Growing Green

Really good lo-fi folk-pop music from Finland. Drowsy is the project of Mauri Haikenen who appears to be obsessed with outsider folkies like Syd Barrett and Skip Spence. Other points of comparison would be (Smog), Will Oldham, and Nick Drake. Most songs are just acoustic guitar, occasional piano, and some odd effects, along with Haikenen's weathered voice. Nice dynamics and lots of good quirky effects. As you'd expect from a band called Drowsy, this is lazy, mellow stuff, and too much of it will put you to sleep, but there's plenty to play on the air here. FCC Clean. Stand-out tracks: 2, 1, 4, 5.

==> 1. draggy, very Howe Gelb vocals
==> 2. pretty piano, whispery vocals, dramatic sweep
3. bouncier folk, very old fashioned ballad
==> 4. very Syd Barrett, chord organ, English ballad feel
==> 5. Skip Spencey, folky, harmonica, becomes noisy
6. mellow folk with piano
7. draggy, spacious
8. displaced noises, reminds me of Sister Lovers, gravelly vocals, spacious
9. repetitive piano and guitar guitar, vulnerable vocals
10. draggy, rough-voiced, very Skip Spence
11. gentle picked acoustic instrumental
12. piano and vocals, downcast
13. long, slow, gains in intensity, ends with over a minute of silence remaining
14. weird, midtempo, finger-snapping, odd echoey vocals, junk percussions