Papir's fourth album shows off the trio's dynamism and subtlety across a broad range of emotional and technically impressive instrumental passages, recalling influences as diverse and possibly accidental as Durutti Column and Hawkwind.
I have slowly developed considerable liking for this four song release. Not that there isn’t plenty of immediate pleasure in listening to IIII but some aspects of these lengthy instrumental pieces are revealed more gradually. The drumming, for example, takes the lead at times, even seeming to hold the melody on "IIII". While IIII is a proper album, in that it is a very coherent and connected composition, it does not have a recurrent theme, although the start of "II" and the whole of "IIII" share a mood of cool reflection after some frenetic interplay between instruments.
Papir has one foot in post-rock and another in an earlier, more muscular or fleshed-out progressive music with echoes of riff-driven psychedelia and surf-guitar. These influences do not tip over into mere pastiche and are kept very subservient to the trio’s own dynamic and semi-improvisational style. Thankfully, even on the extended passages, that style doesn’t really develop into an awkward situation where just the musicians are having all the fun.
Depending on my mood I either start the album with the brisk Tortoise-esque "I" or with the shortest piece, "IIII," which almost resembles a post-rock take on Peter Green’s "Albatross." This is only an option with the CD version as "IIII" is left off the vinyl due to lack of space.
Papir use lashings of twang and wah wah, achieve plenty of tweaks in tone and tension, and effectively use changes in pace and volume to add freshness and variety. My favorite of these changes is during "III," around 11 minutes in, where they drop into a complete silence then add a quiet guitar figure in a slower pace for a while. The effect is rather like the protagonist in a Murakami novel jumping a wall into a peaceful alley and sitting; an escape into another world away from the crowded city and his pressing concerns. Papir also execute a good hypnotic trick: making me listen so intently to the nuances and repetition in their music that I miss the exact point when—to put it in visual terms—the vase becomes two people kissing. This is an immersing release from a young Scandinavian trio.
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