The Knife's Silent Shout cut a swathe for Swedish pop bands
Swedish music is a major part of the international art scene, and we can thank The Knife for that.
Brother and sister duo Olof and Karin Dreijer blasted open the gates on the Scandinavian nation's electronic music community with a sound that managed to be both icily foreboding and euphoric.
Arguably they reached the peak of their artistic creativity with the final album, 2013's Shaking the Habitual. But it was 2006's Silent Shout that established the electronic duo as a star attraction on the world's dance floors, and put them in the vanguard of a national artistic force that has been felt in all genres, from indie pop to heavy metal.
Formed in the southwest city of Gothenburg from the ashes of Karin's previous band, the indie-rock group Honey Is Cool, The Knife won plaudits with their debut album and then commercial success with 2003's follow-up, Deep Cuts. The beats-heavy club tracks were a far cry from Karin's previous work and won a wider audience when compatriot and indie-folk darling Jose Gonzalez covered their track Heartbeats.
Thus established, they turned to building up their Rabid Beats label and creating a studio in which they could indulge their craft. The first result of this gestation was Silent Shout. Darker than Deep Cuts in tone and malevolent in texture, Silent Shout is an unsettling record that was made all the more disturbing by the promotional material, which featured the Dreijers in crow-face masks and clad in black, their human identities hidden in a monstrous guise.