Yung - A Youthful Dream

Drowned In Sound 90

Having already released a couple of EPs and an album entitled Falter back home in Denmark, (condensed elsewhere into the Alter EP, making their debut album not really a debut at all), Yung essentially formed when Silkjaer enlisted the help of local band Snare Drum in order to take his music on the road and free it from the confines of the laptop. Coming from a musical family and having suppressed the initial impulse to rebel and pursue a less artistic career path, his is a mature and uncompromising musical voice. It's not one for the faint-hearted either as album opener 'The Hatch' attests; a refined take on teenage punk-rock anthems that still bears the teeth marks from previous hardcore band Urban Achievers. 'A Mortal Sin' follows with a similar ATD-I sound, but diluted down with a heavy dose of fuzzed up nostalgia while expertly constructed single 'Pills', the first point of entry for most to the band's music, rides in on an isotonic mix of euphoria and hopeless – emblematic of the album as a whole.

After the first few tracks you'll probably wonder how long the pace can be kept up, but Yung's odes to recklessness are written from the vantage point of experience, broadening the appeal and opening it up to a whole new set of influences too. 'The Child' for example is a slow burning shoegaze piece handily squashed into three minutes, woozing away with the wistful lyrics: “He will change his mind a million times/He will change his mind in front of your eyes/Because nothing can stop him/In his mind he's still a child/His hands are shaking...”. It's a stirring midpoint and just one in a lengthy list of album highlights. 'A Bleak Incident' takes the album down another detour too, ditching the strained, barbed-wire vocals for a more pensive tone of the Galaxie 500 persuasion and although you shouldn't need it, 'Blanket' is certain to win over any non-believers, buzzing with surf guitar on a blistering, peptide chorus of sweaty, chest thumping vocals.

Following more in the footsteps of Ought and Vietcong than other Scandi bands, (but still veering off enough to carve out their own identity), Yung's debut is unflinchingly bold and as confident as you'll find. The verve and brashness on display on A Youthful Dream is counterweighted by maturity and tenderness, making this an album to drink, dance, fight, forget and remember to all at once.

Pitchfork 65

At the turn of the decade, the youthful dream of Copenhagen’s punk scene probably scared the shit out of most adults. Iceage, Lust For Youth, VÅR and Lower were barely out of their teens and gaining international attention with abrasive, often violent music and bloody shows that were a throwback to a time before punk broke (right down to the unfortunate taste in iconography). Five years later, those bands have become elder statesmen, playing festivals, starting experimental side projects and shifting towards more refined sounds. Hailing from Denmark’s “second city” of Aarhus, the appropriately named Yung aspires to lead the new brigade. However, their youthful dream is more sonically and emotionally conventional: they want to love and to be loved.

A Youthful Dream is literal post-punk for Mikkel Holm Silkjær. He spent his teen years in hardcore bands with names like Urban Achievers, in part to piss off his father, who also happened to be a musician. In the short time since their 2015 Alter and These Thoughts are Like Mandatory Chores EPs, Yung have added pianos and horns and harmonies, the sort of thing most of their peers needed two albums to start embracing: the droning, metronomic “A Black Incident” could pass for a Lost in the Dream cover, while Yung tap into shuffling Britpop for “Morning View.” These moments add dimension and depth to the frigid, metallic production, which makes Yung often sound like they’re trying to generate warmth in a meat locker.

At least sonically, Yung has embraced beer-fueled, sanctified American fuck-ups like Paul Westerberg and Jay Reatard. Silkjær’s anti-authoritative streak isn’t quite as nihilistic and self-centered, however. Mostly, A Youthful Dream rails against the way “they” prevent “you” from getting what you need to get by. Silkjær longs to help a depressed friend on early highlight “Uncombed Hair,” but sees this situation as indicative of societal ills; he offers the kids a “stiff upper lip” pep talk on “A Black Incident” (“don’t cry out for help, they’ll say you’re weak”), worries they will get stuck in arrested development (“The Child”) with pharmaceutical control the only hope (“Pills”). So, maybe America and Denmark aren't all that different.

Yung’s passion is never in question throughout A Youthful Dream; but at times, it’s all they’ve got. When Silkjær traces his vocals over the lead guitars, it’s enough to make “Uncombed Hair” and “Pills” stick. Otherwise, A Youthful Dream can only push through its weaker melodies and reverb through self-will. Taken together, Yung’s expanse and Silkjær’s yearning, belting vocals can actually evoke the early version of U2 that was considered post-punk. There is a messianic streak in Silkjær’s quest to save the youth from themselves and his distrust of whatever constitutes selling out (“Commercial”). Perhaps he’s only beginning to realize it: “I’m not quite sure if I am blessed,” he belts on “Mortal Sin”, and the important part is that he’s not quite sure. (Maybe he's somewhat sure.) And you can sense his increased willingness to dream big when he later sees himself as part of, “Two precious souls leaning against the idea of being in love”. For an anti-romantic punk band, it might as well be “two hearts beat as one!!!”

The Guardian 60

(Fat Possum/Tough Love)

The fact that Danish band Yung are retreading old ground on their first album is a moot point: guitar rock currently feels like a place where craggy riffs and rasping vocals are reanimated in order to stir up memories of the past. Those are largely positive memories, admittedly, which makes A Youthful Dream an enjoyable record. Sometimes, as on Blanket, it sounds like a prettified version of the pounding pop-punk that used to soundtrack the Tony Hawk video games, while on tracks such as Uncombed Hair and A Morning View, the band seem more melodic and listless in a Lemonheads vein. Mikkel Holm Silkjær’s vulnerable, shaky vocals provide a bit of idiosyncrasy in the album’s more leisurely moments. It’s polite punk: impossible to feel either alarmed or electrified by, but an appealingly ghostly listen nonetheless.