Dungen — 4

While Dungen could easily be called psychedelic revivalists, this Swedish quartet tends to avoid the worst of that genre's long-winded solos and LCD naval gazing musical moments. They instead focus on a more stripped down three-to-four minute pop presentation. Though this may be a step backwards from their seamless classic album Tio Batar, 4 features melodic moments that are far more accessible to psych noobs. Like other Scandinavian bands Motorpsycho and Isolation Years, Dungen effectively synthesize the psychedelic experience by tipping their musical hats to those bands that only dabbled in these sounds during its heyday. "Det Tar Tid" features a subtle bass line that could have found a home on an early Sly And The Family Stone album and "Mina Damer Och Fasaner" has a dub-tinged bass line that expertly trades off with a tight, focused guitar melody. This punch/counterpunch tradeoff leads harmoniously into the next track, the Carlos Santana-inspired guitar-driven "Samtidigt 2." The album runs the gamut of downright psychotic moments to instances of sheer melodic bliss. There's some whacked crazed guitar noodling for those partial to that on the instrumental "Samtidigt 1," which is contrasted by the three piano-driven tracks "Maleras Finest," "Fredag" and "Bandhagen." In fact, as "Maleras Finest" evidences, Dungen are sometimes closer to easy listening soundtrack-to-a-tea-commercial territory than anything brain-frying.

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