STADSVANDRINGAR [AKA: DUNGEN 2]

Another Dungen album that dives deep way back into the 60's, playing a credible psych rock if it wasn't for the fact that's sung in Swedish. Generally the retro-rock/prog applies for 70's soundscapes, but Dungen manages it for the 60's, but by doing so, they have to imitate a rather skimpy 60's sound that with today's technology and support, it sounds a bit awkward.

Based on 11 short songs, and starting on the title track with its Rickenbacker-jangle sound, the album offers a series of short hummable (at least for the Swedes) summer ditties with plenty of joy to live (unlike the many doomy melancholic more prog Swedish groups. So most of the tunes (I think using the word for these tracks is correct in this case) are happy-go-lucky tightly-written songs that do not allow much fantasy. The exceptions immediately leading to your attention being drawn to it, like the second part Solen Stigger Upp, both parts adding up only to 4 minutes or the more complex Fest. An almost-jig track Sot Och Regn is a folky instrumental that is easily the album's highlight, again mostly because the impeccable musicianship of the group, which makes all the more infuriating why they don't explore in that instrumental direction.

The only real puzzle is Reine Fisk's presence in this group, as we'd expect him in more melancholic Paatos or Landberk. Indeed his immediately re cognizable guitar sounds, doesn't seem to have the space to move out of the allotted place it was given. Some more Floyd-esque track, like the closing Krona give a bit more depth to an album that could qualify easily as progressive retro pop, if it wasn't for that little extra that transform pop into rock. Nothing worth writing home about, this gentle retro prog pop should please most who don't necessarily await full prog clichés.