"Slowgold resurrects guitar from the dead"

We heard her on Freddie Wadling's last record and last year she brought home a Grammis in the category show / singer-songwriter of the year. Beyond that: six full-lengths inside the vest. Amanda Werne aka Slowgold is one of the country's most prolific artists who has long been in the middle tier, completely unmoved by trends and such what it seems.

Visor is not something you devote to pleasing the cool kids. Neither do guitars. Both rock and guitar-based pop have been the most outdated imaginable - at least for the last ten years. But on Slowgold's break-up album Aska, she manages to end her old sound while at the same time resurrecting the guitar from the dead.

Because even though Slowgold has taken a darker turn , it also sounds like she had fun and been eager to experiment when she recorded. Everything starts with a moody almost Gregorian brass song - then carries it off with a good mix of show, rock and post rock - it's jammy, it's harmonica, whistling and of course: guitar.

Amanda Werne is a skilled guitarist, and she reminds one of what you liked about the instrument from the beginning: that it can sound hard and soft and smart and sexy at the same time. With the guitar riff on One Day, she even manages to make a slower, bolder homage to Bryan Adams 'somewhat sloppy old' 80s hit Run to You - and make it sound good.

Like other young, Swedish, female artists last year such as Sarah Klang or Alice Boman, Slowgold has made a rather sore album about leaving and leaving. As a copywriter, Amanda Werne is unfortunately not as sharp as her aforementioned colleagues. There are a lot of empty and slightly poetic lines of schooling like "I know you want to hate me, but you can't". Too bad when she managed so well musically.

For together with old Brother Daniel producer Mattias Glavå, she has got a bigger, noisier and more reverb sound - it sounds cooler, darker, stormier, rockier, more fun, and one can only hope she continues to release music at the same rate. With a little more love for the lyrics it can be as good as any.