It seems like I just talked about Sigur Ros on the blog, but that was way back in November when they released their live/unreleased stuff sort of album. I just can't talk enough about how much I love this band. This week they are putting out the brand new full length album full of all brand new songs. The album is called Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust. For those of you that do not speak Icelandic or Hopelandic, this translates into "With A Buzz In Our Ears We Play Endlessly." As you can imagine, the new album is fantastic. After all, it is a new Sigur Ros album. How can it not be great? But it is a bit of a departure from what we have come to expect from these guys. While still managing to very much be a Sigur Ros album, it comes off as being a bit more of a pop record I think, but in a Sigur Ros kind of way. Don't worry, it is still weird. The opening song and single is "Gobbledigook." The song includes a lot of hand claps, and I am a big fan of the hand claps. It is a nice way to start the album, but it really gets me with the second song. This is the kind of Sigur Ros song that I fall in love with. I have no idea what they are signing about but it just doesn't matter. It is like some huge classical anthem that you just fall in love with. It speaks to you without the words. I don't even really think of the vocalist as a singer. His voice is just another instrument in the band. The song has a lot going on. It sounds like a full orchestra and a choir of young Icelandic singers, and it's all brought together by Jonsi's beautiful voice. It is that voice that first made me fall in love with the great Sigur Ros, and it is that voice that keeps me a loyal member of the Sigur Ros fan army. His voice is like the most beautiful instrument in the world. I know I sort of sound like a cult member, but they really are that good.

I still remember the first time that I heard about  Sigur Ros. I had read an article about them in NME and was immediately intrigued by this new Icelandic band that looked sort of like Radiohead. I decided then that they would be one of my new favorite bands. I put a picture of them on my wall at work before I had even ever heard them.  I had no idea what an affect they would actually end up having on my life. They were described as a little bit experimental and a little bit classical. They were maybe a mix of a band like Radiohead and a band like Slowdive. Ethereal and dreamy and shoegazey. Exactly the kind of band that I could easily fall in love with. The first thing I picked up from them was the single for Svefn-g-englar in 1999. I couldn't really pronounce the name of the band or the single. But Sigur Ros easily and quickly became my new favorite band. They are even to this day sort of hard to explain. I often try and explain them to people and find it easier to just make them listen to it. Much like an artist like Bjork, you quickly will discover if you hate them or love them. There is really no in between. Jonsi Birgisson really has a  magical voice. There is really nothing that I have ever heard before that sounds anything like it. Sort of like Elizabeth Frasier from the Cocteau Twins. You just hear it and can't help but be impacted by the power of the voice. The music of Sigur Ros is also really fantastic. With the combination of the music and that magical voice, these Sigur Ros albums are easily some of my favorites.

Agaetis Byrjun came out right after the single and was really hard to find in stores for a while. The album went through a couple labels and distributors but I think anyone who found it also soon fell in love. I later found their real first album "Von" which was also reissued years later. "()" came out in 2002 followed by "Takk" in 2005. Both these albums are fantastic. The band can really do no wrong. I have seen them about 4 times. Each of these show I hold up as some of my favorite shows. I might sound like I am giving them a bit too much praise. But I really do love this band and just can't stop saying it. I saw them at the Fillmore in San Francisco. Gillian Anderson from the X-Files was up in the private balcony reserved for celebrities and friends of the Fillmore. I sort of remember yelling out "Scully" in the middle of the show. I was of course much younger back then. I then saw them at some fancy auditorium on Wilshire in L.A. after I had just moved down there. Both these shows were amazing. But for the Takk tour I saw them in Oakland at the Paramount Theater. I can't really think of a more beautiful place to see them. I had heard wonderful things about the Paramount but had never been there until a week or so before the Sigur Ros show. I had actually just seen an amazing Dead Can Dance show there. Which is sort of weird since a "best of" Lisa Gerrard CD is finally coming out domestically today as well. But this show was the best of the Sigur Ros shows that I had seen. They played some of the songs behind a screen and had amazing visuals during the whole show.