Reykjavík Grapevine - 06.08.2004, Page 28

by Sindri Eldon
Is it really so revolutionary to sit here waiting and expecting some beautifully life-chang-
ing art reinvention to arrive, heralded by trumpets and bagpipes? I was at a very depress-
ing party a few weeks ago, where I felt my apathy and hedonism slide into a deep concern
for my generation´s mark on the history tablets. I was in a downstairs bedroom watching a
good friend of mine while he was drumming on the host´s silver Yamaha drums.
Revolution or social extinction?
H
.S
.
H
.S
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Drum Solo B1
at
Gallery KlinK & Bank
by Jónas Moody
Lortur, a collective of filmmakers
and other artists, will open their
biennial show, Trommusóló B1, this
Friday, August 6th at 5pm in Gal-
lery KlinK & Bank, Brauturholt 1.
During the two-day event a myriad
of bands will perform including
Amina, Forhúð forsetans (trans:
The President´s foreskin), Helmes
og Dalle, Kimono, Skakkamanage,
the Zukakis Mondiano Project, and
Útburðir. On Friday evening the art
show will open, which features the
work of young artists from Iceland,
Denmark, and the US. The work on
display represents all media includ-
ing painting, photo, drawing, instal-
lations, sculpture and, of course,
video. In addition, on Saturday
there will be a series of performance
pieces beginning at 3pm. To mark
the occasion, a catalogue of the show
will be made available in which each
artist has one page to do whatever
he or she wishes. None of the artists
have seen what the others have done
for the book so it should be a sur-
prise for all involved. Of course the
namesake of the series will make an
appearance: an open drum set will be
available for any and all who wish to
make their debut. “We just like this
form of music,” Ragnar Bragason,
the event coordinator, explains, “A
drum solo is a nice thing. Everybody
wants to do a solo.”
The Lortur Group has garnered
quite a bit of attention locally for
their short films and have now begun
to branch out into the international
film festival circuit. The thrust of
the group is embodied in its name.
The group’s statement explains, “In
Icelandic Lortur means shit, or even
a pile of shit. But an older mean-
ing of the word is also food. More
accurately; food that one must chew
before swallowing. And if those
two opposite meanings of the same
word are given more speculation,
then one could come to the result
that food and shit is the same thing.”
The statement later explains that the
process undertaken by an audience,
having to “chew” and “digest” their
work, plays heavily in their design.
“The viewer must put some effort
in the consumption.” What’s more,
Lortur is quite clear that they do not
want to exclude anything from their
work. “There are a lot of subjects and
styles in art that only a few talk or
think about because it is considered
low culture or trash - ugly and taste-
less.” The Lortur group take these
very subjects on as their art.
Geno Sydal will be opening up for 50 Cent on August
11th: “I think we’re going to steal the show, honestly,”
he says.
We sit in a clean and unusually sparse old house of
Laugavegur, built by Geno’s great grandfather. The
contents of the room include an iPod, an enormous
English language dictionary, three notes pads, two
comics from the library, and a hatchet.
Geno: I haven’t heard anybody here do stuff like mine.
Grapevine: Yeah, I’d agree. It’s a bit smoother.
Geno: It’s the delivery. Here they have good flow and
good rhymes, but I haven’t heard good delivery.
GV: The new single from Quarashi?
Geno: Yeah, MC Tiny has the best delivery in Ice-
land. But then the chorus.
GV: It is a shame.
Geno: So much of the hip hop here sounds boring
to me, honestly. Usually if I hear something I’m just
waiting for it to end. That’s why I went to Norway.
(which is where you´d go to escape boring hiphop
-ed.)
GV: Is this your first show since you came back?
Geno: The 50 Cent show will be my coming out
party. We got a great crew coming. Dancers. I’ll be
up there with Hinir from Huxin, that’s the future of
Icelandic hip hop.
GV: Then what? What are you going to do after the
show?
Geno: Then I leave for LA. I grew up in LA. I came
out here in ´94 with my brother.
GV: So you were here when hip hop first got started.
In 1999, I’ve been told.
Geno: With Rottweiler? I was here for that. That was
big, but there was always a scene, it just got bigger
when that came out.
GV: So the Battle of the MCs isn’t just an 8 Mile rip
off?
Geno: Actually, that was here before. I mean, after
that movie everybody is a rapper, but that battle has
been around for a while.
GV: But you’re not competing?
Geno: No reason to. If you respond in English, you’re
gonna lose. And every battle I see, the judges are in
the same crew as the people battling. And somehow
the people from the same crews end up winning.
by Bart Cameron
Return of an MC
I have always admired him, always found him to have
a mysterious magnetism that surpasses his general ami-
ability. And sitting there, watching him, hypnotized by his
fraying dreadlocks swinging as he drunkenly attempted
the drum fill to Nirvana´s In Bloom, I of course realized
what it was: he represented everything I recognized my
native generation by. He had it all; the throwback taste, the
sporty-but-not-sport clothes, the intense desire to socialize
but the quiet intensity of a loner, you know, that sort of turn
of the century hippie who believes everyone can get along
provided everyone is heard. But most important of all was
his lack of direction. He liked music, but that scene just
wasn´t for him. He was a fair athlete, but organized sport
bored him. He had no discerable criticisms and no obvious
passions besides getting stoned or drunk or having a good
time. At the same party, I heard someone complain that
his best friend was giving too many speeches, and that his
need to make the night memorable was preventing it from
being fun. My girlfriend agreed with the complainer, saying
that she really wanted to dance. I jolted upstairs to hear the
speech, and it was indeed very boring stuff.
“I just wanted to say how thankful I am for being here
with all these great people, and I just wanted to remind
everyone how lucky we are to live at such a time, when
complete strangers give one an oppertunity to come to their
house and have such a wonderfully enjoyable experience.”
It struck me as something the captain of a sinking ship
might say, of someone who knows his final oppurtunity to
make a difference is running out. He is too obsessed with
giving his time significance to actually experience it.
And maybe this is the revolution everyone is really wait-
ing for. The death of the kind of person who entails any
signifigance whatsoever to what is going on around him.
Perhaps it is people like The Drummer and My Girlfriend
who represent the first of the new breed, people that don´t
care which album is best, or if they will remember what
happens tonight, or if they will ever make a difference.
The people who are always saying that it is time for
something new are the ones who will fall when nothing
happens. Their time is simply over. It is not revolution that
is coming, but social extinction. The only choices are adapt
or fall into a rut that will end with social exile and a lifetime
of bitterness. Because one day the happy-go-lucky genera-
tion will be running not only the country, but the world, by
the looks of it.
H
.S
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IF YOU HAVE TO DO IT
DO IT AT CELTIC
UPCOMING
EVENTS
Hverfisgötu 26
For information or orders call
511 3240
WeekendAugust6-7th
Upstairs:
Troubadour Ómar Hlynsson
Downstairs:
Troubadour Garðar Garðarsson
WeekendAugust13-14th
Upstairs:
Troubadour Eva Karlotta
Downstairs:
Coverband Spilafíklarnir
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