In case you don’t know Yule was the winter solstice celebration of the Scandinavian Norse mythology and Germanic pagans of many moons ago. Sometime later Christians stole this festivity called Yule and renamed it Christmas. Whether or not the title of This EP is a reference to the old tradition or Christmas it self I don’t know, but thankfully for my sake this isn’t ten songs of Christmas music.
The first thing I noticed when listening to, ‘Yule’ was that it sounded more similar to his 2004 release, ‘Last Light’ than his more darker 2006 release, ‘Empty City.’ Funny enough as I turned the cardboard sleeve over I noticed that the first nine songs were indeed recorded back during the winter of 2004, while the final song, ‘The Falling Snow’ was created way back in 1998, perhaps during a time when Tor was still finding his style.
If you’re not familiar with his excellent Last Light album let me tell you its some fine dreamy melodic ambient music with occasional vocals and atmosphere like you wouldn’t imagine. These first nine short songs (longest is only 3:33 in length) hanker back to that era while The Falling Snow is quite different. Here Tor’s music is in a much more drony dark style kind of reminding me of a lot of the Norwegian and Swedish ambient artists, and not to forget this track runs for over twenty minutes.
As usual with his music there is nothing to complain about and since this EP is limited to only 333 hand numbered copies it’s well advised you scoop one up now before the falling snow buries them forever.
Oh, and not only does Tor create beautiful music, he also creates absolutely breathtaking paintings. His works are always multicolored, mystifying and feature peculiar characters in dreamlike landscapes. Really something to behold. You can check his online gallery here.
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