The late ‘60s were a time of wondrous and rapid evolution in pop music, with major and underground acts alike risking their commercial viability in the name of art-minded experimentation. But perhaps no one went further out than the Swedes. The “progg” scene that flourished in Sweden’s hippie-era communes and universities was devoted to anti-commercialism, guerrilla performance, leftist politics and live improvisation that made the Grateful Dead look tame in comparison. It was DIY before DIY, punk before punk, and though it’s since become a bit of a joke in Sweden, the rest of the world can only goggle in wonder.
Progg is still little-known in the States. Expect Anthology Recordings’ Träd, Gräs och Stenar box set – available for your streaming pleasure on Spotify – to change this.
Collecting two live albums and a glut of unreleased jams from the Swedish band Träd, Gräs och Stenar (which translates to “trees, grass and stones”), this five-hour compilation is a wonderful entry point to a forgotten rock scene that never quite got its due.
Some context: Träd, Gräs och Stenar was the final incarnation of a collective of musicians that had previously gone by the names Harvester, International Harvester, and Pärson Sound. The music the band made as Stenar was a lot more rock-oriented and less out-there than the amorphous, minimal noise they’d made under their prior names. The live albums here – Djungelns Lag and Mors Mors – were released in 1971 and 1972, respectively. By this time, the music they were making was unruly and proudly experimental but also unexpectedly listenable.
Most of the songs here are, for lack of a better word, jams. Träd, Gräs och Stenar were art-school friends, and their music isn’t far removed from what I’ve heard lots of bands here at the University of Oregon do in the heat of particularly wild house shows. They sound like a bunch of buddies fucking around. But they’re always in tune with each other, and it’s a blast hearing the different band members’ ideas bounce off of each other as they move through their songs.
They also create better music than most basement bands, in part because of their restraint. These jams prioritize texture over soloing or dramatic crescendos, and they’re usually gorgeous.
This is not music for people with short attention spans, and indeed, not everyone will want to wade through five hours of improvisational rock. But it’s not essential to listen to this thing back-to-front.
It feels like it’s on shuffle anyway; many of these performances were recorded in drastically different places, from festivals and houses to meadows and airfields, and the recording quality track to track tends to vary.
But if you just want to get lost in a head-expanding musical space for a while, you could do a lot worse than throwing Träd, Gräs och Stenar on.
Listen to “Vår vila” by Träd, Gräs och Stenar below.