Hari & Aino: "A Considerate Kind of Home" / "Maple"

I am old and cynical. I hate promise and possibility, beautiful homes, and success, yet today, if only for a brief moment, I know a heart still beats in my chest. No, “A Considerate Kind of Home”/“Maple” did not give me an existential revelation, but it did help me feel the blood in my veins and think to myself that for about six minutes my apartment isn’t a bad place to be.

Both sides of this excellent Cloudberry single feature the sharp rhythms of Gunnar Jacobsson, whose drums never beat (snerk!) around the bush, and Andrea Dahlkild’s rich, wide alto. The guitars match Dahlkild’s round tones with a bright, clean sound that leaves no sharp edge untamed. Hari & Aino thus aim for, and achieve, a gentle beauty and perfection of form, more suited to warm the heart than blow the mind. Like the best 7” singles, each side competes for which is the superior composition, and there is no clear victor. “A Considerate Kind Of Home” soars to a chorus of long-held notes detailing “faces washed out years ago,” all atop a cresting four-on-the-floor beat. “Maple” matches the intensity of its A side perfectly, cooing and winding its way toward its own chorus of tumbling bodies and expectations. It bears mentioning that the sleeve artwork is particularly beautiful, even by Cloudberry’s high standards. It’s silly, I guess, but I am really glad I got to hold this thing in my hands. I’m even happier I got to hear it.

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