Heads or Tails
Listening Post 389. Uusikuu’s sixth album has a pastoral title, but the group’s picnic basket has a false bottom, out of which emerges a cornucopia of song and delight. Led by Finnish singer-composers Laura Ryhänen and Mikko Kuisma, the ensemble also includes three German musicians and identifies its universe as “Vintage Sounds of Finland”—an apt description that nevertheless reveals surprises. The bedrock of their style is Finnish tango, which ruled the Nordic nation’s airwaves and stages from the 1930s to the 1960s, and for their newest release they extend their repertoire into the 1980s. On Piknik they entangle tango with myriad strands, including country, rockabilly, bossa nova, swing, jazz manouche and boogie-woogie, not to mention native Finnish styles like humppa and jenkka. The album’s 12 tracks, including four freshly minted songs in the time-honored genres, are layered with love and despair, exuberance and drama, the subtle and the surreal—and the odd homicide. Perhaps the collection’s most traditional tango is Iltaan syttyvät lamput (The Evening Lamps Light Up, see videos), penned by Unto Mononen, one of Finland’s greatest—and most tragic—composers. The pace is quicker and the plot murkier in Mata Hari’s Eyes, about an enigmatic young woman who sways alone to a song recalling the exotic dancer, courtesan and accused World War I spy. Transplanted songs include Sä kaunehin oot (Bei Mir Bistu Sheyn), revisiting the 1937 close-harmony recording that turbocharged the Andrews Sisters’ career and unleashed a global host of adaptations; and Kotiviini (Summer Wine), a seductive-cryptic tale best known from the 1967 duet by Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra. And in an unlikely pairing, homegrown sinners rationalize their crimes to a Brazilian beat in Pimeyden työt (Night Shadows). Uusikuu takes lots of chances, but there’s never a misstep: Piknik has the vision to turn heads and the energy to shake tails. (Nordic Notes)

Uusikuu*: Piknik
Laura Ryhänen: Vocals
Mikko Kuisma: Violin, vocals
Norbert Bremes: Accordion, backing vocals
James Geier: Guitars, backing vocals
Florian Dohrmann: Double bass, bass guitar, backing vocals

Guest artist
Milana Misic: Vocals

*Uusikuu is Finnish for “New Moon”

Iltaan syttyvät lamput / The Evening Lamps Light Up
Lyrics & music: Unto Mononen
From the album booklet: “Iltaan syttyvät lamput is a lesser-known tango by the man who was arguably the best-known tango composer in Finnish history. Though the song is innocent, the life of the man behind it was fraught. Mononen struggled with alcoholism and died at age 37 from a self-imposed gunshot… Originally recorded in 1961, the song has appeared in a couple of compilations since but, as far as we know, there have been no more recent recordings. For us, this tango always felt quite special and we wanted to give it a new lease on life. It’s a rather innocent song but full of positive energy—a rarity in Finnish tango.”

(From the Finnish lyrics)
The evening darkness falls
and from behind the windowpane
the blue twilight creeps into the room
and drapes itself in its cloak.
A busy day is gone
lingering among the memories
It can never come back

Again the lamps light up
creating a flicker of light
lighting up in the twilight
The evening calls with a thousand joys
come throw away your worries
You were made for life

And as in the veins
a feverish glow is kindled again
so after a long day
it’s love’s turn
The evening with its brilliant lamps
watches as the world pulsates
so much it has to see

Mata Hari’s Eyes
Lyrics & music: Laura Ryhänen
From the album booklet: “One mystique inspires another in this song. As a child, Laura Ryhänen was fascinated by the figure of Mata Hari, the exotic dancer, courtesan and accused spy who was executed during World War I. Visiting The Hague a few years ago, the composer passed by Mata Hari’s house and started playing a song in her head about an unhappy girl working in a red-light district who was drawn to a song about the touted femme fatale; she spends all her time in a nightclub dancing alone to a song about Mata Hari’s eyes… and then she disappears.”

She was a girl who walked alone
Every night she partied til dawn
She shut her dark heart for a moment
The twilight of the bar took her to a new world

No work, no night, no fear, no debt while she’s dancing
Only courage, exuberance, strength, freedom while she’s dancing

And they played “Mata Hari’s Eyes”
A distant, mysterious song
Ad they played “Mata Hari’s Eyes”
(play, play, play, play, play, play)
It’s playing there

Too fast, time flies
The hands are already shouting, “Two o’clock”
The girl must go back to her everyday life
But her heart becomes defiant

She doesn’t want dirty, quick money so bad
While she’s dancing
There’s only courage, exuberance, strength, freedom
While she’s dancing

And they played “Mata Hari’s Eyes”
A distant, mysterious song
And they played “Mata Hari’s Eyes”
(Play, play, play, play, play, play)
It’s playing

After that night, no one saw the girl
At her work in the suburbs
Did the rapture bring ruin?
What might have happened to her while dancing?
Was it lost happiness?
I guess I’ll never know

And they played “Mata Hari’s Eyes”
A distant, mysterious song
And they played Mata Hari’s Eyes
(Play, play, play, play, play, play)
It’s playing

Kotiviini / Summer Wine
Finnish lyrics: Jukka Alihanka / Music: Lee Hazlewood
The American country singer and songwriter Lee Hazelwood wrote Summer Wine in 1966 and initially recorded it with Suzi Jane Hokum. But it was his duet with Nancy Sinatra that gained widespread acclaim and eventually spawned adaptations and covers around the world. The first version in Finnish (performed by Anna Hanski and Pekka Kaasalainen) was a runaway hit in 1990. Uusikuu’s adaptation makes one plot switch—the man rather than the woman makes the seductive wine.

Pimeyden työt / Night Shadows
Lyrics: Heikki Herttuainen / Music: Florian Dohrmann
In this Uusikuu original, bassist Florian Dohrmann wrote the music first, with the understanding that the song would be about someone walking innocently in the night, while most people are asleep. It took a while for Heikki Herttuainen to develop a clear idea for the lyrics; when he did the night became darker, but not so dark that it could erase the sins it witnesses.

The darkness of the night falls on my face
I can’t see the opposite shore
As I walk the streets of this dreary city
The shadows cover the evil
with their wings in the twilight
No one brings his neighbour to judgment

The strange man next door
walks with a sweaty forehead
and sows marks out of his coat pockets
After the bank robbery
he has been silent
and retires to his home, probably repenting

The night wraps us in its dark embrace
and makes us forget all our misdeeds and petty sins
But one does not realize
that darkness alone cannot make guilt fade away

Nuutinen, the pharmacist, too
begins his night duty
takes a little sip from his bottle of rectified spirit
To escape the evil world
he rides with the bottle
in the dark no one else can see it

Night wraps us in its dark embrace
and makes us forget all our misdeeds and petty sins
But one does not realize
that darkness alone cannot push the guilt away