Today has been a day, totally dominated by music, that's no bad thing of course, I've really enjoyed it, and now at 1.15am the day is pretty much over.
On the way home from work a few days ago I heard a Radio 1 DJ comment that Sigur Rós had been he and his wife's favourite band during his wife's pregnancy. A bit of an unusual comment perhaps, but I made a mental note to listen to the album Takk... which I had downloaded previously, just for the track Hoppipolla which was featured on the trailer to the BBC nature series Planet Earth.
So, this morning my day started normally; wake up too late, rush around to get ready for work, then jump in the car and drive to work. As planned once I'd set off I put on Takk... to listen to on my journey.
I'm not sure what I was expecting, but by the time I got to work I knew I had found a real gem of an album, and one that somewhat frustratingly, I had owned all along!
As some of you may know, I am going through my music collection and buying the CDs of anything that I've either copied from people or downloaded. I knew that this album was so good, I was going to have to listen to it properly over the weekend, and that meant I was going to have to take a trip into Slough town centre at lunch time and buy a copy.
Before lunch I did a bit of research on the internet to find out some background information on Sigur Rós, and also to find out if there were any other albums that I should be looking for from them.
According to the press, Takk... is arguably the band's best work, but I don't always believe what I read so I will be listening to the other albums as well.
One recommendation was the new film by Sigur Rós, released earlier this month, called Heima. The film is basically a documentary, which follows the band around as they perform 13 special, free, un-publicised concerts for the public in the small towns and the countryside around Iceland.
I watched the trailer for this film here and was instantly entranced; the combination of the unique landscape of their homeland of Iceland, and the lilting vocals of Jón þor Birgisson was spectacular. I had to buy a copy of this too.
In HMV, there were two versions of the DVD, a standard and a special edition, which came with a 116 page book of photos taken during the making of the film.
I selected the special edition, which was rare for me, but I was enjoying the music so much, I had to have the best copy available. It's a shame there isn't an HD-DVD version of the film, but at least this one does come with a DTS soundtrack.
After work I had already planned to go and watch a performance from the Watoto childrens Choir at Greyfriars church in Reading with a friend of mine. This started at 7.30, so I just had enough time to drop my car off at home and get a lift to the performance.
Watoto is a project set up by an American Christian couple in Uganda to give help and support to orphan children who's parents have died of either AIDS / HIV or in the conflicts taking place in the north of the country. It is estimated that 50 million children are orphans in Africa as a result of the AIDS / HIV epidemic. Although it's just a drop in the ocean, the Watoto project currently gives housing, education, and hope to 7,200 of these children, and their aim is to increase this to 10,000 by the end of this year. More information on the project can be found here.
The performance from the childrens choir was great fun, the enthusiasm that this kids had was fantastic, and made the prim and proper English reserve look all the more ridiculous as the audience was encouraged to dance along with them to a couple of songs.
After the performance, we stopped in at our local pub, the Calleva for a quick drink, then I went back home to watch Heima...
This DVD is just as good as I thought and hoped it would be. I am still amazed at how the live recordings sound so good, the timing that this band have when they play together is like nothing I've ever heard. The talent that all the musicians have is exceptional, effortlessly playing a wide range of instruments, from Electric guitars with a bow, to an organ made from peices of rock collected from a landslide.
Towards the end of the film, the band members describe the way it feels when they're performing as though they're floating, the bassist Georg Holm even said that he got to the end of the concert and he couldn't remember playing, it had just happened.
It's rare that you hear a band so well connected as a group, so unique, and so creative as Sigur Rós. I'm very much looking forward to hearing the other albums.
Agaetis Byrjun is probably their best to date. They are an amazing group. Their music continues to blow me away everytime I hear a new song or listen to one of their CDs I haven't played in a while. Hope you enjoy and appreciate them as much as I have.
Posted by: Changa | 11/16/2007 at 08:27 PM