1. No one can accuse Annbjørg Lien of sticking in a rut. Her studio albums have taken her through raditional Norwegian music and far beyond, and this live disc (A. Liens Alive, get it?) blows them all out of the water. With some raditional material, a good dose of prog rock, and a fleeting version of Grieg's "Morning Mood," it covers plenty of ground. Some tracks have appeared on her prior records, but they're drastically rearranged here: "Loki," for example, is now pretty much undiluted prog rock. But the centerpiece has to be the epic "Origins," an aural journey through Nordic music lasting over 14 minutes that includes the sounds of Norway, Sweden, and even Finnish joiking. It's daring -- pushing the audience -- but it works, a constant stream of movement that carries the crowd along in a tour de force. While Lien sticks mostly to her trademark Hardanger fiddle, the Norwegian national instrument, she also proves very handy on the Swedish keyed fiddle. While this is her album, the band plays a very important part throughout (with the exception of the solo closer), with keyboardist Bjorn Ole Rasch and guitarist Roger Tallroth both strongly in evidence. Aliens Alive feels like the culmination of Lien's career to date, the end of one era -- and if it is, she's leaving it in fine style, ready for the next step.
Chris Nickson, Rovi
2. "Behind every traditional hardanger fiddle tune there is always a story, always a fairy tale, and you actually tell the stories when you play the fiddle." Annbjørg Lien
Annbjørg Lien finds, in folk music, everything from fairy tales to science fiction. Indeed, the title of her previous album, Baba Yaga is drawn from a fairytale. Aliens Alive is a selection of live performances culled from Annbjørg Lien's 2001 Norwegian tour.
For those who don't know, Lien is Norwegian, from Sunnmore; cites Emerson, Lake, and Palmer as a primary influence; and is fluent in the idioms of jazz, folk, new-age, and progressive rock. She's been a hardanger fiddle player from six years of age, playing concerts abroad since her teens (Italy at 14), and released four albums in the eighties before finding international fame in the nineties. She also plays nyckelharpa and violin, and has an orchestral background with folk and classical training.
Note: A hardanger fiddle (hardingfele) is smaller than a violin, has a flatter fingerboard so that playing multiple strings throughout a piece is the norm, and has sympathetic steel strings beneath the top strings that resonate when certain top notes are struck, yielding a kind of reverberation when tuned, as it usually is, to notes prominent in a particular piece. It's an exclusively Norwegian instrument, usually quite baroque in ornamentation -- like the mediaeval viole. The fractally 'harmonics' are also most pronounced at close range.
Annbjørg is a consummate collaborator, working on projects ranging from being an official Olympic Musician to an appearance on an album by The Chieftains. She seems to have even taken the stage with Deep Purple on their Concerto Tour 2000. One of the most interesting projects in which I've encountered her is The Man from God Knows Where. Do listen, as the audio is magnificent.
Though with its range and subtleties the hardanger is a solo instrument, on Aliens Alive Lien places it in an electric/acoustic band setting, with sophisticated arrangements that allow the instrument to really shine. Even Jew's harp and bagpipe lend to the instrumental theatrics of this disc.
This is a CD for fans: live cuts from the 2001 Norwegian tour, all of her other albums are represented, and there's even some new material. Though Lien's hardanger is the centerpiece, the band's sonic integrity is due in part to including Väsen guitarist Roger Tallrothm, Norwegian guitar virtuoso Rolf Kristensen, keyboardist Bjørn Ole Rasch (of Bukkene Bruse), Hans Fredrik Jacobsen providing wind, and Rune Arnesen and Per Hillestad driving percussion. She is also joined by Bjorn Ole Rasch - keyboards, mini-moog and programming, Rune Arnesen - percussion, Hans Fredrik Jacobsen - flutes, bagpipes, clarinet and oud, and Roger Tallroth - guitar.
"The Rose" (a traditional tune arranged by Lien) opens with a mournful, wasting hardanger, unaccompanied, that seems to feed on the ambience and wither with aching beauty into the next track. It was great to hear "Loki" again from her previous album Baba Yaga. The ethereal new-age quality of its beginning is made hot with percussion and chant and given over still warm to the keyed fiddle, pulled back and forth between fiddle and flute. Parts of it reminded me of Enya's "Deireadh an Tuath" until it was pleasingly bloody with oozing mini-moog. Or was it throat-song? Hard to tell.
"Origins" is a medley of Nordic musical styles including a wonderful Troll (Yoik) , Ailo Gaup, in the part called Oainnahus ("vision"). A version of "Oainnahus" also appears on Baba Yaga. "Morning Mood" is a half-minute parody of composer Edvard Grieg's piece from Peer Gynt. The audience laughs, but I think it's a poor potshot and really beneath the artists. It bears even less mention than it merits disc time. "Knepphalling" has been hitting playlists in America. It's Roger Tallroth's arrangement. I don't think it would be an insult to liken it to acrobatic Nordic bluegrass. His guitar duet with Lien's hardanger is almost reminiscent of "Duelling Banjos."
"Larry Goes Log-Driving," an adaption from Baba Yaga, is arranged by keyboardist Bjorn Ole Rasch -- an audience rousing piece capped off with an almost power-rock enthusiastic ending. "Luseblus" has a promising blues lead-in that provokes the audience which, unfortunately, wounds the track with rhythmic clapping. I suppose this is what I dislike most about live CDs; sometimes they turn into an exercise in call and response, almost as a philosophical obligation of the artist to collaborate with anyone who wants to join in. I think it's akin to passing out kazoos. Fortunately, it doesn't last long, and this is another popular one for the station playlists. "Astra" (from Baba Yaga) fits its title (meaning "eternal light"); if Vangelis had fiddles, it would be like this. "Inoque" (also from Baba Yaga) came out of Lien going to Mozambique with Save the Children. I like this version much better than Baba Yaga's. There is less tribal singing which, brought in from another live recording, never quite works. That kind of sampling is a thing for the studio rather than a live performance, so the use of it here is properly conservative, just enough to hint at the track's purpose.
Title track "Aliens Alive" features guitarist Roger Tallroth of Vasen. If Mussorgsky's is 'walking music', this triple procession of vignettes is skipping, running music. The drums are marvelous. Bagpipes, too. It's the most exciting one on the CD, and the audience virtually chants its applause.
"Fykerud's Farewell to America" will be familiar to hardanger devotees. Inspiration and hardanger legend Hans Fykerud is memorialized in this solo hardanger track, just as Hans W. Brimi was remembered in "W" from Baba Yaga. Lien is clearly drawing attention to the hardanger as tradition, shoring up a knowledge of its roots.
Even though much of the material is from Baba Yaga, it's not a repeat of that CD. The variants here are desireable in their own right. Fans will want both albums. This disc, like Baba Yaga, does have that Emerson, Lake, and Palmer flavor, so it's sure to please both Nordic trad and prog rock fans with nostalgic leanings. It's as perfect as its predecessor as an introduction to Lien's work.
Asher Black
3. The last decade has seen Annbjørg Lien rise to a status as Norway’s highest profiled female fiddle player. Through recordings and live performances with a wide variety of domestic and international folk-music players, she has managed to achieve a sense of transcendence as barriers such as genre and preconception start to fade away. Her performances are of a highly individual character and set in a unique worldly setting that’s punctuated by beautiful musicianship and artistry. Lien’s fiddling can be hauntingly absorbing as it melts the past with the future, creating a hybrid that has won hearts all over the world. This live recording captures this distinctive symbiosis that is a product of her strong background in traditional Norwegian folk and a keen ear for new and exiting sounds. The phrase “Folk music for a new millennium” sounds like a hollow cliché, but in this instance the phrase has relevance.
Tomas Lauvland Pettersen
4. Aliens Alive is exceedingly well named.
Norwegian fiddler Annbjorg Lien creates amazing alien landscapes with her music, captured here at various locations on her 2001 tour of Norway. Mixing original music with traditional folk melodies, Lien and her band create a tapestry of wonderful musical colors and textures. It's an aural sensation that must be experienced again and again.
Lien plays keyed and hardanger fiddles, sometimes solo but usually accompanied by a broad array of instruments and exotic vocalizations. The music is, in turns, mournful, majestic, soulful and happy.
The album begins and ends with solo tunes featuring the hardanger. On "The Rose" and "Fykerud's Farewell to America," the distinctive drone makes the mournful tunes sound more like duets than solos.
The organ, sampled chorus and distant flute combine on "Loki" for a very eerie, exciting sound. The album progresses into the epic "Origins," with powerful tonal combinations, including more sampled vocals, bass drones, organ crashes, wailing guitars and more. There are also examples of Nordic throat singing; the vocal acrobatics by Ailo Gaup, which includes varied grunts, snorts and whistles, is very unusual, alien to my ears -- and again, very exciting.
"The Water Lily" is a lovely duet for fiddle and organ (with some touches here and there by guitar and flutes). "Morning Mood" is an odd track featuring the hardanger, briefly plucked, and the occasional "ah" by Hans Fredrik Jacobsen; it recalls a piece by Edvard Grieg but serves no real purpose here. "Knepphalling" sounds very much like a traditional folk dance, while "Luseblus" goes for a bluesy feel. "Astra," a moody piece, leads into the jazzier "Inoque." "Aliens Alive" begins with a baroque touch and develops into a delightful montage of music, with the hardanger dancing lightly over all of it.
At times, it sounds like something Dead Can Dance might have produced -- and that's high praise indeed. Lien certainly isn't alone in this project -- she's joined by several talented musicians who help to assemble this exquisite package -- but she and progressive keyboardist Bjorn Ole Rasch get much of the credit for writing or arranging the bulk of the music on this CD. The result is simply extraordinary.
The presence of the audience is very subtle; it's easy sometimes to forget that this is a live recording. But it must have been an amazing live experience for those lucky enough to be there! The penultimate track ends with rousing applause -- and man, I wish I'd been a part of that crowd!
Tom Knapp
5. The music is alive! Annbjørg Lien´s Aliens Alive is more than just a live recording. What better way for Annbjørg Lien to celebrate her three latest releases, than giving us the best parts live! And rather than just repeating the albums, its a creative and colourful exploration of themes and textures.Adventurous LienThe new arrangements and improvisations are summing up where she's at just now, and pointing ahead. Embracing traditional Scandinavian music as well as modern forms, Lien gives us a vision of adventurous music rarely seen.
From the contemplative beginning like a clear mountain spring, through rapids and cascades, the album feels like a Norwegian river, a beautifull tapestry of melodic and rhytmic cross currents. The band creates potent and poignant images. Its a marvellous flow of spirit, sound and harmonies.Beyond Boundaries and BarriersIts another of those steps into musical wonders which Annbjørg and her companions do so well. There are moments of aural revelations when keyed and Hardanger fiddles interplay with guitar, flute, percussion and keyboards. Its again a moving beyond boundaries and barriers, a mystical blend of past and present. Its a visionary voyage from the atmospheric voice of the Space Age to the voice of the Sami Aboriginals.The Tradition is AliveMellow and monumental, the album evokes a futuristic nostalgia. Annbjørg once again shows the relevance of roots and real traditions, magically bridging the past and the future. Profound and simple, it captures your senses. Its music speaking to the heart and the mind. It enters your deepest emotions, makes you smile, listen and even sometimes think.
Its more than a live recording, its alive.
From grappa.no
6. I love this CD. It has beauty, power, passion and guts. Particularly guts. Annbjшrg Lien is probably the best known young Norwegian fiddler, mainly because she is a fabulous musician. She plays the Hardanger fiddle (a sort of double-strength fiddle) and the nyckelharpa (essence of fiddle, like a bowed hurdy-gurdy or an Indian Dilruba). Lien mixes the traditional and the experimental, and she gets away with it beautifully. The dozen tracks here add up to seventy minutes of excellent music. As you may know, I'm not a big fan of fusion and the like: however, I'm prepared to make an exception when it's as powerful and exciting as Aliens Alive.
The opening track is a five-minute Hardanger solo, putting this awesome beast through its paces. If that doesn't twist your viscera, stop now: you obviously don't have the guts for this music. Track 2, Loki, starts the fun with a blend of nyckelharpa and modern instruments, eerily evoking the Norse god of mischief through a mix of primal lyrics and stunning instrumental effects. The medley Origins is in a similar vein: driving fiddle giving way to sepulchral vocals, plus some modern dance sounds, all woven around a sumptuous tune. Keep your ears open for the fabulous flute solo from Hans Fredrik Jacobsen. Traditional tunes and Lien/Rasch compositions flow together without a ripple.
The Water Lily introduces a gentler mood, fiddle and flute over a simple accompaniment. Then, after a brief tongue-in-cheek flirtation with Greig, it's back to the hard stuff: traditional Hardanger fiddle music grabbed by the throat and whirled round the room, to the rhythm of Roger Tallroth's guitar. Two more Lien/Rasch dance tunes make up the Larry Goes Log-Driving set, still earthy and full of fire, but with the ethereal purity of those high-pitched resonances in the upper reaches of the fiddle's compass. Intoxicating and entrancing.
Luseblus is a Lien composition in the style of a traditional reel or polka, low down and gritty, another visceral tune. It's followed by perhaps the most modern arrangement on the album, somewhere between New Age and film music, an easy listening piece with its own particular beauty. Next comes Inoque, filled with the sounds of the Norwegian rainforest (I'm guessing here, because the one thing this CD lacks is good sleeve notes!), and then the title medley which is another triumphant combination of traditional tunes and Lien/Rasch innovations.
And so it ends. The final track, a traditional air which translates as Fykerud's Farewell to America, is another solo fiddle masterpiece: one of those unforgettable Scandinavian tunes like Til Far or Josefins Vals, the perfect end to a perfect hour. Like I said, I love this CD. It's also a live recording, and has some extra magical moments as a result. If you can find Annbjшrg Lien live, grab the opportunity. If not, Aliens Alive is probably the best substitute and you can probably find it at
www.grappa.no if nowhere else.
Alex Monaghan 
