Oriental Sunshine's Dedicated to the Bird We Love was originally released in 1970. In the late '60s the winding countryside of Norway was hardly the ideal time or place to be playing psychedelic folk music. But the teenage duo of Nina Johansen and Rune Walle, aided by their friend Satnam Singh, triumphed over high odds - the results speak for themselves...

Johansen and Walle discovered a shared love of The Beatles, Joni Mitchell and eastern sounds. They soon started playing and writing songs together. Then they met Satnam Singh, who played the flute and tabla. Dedicated to the Bird We Love is the band's one and only album. After the death of Johansen’s father and with Singh facing deportation the band lost contact. It's interesting, listing to this now, to ponder on what could have been if the band had managed to continue working.

The 11 songs here (30 min, 48 sec) are as fresh today as when they were originally released. For a younger audience, this may sound like a western take on Indian music (the sort of music that's piped into cheap Indian restaurants) but give it time, and a few listens, and you'll start to appreciate the depth and complexity of the music.

On a side note, I couldn't help wondering, when listening to 'Unless', whether Morrissey was a fan of Oriental Sunshine.

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Nick Smithson