After releasing a first album in 2015, OREGON TRAIL moved to Le Locle, a rural and gloomy place in the swiss mountains. There, the band worked hard on creating a unique sound inspired by the depressive and uncanny, yet harrowing landscape surrounding them. Their second effort ‘h/aven’ was wrought between the purity of snow and the fathomless nights, inspired by the loneliness of the town and the majesty of the forests, compressed by the light and the cold. No other places could have led to such a cathartic yet uplifting album where massive and solemn guitars pave the way for C.-A. Bernhard to scream existential thoughts in the most liberating way. On ‘h/aven’, he searches for essential guidance, the drive to live – Something the band also wanted to express musically. Between heavy parts calling for a stand-off and long drives begging for contemplation, Oregon Trail went deep down wells and up high summits to find beauty and relief in the contrasts. ‘h/aven’ grasps at life, it is fuel for desperate souls.
