It’s getting harder to feel excited by Swedish youngsters with their musty bluesy undistorted garage vibes pretending the last 40 years of musical evolution didn’t happen – especially as this latest generation of pseudo-hippies sound like they’re paying homage more to the Swedish retro scene of the last decade than to the actual early days of hard rock.
Vidunder’s motivating influences are seemingly early Witchcraft and Graveyard (Captain Beyond and Blue Cheer are mentioned in the press release, but this sounds nothing like either), with Troubled Horse/Spiders/ex-Witchcraft axeman John Hoyles adding sweet guitar solos to three songs and vocalist Martin Prim sounding as in thrall to Magnus Pelander as the Witchcraft frontman was to Bobby Liebling and Roky Erickson.
And yet, for all the wearying omnipresence of this bellbottomed bandwagon – and although precious little of it manages to equal the authentic sounds of the early 70s – a trio like Vidunder still have plenty of charm and effortless listenability, with a fun set of discreetly catchy, jangly foot-tappers that cheerily repel cynicism.
