After five albums on the Munich-based ECM label, Wallumrød turned to Norway’s leading independent label Hubro in 2016 with Kurzsam and Fulger. Four years later, Many emerges after experimenting with ways to broaden the sonic palette of his band using a combination of acoustic and electronic sounds (everyone in the band gets in on the electronica bit).

One of Norway’s leading experimental groups, CWE has created its own sound world with a kind of post-minimalistic-into-Norwegian-folk-cum-jazzy-avant-garde montage. This latest step in Wallumrød’s odyssey into sound adds ‘old school music concrète interludes and electronic add ons’ to the mix where everyone seems to circle around an idea or musical motif in interchangeable holding patterns. Small sonic ideas are patiently teased them into bigger ideas –’50/80’, ‘El Johnton’ – but as Jonathan Swift once cautioned, something may pass as wondrous deep for no better reason than it is wondrous dark, and by the end of Many I’m not sure which would be which.