースティック・デュオによる3枚目のアルバム。北欧ならではの切ないメロディとサイモン＆ガーファンクルばりのヴォーカル・ハーモニーは古き良きポップ・ミュージックを思わせるが、随所でエレクトロニクスを取り入れるなど、モダンな味付けもありだ。ときおり入る無機質なビートが彼らの優しく温かみのある歌声をよりくっきりと浮き彫りにしていて、疲れた心を癒してくれる。シングル「ミスレッド」もα波とマイナスイオンを発散する、とっておきのアコースティック・ポップ・ソングだ。時代も国境も超えて聴き継がれそうな、珠玉のメロディに溜息が出る。（山崎智之）

Album Description

Their second album, 'Riot On An Empty Street' picks up where 'Quiet Is The New Loud' left off. Recorded over the last six months in Bergen, with periodic visits from ex-patriot Erlend - Riot contains more complex arrangements tWith You', 'Know How,' 'Love Is No Big Truth' or first single 'Misread', every track sounds like an old friend coming home to you.

"It's quite style schizophrenic," adds Eirik "We're each inspired by different things so it can be a little confusing, but that seems to be a modern phenomenon, people don't know what genre to put themselves in."

"I'm looking forward to everyone saying it's not as good as the first album," laughs Erlend, "It's funny because two of the songs are from 1998, so it's us, covering us from five years ago," he adds.

The Kings were joined in the studio by hotly tipped Canadian songstress Feist, who appears on two of the albums twelve tracks, the bossa-fuelled 'Know How' where she assists Eirik, and the album's closing track 'The Build Up'- where she duets with Erlend in what is one of the Kings' most stark and beautifully emotive tracks, a rare moment captured in time. Both were big fans of her much-fabled "Red Demos" and she melds perfectly amidst them, bringing an air of added suspense and emotion and of course her majestic voice. "Her voice is amazing", gushes Erlend, "I'm very proud of the 'Build Up', for the first time ever we managed to do something spontaneous, Feist wrote the words an hour before she sung them, and it doesn't sound like anything else we've ever done."

So there you have it. Kings Of Convenience - 2004. A therapist and a superstar singing DJ, an odd couple, but still the best (old) new acoustic band in the world. 'Riot On An Empty Street,' forms their very own republic of two, principality of Eirik and Erlend. A great place to visit again and again.