Hurdy-Gurdy are Stefan Brisland-Ferner (of Garmarna) and Totte Mattson (of Hedningarna), both masters of the Swedish hurdy-gurdy. The h-g has been called “the medieval synthesizer,” and you’ll believe it when you hear the range of sounds these two get from their instruments. All the sounds on this CD come from the h-g, though there’s some processing, sampling, and other bits of Mac-induced programming involved – but the original sources are all h-g. It’s dramatic, different, sometimes scary, so creative and hard to describe. All instrumentals. Play it all, trust me, I know…

*1. Dark, driving, seriously cool.
2. Nicely relaxed midtempo groove w/a hypnotic quality.
*3. Upbeat, crackly w/an almost Celtic sound.
4. Mostly midtempo w/great whining bits.
*5. A background drone, a dark midtempo strum, a high whine. Yow!
6. Brightly folksy dance that picks up into a lively whirl.
7. A nya-nya sound into a busy modern-medieval dance.
8. Spare & dramatic, like a French movie soundtrack.
*9. Fast & happy toe-tapping polka-morph. Yee-haw!
10. Upbeat but coolly dark dance groove.
11. Mid/uptempo, gets really busy and strident.
12. Plinky drone into an odd, halting midtempo dance.