Burning Hearts

While Sweden's indie music scene has many familiar faces, Finland is a more mysterious land that conjures up images of stark wildernesses. Yet based on the music of Burning Hearts, there might be more warmth and colour over there than anyone would expect. Comprised of Henry Ojala and Jessika Rapo (from Cats On Fire and Le Futur Pompiste, respectively), Burning Hearts definitely have one foot firmly in the '80s, with their backward glancing, synth-heavy tunes. Much like U.S. band My Favorite before them, they've managed to distil the good from the bad and produce remarkably effective pop songs of romance and longing. For the most part, Aboa Sleeping is a gently hypnotic album that lags only with the interesting instrumental "The Galloping Horse," which utilises samples from a seven-inch record of irregular heartbeats. It just feels at such odds with the rest of the record that its placement almost right in the middle is downright clumsy.