«Swedish born Petter Friberg is a veteran when it comes to electronic dance music. He started producing underground techno back in the late 80's and issued a couple of twelve inches. After that, with partner Martin Frick under the alias Superstereo, he released three EPs of groovy danceable tunes, but after a few years he got into Eno and The Orb and began working in the ambient electronica field. As Motionfield, he has two excellent works published - one on Stadtgruen and another on Autoplate, Thinner's sublabel for ambient grooves. So, it's no less than an honour for test tube to feature his latest and third work, "Northern Lights".
Shorter than an album but a bit longer than an EP - kind of a mini-LP - "Northern Lights" is inspired by the long and bright summers in Scandinavia, the 'midnight sun', which never goes down in that time of year. Naturally, 'Nordic Lights' is a blissful start for this release, shifting between two different layers of ambient, closely reminding of 90's ambient electronica and also of more recent Boards of Canada material. But nature also plays a role in this release: 'Enter the Polar Circle' recycles early Biosphere ice-scapes into a post-millennium Vangelis, Blade Runner era; 'Sounds from a lonely forest', grows from a cold cavern-shaped musical score into a sweet little drone, ripped out from - again - Boards of Canada's best interludes. There are truly promising works here. Other tracks like 'Turning the plate' or 'Depend on me' play more into dark ambient territory, scandinavian flavored. And others yet, are perfect old-school ambient tracks, carrying us fifteen years back. All in all, a perfect release for the nostalgic 90's adolescent inside us all.» - Pedro Leitão

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