Civil Polis - Valdsvagen Civil Polis

On Civil Polis's second album, a dance of death is unfolding. Children whirl through the wave of violence, mothers try to keep the proverbs under control. A skeleton comes to life, then falls asleep again. There's a limit to how much a person can take, but apparently that limit hasn't been reached. The light at the end of the tunnel is the bleached hair of headless Nikes.

Erik Fichtelius—the journalist who interviewed Göran Persson for what felt like two decades—once said that the second time around, you have to be ten times better to earn the same appreciation you got the first time.

Våldsvågen ("The Wave of Violence")—the follow-up to last year's En man utan referenser (A Man Without References)—takes him at his word. It's an album that refuses to accept writer W. David Marx's thesis on the death of subculture. The key to a functioning movement is, as we know, movement. There is no choice to be made between pop and the avant-garde, between communication and innovation, between yesterday and today. What matters is that Våldsvågen is a portrait of the present, created by an artist caught in an endless rush—the result of the constant and absolutely necessary pursuit of an entirely new kind of electricity.

CIVIL POLIS has been Sweden's biggest band since its founding in 1910. Våldsvågen will be released only as physical media on 180g vinyl through CIVIL RADIO, as well as for digital à la carte purchase. The physical edition includes a 28-page booklet created in collaboration with artist Mathilda Forström.