Photo by Takayuki Okada
Over the past few years, Elias Bender Rønnenfelt has led an insurgency out of Copenhagen, Denmark. His critically-acclaimed band Iceage has released three albums in as many years, and for some, they’re the saviors of punk; for others, they’re exploding the very definition of the genre.
Amidst this hyper-scrutiny, Rønnenfelt stepped aside last year and returned to his onetime solo moniker Marching Church. Now a full band, the group released an album that spelled out its intentions in big letters: Telling It Like It Is. Marching Church lives up to that title not with sloganeering–as a singer, Rønnenfelt swallows his words with a Nick Cave/Iggy Pop snarl–but with tense, livewire energy. Fittingly, “Heart Of Life” swipes the bouncy “Lust For Life” beat but builds a ghostly cathedral on top of it, full of silence more than fireworks. The tension comes about from two opposite-but-equal musical actions: subtlety and heart-on-sleeve bloodletting.
“Heart Of Life” appears on Telling It Like It Is, out now. Marching Church plays the Mohawk on Tuesday, January 24.
–Art Levy // host, Sunday 10 a.m. – 2 p.m., producer, My KUTX
