PASI KOIVU

Pasi Koivu is a trained musician from Jyväskylä, central Finland, recently remembered from multi-national group CORVUS STONE. The three albums under his name are completely one-man efforts, this one being the first of them. When sending me the CD's he felt a little ashamed of these experimentations and thought that he has matured a lot as a musician from those times.

'Madman's Dream' has a jazzy vibe which is in a rather rude contrast with the angular and rough-edged synthetic sound. A jazz group would make a nice performance from that composition, but this frankly isn't very pleasing to ears. 'Ghost Forest' is rockier, and again the noisy soundscape is its weakness. "Pasi uses KORG M50 keyboard", we are informed. I'm generally not very good at telling the programmed sounds from real instruments, but here the overall sound is often bad, in whatever way it is produced. If a band-like sound is attempted, it would be a good idea to use real musicians playing real instruments instead of phoney programmed sounds. 'Sombrero' is a crafty little composition and the more delicate moments with the keyboard playing solo are all right, but a certain sense of half- baked sound is present.

The sound is the problem almost throughout the album, being extremely far from polished Electronic Music professionalism. (I deeply enjoy that genre and I am a bit disappointed that this album seems to pretend being something that it isn't. As a many-sided and surpriseful composer Pasi shows unquestionable potential here, but the way those compositions are represented is immature. Therefore this music leaves me cold emotionally. I could name another Finnish keyboard-centred one-man project whose music works a whole lot better. I'm speaking of OZONE PLAYER, ie. Otso Pakarinen (a worthy addition to PA perhaps?).

'Also Starring' has a nice jazz groove, and joyful 'Space Party' is indeed aptly titled. Brief 'Jester Doll' is the calmest and prettiest tune. The pointlessly long (67 min 39 sec) album could have been improved also by some further choosing and editing of material (actually I said the same about Corvus Stone), but much more by using more musicians. Hopefully the two later albums sound a bit better.

The third album from Pasi Koivu has put my understanding of music and the speakers on my stereo rack on a trial. I first thought they were broken, but I was wrong.

Pasi Koivu has created something pretty unique here. The music is like triple glazing windows. Different layers of music put on the top of each others in other words. Which is great when they work. But these layers feels uneven and clumsy in my ears. I am all up for avant-garde and challenging music, zeuhl being my latest craze. But it has to have some meaning and quality to it. This album feels like one experiement too far. Or maybe it is a halfway house and the experiement will blossom into something great next time around when the finished product is being unleashed. I do not know. Lucid Dreams does nothing for me.

2 stars

Pasi Koivu is a Finnish guy who has worked behind the scenes (most notably with Black Widow) for a time in addition to working with his own music too. See interview for more info.

I have not heard his debut album so this album is my first exposure to his music. I am by default fairly sceptical towards one man projects due to their one dimensional music. No band, no processes where ideas can be developed between human beings. The likes of dynamics that creates excellent music in my view. And yes, Mind Converter is suffering from this lack of dynamics too. It is full of very good ideas which may have been developed by throwing them to other human beings and then see what bounces back. But computer and keyboards generated music is not bad at all. There are some great melody lines here in interaction with some not so good stuff. The music is both hard as in hardcore house and melodic as in ambient house. This makes it a good album in my view. I prefer my music organic though. But this album is worth trying out.

3 stars

Stylistically hard to pigeonhole, multi-layered, comprising symphonic, psychedelic, ambient, jazzy elements, often presented with avantgarde approach, uncommon, frequently coupled with a dissonant or hallucinogenic touch on top of it. Sometimes it even sounds rather innocent ... but with intent ... nothing is thrown in by chance, this needed hours of compositional attempt I am sure. With other words - definitely worthwhile to explore if you're open-minded enough to be interested in synthesizer generated stuff. To bring some notably weird exemplars to the fore first - Confession is carrying basics which definitely could suit for a funeral, Moonmadness lives up to its name exactly, where on Mushroom Dance Pasi sends you on a dizzying trip featuring some oriental sentiment.

With the wonderful The world is so cold and Drops in the ocean we can deeply plunge into nordic melancholy ... cinematic, ambient - a pleasant contrast to the avant tinged first songs which I don't like so much. The album's highlight is saved for the finale - the extended epic, where Heavy Butterflies are fluttering around all over (you should close your eyes when listening to let nature take its course). This is an extremely gripping one, entertaining due to sense of dramaturgy and suspense.

'Lucid Dreams' is a very unique album, probably Pasi's most ambitious. Fellow countryman Eetu Pellonpää has created the nice psychedelic artwork. While checking up my huge music depot only Trip Lava (Joel Lee) comes into my mind when searching for something comparable music wise - just in a wider sense. To sum it up, Pasi Koivu offers an interesting mix of soundscapes with many variants here, which definitely needs time to get involved with.

Anyway, what a magnificent kaleidoscopic space in Pasi's flexible brain is. This psychedelia might be drawn and created just as Pasi's eyes, nose, ears, skin, and undefined sensory nerves could feel, and just as Pasi's mouth, vocal codes, hands, feet, and unexplainable sound launchers could shoot, I imagine.

Guess he has got much influenced by various music scenes and artistic incarnations - especially Oriental culture (by the way, people in the North Europe may be familiar with Oriental cultural effects - feel synchronicity between them and us, at least for me). Very trenchant ethnic sandstorm blows our brain away in the sixth track "Drops In The Ocean", even with very soft and smooth percussive rhythms and beautiful synthesizer cosmic moments. On the contrary, we can touch a risky, eccentric colour in some cold, chilling sound spreaders like "Mushroom Dance".

Pasi's play and sound structure cannot be felt exquisite but very rough and straightforward - may not be perfect as for his playing skill, but who cares? He visually and musically exerts his state of mind, with some confusions and unexpected incidents. The first track "Infant Galaxy" has a tremendous groove, just like his non-concrete pleasure under the sky, glittering space (I consider he could show obviously this atmosphere with such a fuzzy, rough technique). And listen, the title track has a hearty star crystallized by his electric piano solo and floating synthesizer flowers upon the backyard - lovely one indeed.

The last one "Heavy Butterflies" can be mentioned as Pasi's psychedelia itself methinks. Under uncontrollable synthesizer noises with definite rampancy, his heavy keyboard flapping of butterfly wings goes ahead against such an adverse circumstances. The 20 minute tune is a bit tough for me, but simultaneously can let me know what and how Pasi considers and plays forward. Yes, with this longest stuff we can analyze Pasi KOIVU Psychedelic Eye and the unexplainable dreamy world. Apparent difficulty we can feel, use our brain power for, and finally grab something - upon his long road to psychedelia.

Lastly, please let me say that another psychedelia artwork upon this sleeve was created by Eetu my friend. I can see psychedelic upliftment, upregulation among their collaboration.