College Times

Issue date: 3/6/08 Section: Music

Media Credit: Carl Ahlstrom

Staying In is the debut full-length release of Joachim Dyrdahl, better known in his native Oslo, Norway, as diskJokke. It's an album full of deceptively simple dance music, music that's oddly emotional despite the usual trappings such a description implies. Most of the songs here never reach for melodrama, never work toward any sort of cathartic moment of release. Instead, diskJokke slowly works his keyboards and samples over disco beats, content to find the heart in melodies. Thus, many of these songs feel like self-contained pieces, songs that stand alone, balancing synthesizer melodies and empty space, while often moving in several directions before the track ends. So, opener "Folk i farta," starts with a piano melody that dissolves into a retro disco track complete with handclaps and distorted bass lines, before it all finally gets rolled back together in the end. Many of these songs follow this same pattern, establishing pieces of the song throughout, and then combining them all in the end. But what really sets the album apart is its insistent pop charm: these songs are so catchy, it never matters what Dyrdahl's doing, just so long as the beat keeps going and the melodies keeping striking an emotional chord.

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