For the past seven years Kornél Kovács has been busy rocking dance-floors and boomboxes worldwide as one third of Stockholm’s Studio Barnhus alongside Axel Boman and Petter Nordkvist. The label and DJ trio is spearheading a new era of fearless Swedish off-centre dance music, straddling the line between cute and menacing.

Anticipation for Kovács’ debut album has been rocketing following stand out releases like 2014’s wistful Szikra, last year’s mad party anthem Pantalón on Glasgow’s Numbers imprint and the late night groove of Space Jam on Smallville Records. On The Bells, Kovács pops open his trunk full of sounds nicked from the lost and found bins of nightclubs all over the world. From the distorted organ chords of BB to the stripped down trancehall beats of Josey’s Tune or Szív Utca and the title track’s cinematic romanticism, it’s all of the bells and all of the whistles – further positioning Kornél Kovács as one of the most characteristic producers of modern house music.

The record was completed in an intense two-week session with Kovács’ great friend and great studio engineer Matt Karmil in the winter of 2016. Another close friend, artist Malin Gabriella Nordin, has created the album artwork together with her brother Jonas.

Prompted directly by Kovács to give his report on the record, Studio Barnhus label boss Axel Boman had the following to say:
“Kornél’s bells will echo far beyond the nervous and trend sensitive ”dance” genre that our label sometimes is associated with, and into pop history. It’s one of our best, most innovative and creative releases to date, and the fact that one of my best friends has managed to do this on the label we share together makes me so proud that I want to cry. The Bells is the reason I dreamed of starting a label in the first place.”