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The first few tracks are strong, hopeful, and joyous. This album is an emotional roller coaster, beginning with an exhilarating crescendo and ending with a soft goodbye. I suppose I can't make an unbiased review of this album, because it just fills me with so many emotions. Then the tracks become quieter and more subdued, but they're still imbued with feeling. Get this album if you want music that will take your breath away, will make you think, and will make you feel.
It is difficult to write about something you love, our words can often fail to capture that which stirs in our hearts. The music of Sigur Ros is constantly defined by a certain grappling with life and death. When we listen there is still joy still simmering in our hearts, but it's a joy tempered by time and tide. No, it is the ambivalence of death reminding us why it can be so painful, namely because we love so much. I think that the stark reality of death and the anxiety it creates is fundamental to their music. The bridge which swells with dynamic intensity and polyphonic grandeur is one of the most hope inspiring and blissful musical experiences that one will find anywhere.
The feelings are dark, intense, at time transcendental, but even with the punctuated elegance of tracks 3 and 4, I feel like I am in a place that is more akin to purgatory than heaven. Vid spilum endalaust gets us back onto the hope train with a similarly pounding piano/bass line which drives us forward but with that familiar and comforting (though somewhat more restrained) sense of joy and purpose. While ( ) seems to delve deeply into that vast crevasse of metaphysical doubt and ensuing anxiety that have become omnipresent in this post-modern era, Med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust is their redemption song. ( ) as an album (also a 5 star work of genius in my opinion) is an epic meditation on pain and loss. They are simply crying to the shy kid staring at his feet in the corner, just let it all go, come and dance, it's time to play.Dance is a word that comes to mind on the second track, seeing that Inní mér syngur vitleysingur has even forced a surly misanthrope such as myself to laugh, run and flail my limbs without abandon, whether I'm at home or frightening fellow commuters on the metro as the propulsive rhythm transfigures me into the dance commander.
I feel a great deal when I listen to it, but hope or joy are certainly not feelings that readily come to mind. It is much easier to write a bad review, for while so much that is bad is bad in the same way, things that are truly beautiful seem to radiate their own, individual light (yes, I aped Tolstoy there). But while there is a definite sense of melancholy that can be felt, it never reaches those depths of absolute loss that punctuate ( ). This review is my unequivocal no. It is difficult to listen to this song and without be grateful for every moment we've been given in this life.I would hate to refer to Gódan daginn as filler, it is calming, otherworldly and a wonderful transition between the two most expressively hopeful tracks on the album. In that sense, after the pain, meditation and depuration of ( ), Med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust is in a sense reaching for the sky. Here we are in this world, everything is fleeting, we love so deeply as the lines form on our faces and the unbearable lightness of being shines into every corner and crevice of our souls. Med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust says yes, we will die, but because life is transient we will love, cry and dance.
I was inspired to write this review as a result of a comment written about another amazon reviewer: "this guy hates everything." I am yet to write anything but a one star review, and I thought, will I merely be another snobbish curmudgeon eviscerating every piece of garbage that a world of commodified art tends to produce. The next seven tracks represent a slight transition. The first four are almost like the laughter, joy and celebration of life, love and friends, but festival ironically takes us out onto the verandah, cumulous clouds and a silver moon above, cigarette in hand, reflecting on the night and the mortality that comes creeping back to us when our serotonin levels start coming back down. This feeling seems to permeate the rest of the album, hushed, delicate, intense love and the knowledge that one day it all ends. It is life affirming in the deepest sense, raging against the dying of the light in the only way that will give us peace.The album begins with Gobbledigoo, an effervescent, frolic into childlike abandon. And yet, somehow, the breeze rustling the leaves and the pallid light dripping from the sky grab our hearts and we no longer fear the terminus on this strange, beautiful journey. For me, Med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust is something like a counterpoint to ( ). And as the last track reminds us, in the end, everything and everyone is all right.
( ) tells us that we are all going to die. You could almost hear the repeated vocal lines at the beginning, chorus and bridge as youthful taunts, but taunts lacking any malicious intent. Ára bátur becomes the culmination of the ephemeral laugher of youth with the pained reminder of ultimate loss as it gradually builds into a tear wrenching crescendo that is simply sublime. And yes my friends, it really is, even when it isn't.
but being a person who looves indie pop music, as well as folk and experimental stuff, i cannot complain. i am surprised that this cd has not received more bad reviews by customers. i mean if i look at it from the bands perspective they seem to be doing things some listeners wanted them to do, and they are taking a highly evolved indie pop sound and making it much more accessible to a wider audience while still containing the main ingredients that made this band so unique. after reading so many one star reviews for takk. ( a cd i love) this cd is by far a big step away from what we are used to hearing. i do believe they are still unique and i am not going to take them for granted. ive seen good bands go in different directions before and it has always been a painful experience but this time it just really isnt so bad.
My first introduction to it was from a friend in Yosemite, sitting around the last glowing embers of a campfire beside Smedberg Lake, deep in the backcountry wilderness. Emotive vocals and captivating music. Track 5 "festival" is transportive: completely beautiful. I'll forever associate the evocative qualities of this music with that place. I bought this CD for my brother because I couldn't wait to share the experience with him.
they never cease to amaze me. another brilliant recording. now if only they would play here again, their live performances are outstanding both visually and sonically.
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