Reykjavík Grapevine - 12.01.2007, Qupperneq 34

_REYKJAVÍK_GRAPEVINE_ISSUE 01_007_REVIEWS/MUSIC/LIVE
There was a nice cosy atmosphere when I
stepped into Tjarnarbíó. Candles were burn-
ing, lamps were lit and foreign exchange
students, who looked like philosophy ma-
jors, gave the place a cool underground
vibe. I had been told that this concert was
a “woollen sweater thing”. When people
mention the woollen sweater my brain proj-
ects a blinking neon sign that reads preten-
tiousness. I own a woollen sweater so I was
pretty excited.
The place wasn’t packed, which painful-
ly reminded me of the fact that Icelanders’
idea of culture is to watch the X-Factor. If it
isn’t Mugison or Sigur Rós we don’t give a
shit. But Amiina have long played with Sigur
Rós, so as those thoughts sprang to my
head people kept streaming in. Apparently,
like during most of my sexual encounters, I
had come too early.
Ólöf Arnalds stepped onstage and apol-
ogised for forgetting one of her guitars.
She ran offstage and in a flash was ready
to play. Not a guitar but the Hawaiian na-
tional instrument, the ukulele. I’ve always
dreamt of seeing a woman playing guitar
well and singing. My dreams were fulfilled.
The closeness that Ólöf generated was so
intense I felt she was in my bed. I whispered
in her ear “keep playing and I’ll love you”.
If there are any feminists reading this who
take offence and consider me gender biased
I’ll have you know I would review Pétur Ben
the same way.
At one point Ólöf forgot her lines and
asked Kjartan, Sigur Rós’s keyboard player,
if he remembered the lyrics. He wasn’t pay-
ing attention but Ólöf came through at last
minute. It was things like these that made
this experience feel intimate. I felt at home.
And that is what concerts should feel like.
Families should be like a great concert and
great concerts should feel like family.
Amiina started with quirkiness fitting
of members of the Icelandic cultural elite.
Noise some would say. Others would call it
music. To me it was just foreplay. Soon the
noise turned into joy and out of chaos came
harmony. The tree huggers and I were feel-
ing it. An electric cello, violins and instru-
ments I didn’t even have names for, formed
a coalition. mixed with glasses of water and
even a saw made it a night to remember.
I was starting to think that the girls
weren’t gonna sing, but soon the small
mythical creatures started to harmonise
perfectly. Being a feminist myself, I loved
the fact that I was watching a world-class
concert and both the acts were performed
solely by women. At one point the four
Amiinas were all playing violin family instru-
ments and I was loving it. I don’t know what
“amiina” means but from now on, “amiina”
will be a female word for soul to me. I think
the word amiina kind of sums up the experi-
ence.
Amiina: The Word for the
Female Soul
Text by Helgi Valur Photo by Skari
Who: Amiina
Where: Tjarnarbíó
When: December 7, 2006
I had been looking forward to seeing The
Brian Jonestown Massacre perform for the
longest time. Throughout the years, their al-
bums have given me hours of enjoyment and
some of their songs have touched me in a
way most rock songs do not.
What I did not look forward to, however,
was the sight of a dead-drunk dude wander-
ing around a stage, crying out for bottles
of vodka while his bemused band members
tried to seem less embarrassed than they
obviously were (save for recently returned
tambourine-man Joel Gion, who managed
to look completely disinterested at all times).
Sadly, this was exactly what the main part of
BJM’s set amounted to. Endless disappoint-
ment.
After what seemed like an eternity of the
band plugging in and tuning up, and even-
tually tuning out, Newcombe handed out
salt pastilles to the adoring crowd before a
familiar drone sounded and the show com-
menced. And for a good 20 minutes, all went
according to plan. They played classics, and
they played them well, the crowd danced
and folks sang along. At its best their music
grabs you by the nerve endings and drags
you along.
Then Newcombe wanted some vodka.
The intervals between songs got increas-
ingly longer as the show went on. Various re-
quests for drinks, tuning up, handing out salt
pastilles, and looking bored while the crowd
got increasingly thin, dragged on for all too
long. While every BJM fan knows that the
band has a reputation for rowdy onstage be-
haviour, fighting among themselves, baiting
the audience, I refuse to believe that’s what
they all came to see. That would be under-
estimating the music – which is good at its
worst, enchanting at its best – and its fans.
Maybe BJM were just moving in on a
five-hour set, something that would have
evened the bullshit/music balance to a nice
equilibrium. That was not to be, however,
for the venue closed at one and pulled the
plug as BJM prepared to go into their next
song. Alas, no one had apparently informed
them of Iceland’s drinking laws, so they nev-
er managed to play the evening’s purported
set. Too fucking bad.
Decadence has for long been a staple of
rock music. It’s part of the reasons it’s good.
Drinking, drugs, fighting and unprotected
sex probably amount to about 75 percent of
why people like certain types of rock ‘n’ roll;
watching someone live out hedonistic, self-
destructive fantasies can provide catharsis
and a sense of cool essential to the type of
rock BJM play. But, goddammit, they need to
play it too. It’s not enough to stand around
onstage, drinking and looking cool. If that
was all the audience were after, they could
just as well have saved some money by go-
ing to Kaffi Stígur to watch the local bums
cavort.
You Could Have Had It
So Much Better
Text by Haukur S. Magnússon Photo by Katla Gunnarsdóttir
Who: The Brian Jonestown Massacre,
Where: NASA
When: November 29, 2006