They call it “cow-jazz.” Instrumental country by jazz musicians. Pedal steel guitar over dub rhythms. The sound of transcontinental railroads crossing fjords. Whatever you call it, Himmelskip’s music shouldn’t work on paper – and yet it does, brilliantly. Four young musicians from The Norwegian Academy of Music have created something genuinely new with their debut album Den siste kvegdriver (The Last Cowboy), which is out now. Filming with them in painter and novelist Lars Elling’s atelier in Grünerløkka, Oslo was an absolute joy. Backed by Elling’s work-in-progress, they played three songs for The Influences: covers of the traditional Christmas song O Holy Night, Knut Reiersrud & Iver Kleive’s Himmelskip and their own Reven – which is a beautiful coincidence, given the painting Elling was working on.
A proper homage.
Now Himmelskip are making instrumental music that is interesting to try and describe. Think William Tyler getting lost in Norwegian folk melodies for a winter. Or Justin Vernon scoring a Sergio Leone western – all that falsetto over tumbleweeds and shootouts. For the album, the band knew what they wanted. No outside producers, no compromises; Himmelskip recorded Den siste kvegdriver themselves at Oslo’s Amper Tone studio, working with engineers Johnny Skalleberg and Tomas Pettersen to capture that warm, analogue sound they were after.
“The piece Himmelskip was a quite obvious choice when we were asked to do a cover. This is a song by Knut Reiersrud which was released in 1996 on an album with the same title. The piece, as well as the name of course, has been a big inspiration to our music and we felt that this would be a proper homage to both the music and legacy of an important influence.”
“All the members have a connection to this song.”
We ended up filming this session at Lars Elling’s studio through a bit of chance. Every year, Elling goes to see graduation performances at The Norwegian Academy of Music with one of his children and that’s where he discovered Himmelskip, and invited them to perform at the launch of his latest book. Elling was gracious enough to let us film this – and two other – session in his beautiful space.
“For O Holy Night we wanted to see how we can arrange a tune that is well known into our sonic universe and still stay true to the composition and essence of the song. The tune is something that all the members have a connection to. The arrangement is by our very own Simen Harstad Jakobsen.”
Listen to Himmelskip
If you’re looking for something that defies easy categorization, something that sounds both familiar and completely new, this is it. Cow-jazz. An imaginary western soundtrack. Folk music enthusiasts playing instrumental country. However you describe it, Himmelskip are creating music that deserves to be heard.
Den siste kvegdriver was released on Die With Your Boots On Records November 14th, 2025.
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