It’s a rare album that can induce tears on a first listen, but this is it.Ī first person narrative beginning in the womb, a boy anticipates nativity with an awareness of transience, reticence, impatience, and the explosive violence of birth, followed by experiences of the comforting softness in his early sensations.
Ágætis Byrjun is an amazing breakthrough which has inspired dozens of bands-the reverberations are still being felt today. Not all the tunes on Ágætis Byrjun are as timeless and wonderful, but there's plenty to enjoy here. At over ten minutes, it's long for a pop tune, but the running time goes by in a flash because the music lulls you into a trance state. The breakout track is the title cut Svefn-g-englar, which steadily builds to an epic conclusion slowly dying away. It's more the ever so patient accrual of layers of bowed guitar, keyboards, strings and horns, all played legato, and how all of it is recorded through echo and reverb and other production tricks.
How do they pull it off? It sure isn't the melodies and the harmonies, which are standard issue. For sure, you can trace Sigur Ros' antecedents in My Bloody Valentine, Mogwai, and other similar post-rock bands, as well as ambient and industrial music, but the widescreen cinematic dreamscapes of Sigur Ros are unique to them. They are then taking a well deserved break before beginning work on new material.Ágætis Byrjun is a triumph of engineering and arrangement, but most of all, it's a triumph of imagination. The band celebrated the release of 'Takk.' with an extensive world tour, playing their largest shows to date, including a headline show at the Hollywood bowl. It entered at number 16 in the uk charts and at 27 in the us. Finally released in september 2005, 'Takk.' quickly became Sigur Rós' largest selling album to date and charted highly across the globe. 2004 was largely spent writing and recording the band's fourth album, 'Takk…' (thanks). they took a well-earned break that summer, after which they joined forces with Radiohead to write music for the modern dance piece split sides by Merce Cunningham, one of the band's numerous side projects since the release of ( ).
Early in 2003, Sigur Rós embarked on an extensive European and American tour which included legendary performances at the Hammersmith Apollo in London and Radio City Music Hall in New York city. The video garnered MTV's attention and was awarded the best video of 2003 at the MTV Europe Music Awards. The band's third video, 'untitled 1' (aka vaka), was directed by the highly respected Italian director and photographer Floria Sigismondi, and was released in february 2003. The second video, for viðrar vel til loftárása, was released in september 2001. the band's first video, svefn-g-englar, was released in june 2000. The band produced three videos from the first three albums two for songs from ágætis byrjun and one from ( ). At this point in their career, Sigur Rós had now sold over one million records worldwide. The first track from the album was released as a single in may 2003 and reached the #9 spot in America's Nielsen chart. The album sold well and even reached #52 on the American billboard chart. Sigur Rós released their third album in october 2002, entitled ( ), which came out to favourable reviews around the world. perhaps due to the hype in the american media, the shows were attended by many big name celebrities, somewhat to the band's bemusement. the band toured North America for the first time in april and may 2001, and the vast majority of the dates sold out straight away. large quantities of cash were offered, although in the end the band chose the deal which gave them most artistic freedom. this resulted in a frantic hunt by major US labels to secure the rights to their material in the states. The band attracted a huge critical acclaim throughout the world in the second half of 2000, particularly in America.
The album was originally released only in Iceland, but was discovered by Brighton's Fatcat records, who snapped the band up and released the album in the UK in august 2000. The band really found their feet with their second album, the masterpiece that is Ágætis byrjun (a good beginning). The first album, recently given a worldwide release for the first time, is called von (hope). they were later joined by Kjartan and when Ágúst left the band after the recording of Ágætis Byrjun in order to pursue a career in graphic design, he was replaced by Orri in 1999. The band were formed by Jónsi, Georg and original drummer Ágúst Ævar Gunnarssoin 1994.