The Portastylistic: pop*eye..." Taxi Taxi! "

....................................................................................................

“ THIS IS BEAUTIFUL...ENJOYY! ”

Getting lost in this delicate and often bewitching
world is highly recommended.

-the portastylistic

....................................................................................................

Taxi Taxi! - Still Standing at Your Back Door (2009)

Finally the über talented twins Johanna and Miriam Eriksson Berhan from Stockholm, Sweden are ready to release their debut full-length album 'Still Standing At Your Back Door' is the debut album by Taxi Taxi! It consists of ten hauntingly upbeat and sweetly vulnerable songs composed and played almost entirely by twin sisters Johanna and Miriam Eriksson Berhan, who were born in Lulea, Northern Sweden, on January 16th 1990. This means they were roughly four years, one month and eight days old when fierce panda released its first ever single.

'Still Standing At Your Back Door' is ten tracks of heartbreaking simplicity and searing melodic honesty. Taxi Taxi! have already been described as "mesmeric", "ghostly" and "bittersweet" and for sure here are two people lurking at the dark folk end of the street, fragile of voice, gentle of guitar, sombre of mood and minimalist in structure.

At only 19 years apiece, Swedish twin sisters Johanna and Miriam Eriksson Berhan have crafted a wintry, warming, wonderful debut album in Still Standing at Your Back Door. Flush with tales of adolescent heartbreak and woe, Lykke Li’s Youth Novels makes for an obvious antecedent – indeed, both acts have received the patronage of one Björn Yttling (of Peter, him and John fame) – but this is a rather different affair, swapping that album’s precocious polish for a pensive, earthy manner that suits the pair’s harmonies to a tee.

What we have for the most part here is quite simple, and no less effective for it: two girls singing and playing the guitar. Of course, it helps that they’re blessed with two extraordinarily pretty voices – one effortlessly reinforcing and complementing the other. But given a few listens, the album yields much deeper reward: a melodic touch as mature as it is sweet, and bold, evocative arrangements that revel in the possibilities offered them.

Opening with the hissing slow burn of its title track is a gutsy move, and sequencing gorgeous highlight More Childish Than in a Long Time immediately afterwards a masterstroke. On these songs the duo traverse minor-key soundscapes with self-assurance far exceeding their tender years – gratification hardly instant, but all the more enduring for it. The last of the opening trio is a mournful number entitled Same Side of the Moon, before the irresistibly positive Old Big Trees bursts forth. Take note: “Maybe my skeleton would be quite beautiful beside yours… we would still be pretty deep in the soil!”

All I Think Of eschews the acoustic template entirely, boasting deep low-end and stuttering percussion that frames the twins’ voices in agreeably unexpected surroundings. Elsewhere, His Heart or Mine comes on with a brassy Gallic sway that surfaces intermittently throughout these ten songs, bolstering Ripest Fruit in a style not dissimilar to that of Beirut’s delightful Flying Club Cup LP.

The album closes with Mary, wherein the girls’ vocals take flight atop sedate ivories and strings. It’s a graceful, tear-stained farewell, perfectly in keeping with the preceding and suggesting even stronger material lies down the road. Until then, getting lost in this frank, delicate, and often bewitching world is highly recommended.

.........................................................................................

All about
TAXI TAXI!

Taxi Taxi! is a duo of twins, Miriam Eriksson Berhan and Johanna Eriksson Berhan from Stockholm, Sweden. On the basis of just two demos (made public via the Internet) they have made many friends all around Sweden and Denmark and have already performed at such festivals as Roskilde and Hultsfred Festival. Their debut self-titled ep was released in Spring of 2007 (in collaboration with producer Björn Yttling from Peter, Björn and John) on Rumraket. Listen to previews here.

State can’t pretend to have heard Taxi, Taxi! in 2005 when they released their eponymous EP. Only 15 at the time, twin sisters Miriam and Johanna Eriksson Berhan had crafted a posy of folk songs that are fragile, simple, ghostly and quirky. Ok, they’re Swedish, so let’s not bother with the latter. In fact, unless stated otherwise let’s just assume all things Swedish are quirky, or at least stylistically different. We just have to compare ‘Let The Right One In’ against ‘Twilight’ (no offence Kristen).

Since then the girls have relocated from Lulea (Northen Sweden?) to Stockholm, where they recorded the fabulous Step Into The Light EP with Björn Yttling of, yeah you guessed right, Peter, Björn and John fame. Lead track ‘More Childish Than In A Long Time’ is instantly mesmeric and deeply heartbreaking; it’s hard to believe it was written by anyone born in the ‘90’s. Oddly attractive in a “belle laide” kind of way, the girls have the most wonderfully delicate harmonies. Their songs are minimalist in structure with gentle guitar, piano and sometimes accordion; displaying a melodic honesty which has found them covered by Peter Broderick.