Review of Gosta Berlings Saga at NEARfest Apocalypse posted 25th June 2012''If UK ended the day with bang, the trigger was primed in the morning by Gösta Berlings Saga. They take their name from an epic Swedish novel, but take their music from King Crimson, Univers Zero and fellow countrymen, Änglagård. But unlike many of their contemporaries, including Änglagård and Aranis, they aren’t afraid to hit a groove and work it, and they’ve got a great drummer to do it in Alexander Skepp, a piston driven rhythm machine.
“354” was a typical pice for the set with an intricate, minimalist keyboard cycle from David Lundberg, sliced by Einar Baldursson’s guitar over a groove of doom from Skepp. The song builds to a ringing, exhausting climax with swirling organ and Jannick Top-style bass from Gabriel Hermansson. Playing a Fender Telecaster, Baldursson had a different tone than most NF guitarists with a appealing surf-twang in his playing. While in the mode of other bands, GBS had a varied sound that employed vibraphone cycles and even a metal-flamenco mode on “Gliese 58Lg.” Änglagård drummer Mattias Olsson, joined them on their last song playing percussion. Gösta Berlings Saga was definitely the WOW! band of NEARfest Apocalypse.
Although most of the band looks like they’re 15 years old,
they were in-sync with the NEARfest zeitgeist. When Skepp introduced one song as being inspired by Dungeons & Dragons’ 20-sided dice, squeals went up from the predominantly male audience. Opening with a 3 song suite of tunes from their latest CD, Glueworks Skepp opined, “When you play three songs together you have a Prog Rock epic.”