Reykjavík Grapevine - 20.05.2011, Page 28

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The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 6 — 2011 Who would you rather see, Cyndi Lauper or Svartidauði?
Maybe a pairing of the two might be interesting!
An evening of extreme music on what
was probably the sunniest weekend
Iceland has seen so far this year? It does
seem a little incongruous, but once
we’re inside the dark, dank confines of
Kaffistofan the pleasant weather out-
side can easily be forgotten. Covered
windows, incense and walls daubed in
blood and symbols set the scene amply
enough. Things are about to get evil.
First up is AMFJ, an artist described
by this very publication as a “one-man
death march of genocidal sound de-
struction”. Seems pretty close to the
mark to me. Looping, hypnotic noise
with a bearded gent howling over the
top.
Next we have Abominor who seem
to have a nice old-school black metal
vibe going on. I can only say that they
seem to have this vibe because the
sound is so bad inside Kaffistofan. You
know when you watch a poorly re-
corded live video on YouTube on crappy
laptop speakers and you can barely
make out what’s going on? Well it basi-
cally sounded like that, except a hell of
a lot louder. It means that working out
what’s going on is a pretty damn hard
task because I could see the guitar-
ists move about on the fret-board but I
couldn’t hear it in my ears. All I can hear
is a wall of noise. This sucks because
Abominor seem to be pretty decent and
the drummer kicked up a nice groove. I
will check them out again if I have the
chance.
Gone Postal were in the same boat
with the poor sound, which is frus-
trating because when I saw them last,
at the Metal Battle at Sódóma a few
months back, they sounded rad. Seen
as Gone Postal’s repertoire isn’t all full-
throttle blasting it was a bit easier to tell
what’s happening though. They’ve got a
nice death metal thing going on.
And so onto Svartidauði’s vicious
black metal assault. Again, the set was
marred by bad sound. This meant that
a lot of their more intricate guitar work
was lost in the wall of noise and things
only became clear during songs’ slower
sections. One such section occurred at
the tail end of Svartidauði’s set and was
truly crushing. It sounded utterly ma-
levolent and made up for the frustration
that the sound had caused through the
night.
EVIL SOUND HALF-RUINS EVIL CONCERT
Music | Live review
Svartidauði, Gone Postal, Abominor and AMFJ at Kaffistofan. Saturday May 7.
CLyDE bRADFORD
RAkEL ERNA SkARpHéðINSDóTTIR
“You know when you watch a poorly recorded live
video on YouTube on crappy laptop speakers and
you can barely make out what’s going on? Well it
basically sounded like that, except a hell of a lot
louder ”
Cyndi Lauper? Really?
Have the girls that just wanted to
have fun in the ‘80s finally started
having fun?
When I first learned Cyndi
Lauper would be one of the
first international pop artists
to perform in Harpa, I was re-
ally surprised. Who would want to see
Cyndi Lauper? Shouldn't she just stick
to playing her hits over and over in Ve-
gas? Well, she keeps getting endlessly
nominated for Grammy awards, but
does anyone remember anything she’s
done since ‘85? She's doing celebrity
reality TV for crying out loud!
But maybe Cyndi shouldn't be get-
ting such a negative reaction from my-
self, as her body of work and impact on
pop-culture have never been as rel-
evant. Her hits are, of course, karaoke
staples, but it feels that today they have
a bigger purpose than being belted out
off-key at Cosmo-fuelled girls' nights
out.
From the nostalgic balladry of Ariel
Pink to the serious cultural criticism
of Arcade Fire (Cyndi performed two
songs with the Canadians recently, one
of hers and one of theirs), from ‘witch
house’ to ‘chill wave’ (where did these
horrible genre names come from?) it
seems the innovative side of pop cul-
ture is now all about paying artistic
homage to the queens of ‘80s pop. This
is especially interesting since they for a
long time seemed were viewed as more
of a joke than serious talents, the re-
sults of capitalist America taking over
the music business.
The loud synths and weird clothes
are no longer cool in a bubblegum, ‘80s
high school sense. They are becoming
serious, mature mainstream fashion.
Is it because the people who grew up
listening to this are now running show
business? Have the girls that just want-
ed to have fun in the ‘80s started having
fun again? Are they doing it right now?
It may help a little, but it seems too that
the joke is wearing thin. We have the
‘90s to make fun of now, and the pure
gold pop hits of the ‘70s and ‘80s are
climbing up the respect pillar, reach-
ing the best of the ‘50s and ‘60s. If you
look at Cyndi’s clothes in her stunning
'83 and '84 videos, you can see a re-
semblance to today's cuts, patterns and
items—even her iconic ‘shave-off-one-
side-of-your-hair’ look seems to have
caught on in fashion recently.
It feels like we are living in an age of
post-irony. The criticism of the materi-
alistic ‘80s has faded as people realise
that things haven’t gotten any better
in terms of material- and commercial-
ism. Instead, people are embracing
the highly ignored artistic and cultural
value of ‘cheesy’ synths (now: Yeezy
synths) and formulaic songwriting. Hip-
sters donning shiny jackets and vintage
‘80s sunglasses as an ironic statement
are becoming oddly relevant. Blasting
‘80s powerpop at parties will not bring
about giggly singing and ugly dancing,
but rather goosebumps and a strong
feeling of togetherness with everyone
in the room, as well as a good, loud,
feel-good sing-a-long.
It's a shame that Cyndi was dumped
into the same category as the one-hit-
wonders of the ‘80s, as she has power-
ful artistic charisma, owing a lot to the
likes of David Bowie (frivolous fash-
ion sense and great stage presence)
and Talking Heads (playful use of the
pop form), but her original charm had
drowned in negative talk of the ne-
farious decade she made her way in.
However, it’s starting to look like Ms.
Lauper will once more be viewed as a
true talent, and songs like the hitherto
unmatched ‘Time After Time’ will never
again be laughed at.
As far as her appearance in Harpa
goes, I have a feeling that the crowd
will be equal parts girls having fun,
nostalgic thirty- or fortysomethings,
hipster kids and music fans that are
slowly becoming proud of their guilty
love for ‘Time After Time’. I at least will
be in that last camp, enjoying the sound
of such powerful balladry in the state
of the art acoustics that our shiny new
glasshouse by the harbour has to offer.
Opinion | Music
péTUR EGGERTSSON