Album DescriptionAlready an incontestable figure in the Scandinavian music scene, Maja Ratkje follows the release of her stunning first solo album, Voice (Rune Grammaphone), with Syklubb Fra Hælvete. A compulsive musician who, in addition to her main activity as part of all-female avant-garde free-improvisation quartet Spunk, is a lecturer in composition at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, a world-renowned contemporary composer, an impressive singer and an accomplished musician who has recorded with Norwegian accordionist Frode Haltli and Jazzkammer. Together with fellow Spunk-ette Hild Sofie Tafjord, Ratkje improvises with analogue electronic gear, samplers, vocals, harmonica and miscellaneous acoustic instruments to shape a more defined, delicate series of soundscapes. Adding Ratkje?s voice to the distortions and feedback, the pair develops the experimentations created by Spunk. Hailed by Thurston Moore as the most exciting noise record ever released, Syklubb Fra Hælvete is intriguing and disturbing, yet manages to capture the imagination by remaining firmly focused all the way through.