Reykjavík Grapevine - 17.06.2011, Síða 23

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Music | Review
(But not too late, I have to get up early)
The album lead-in is a raging ‘90s key-
board loop with promises of a record
best experienced while wearing over-
alls and watching some ebony merce-
nary on ‘Top of the Pops’ grind in front
of two nerds from Coventry. That turns
out to be a false promise, although
there is some shared ground between
FM Belfast and the raver pop. For one
thing, ‘Don’t Want To Sleep’ is very
much the opposite of the latest GusGus
album, which focuses on melodramatic
electronic anthems and craftsman-
ship—FMB have always been going for
something sloppier and goofier than
that. They don't worry too much about
musicianship (like the punks) or au-
thenticity (very unlike the punks) or
originality (like every bastard musician
dating back to the primordial soup). It
has some of that carefree day-glo of the
hoover synth days.
FM Belfast are a live band and their
live shows bring the house down like
clockwork despite having by all appear-
ances been dared on stage 10 minutes
earlier as a joke.
This makes it a little tricky to review
FM Belfast albums, as it's not the kind
of band you should form an opinion on
without having seen live. They are a live
band to the core (take note bands trying
to make a living with plummeting album
sales), a travelling circus of sloppiness
that spills into every corner of the room,
the idea of "stage presence" lost by
the time you notice half the audience
is on stage and half the band has gone
stage-diving in their underwear.
It's the kind of anarchy you nor-
mally associate with psych-rock or
gypsy punk (think Monotonix, Lightning
Bolt or Gogol Bordello) but dressed in
enough bowties and careless grins to
please a thousand in-laws.
The dogged refusal to be taken too
seriously—understandable when you
consider how easily this kind of naive
chaos can be corrupted (look at what
happened to Cansei de Ser Sexy)—com-
bined with the strong live focus makes
‘Don't Want to Sleep’ a tricky album to
review.
As mentioned, the album opens
with the misleading raver keyboard on
'Stripes'. It's fun song but a little samey
and without a clear chorus my guilty
feet fail to find that rhythm. Could be
much worse though.
The second song is called ‘Ameri-
can’ and sounds like a comment on
the relationship between Icelandic
and American culture. Unconnected
to anything, this reviewer was living in
a predominantly Jamaican neighbour-
hood of New York City while reviewing
the album and couldn't help but think
what a neighbour might think hearing
FM Belfast wafting out the window. I
can't say I have high hopes for Ameri-
cans learning to appreciate FM Belfast
on a large scale (let alone Caribbean-
Americans). Maybe this is why I find my
appreciation for FM Belfast wavering
occasionally. One moment I'm sucked
in and their music fills me with smiles
and sunshine, the next it all seems very
slight, jokey in that insular Scandinavian
indie way. FM Belfast may want to learn
American but they can't help but insist
on an accent that sometimes can come
off as a little off-putting. ‘American’
feels more unfinished than charmingly
raw. But you’re still interested in seeing
where this album goes.
In the song titled ‘Mondays’, things
pick up a little but it still sounds more
toned down record than their previous
effort—maybe this reviewer needs to
adjust his perception?
On ‘Believe’ it's starting to sound al-
most wistful. Wistful FM Belfast album?
Really?
With ‘We Fall’ it’s bordering on the
morose, I don’t get where they’re going
with this—does the album come with
IKEA directions for assembly? I guess
they could be taking the same road as
Gorillaz did on ‘Plastic Beach’, half-pop-
py ballads about the dangers of modern
living.
‘Noise’ is definitely growing on
me. It's cinematic, might work as the
soundtrack to an anime show about a
young boy learning about the true na-
ture of friendship by piloting a mech
into battle. Definitely ‘Plastic Beach’.
Quite a beautiful song, actually—re-
minds me a little of Moby's ‘Porcelain’
(ask your parents).
‘Vertigo’ is a total charmer—a lovely
horn-section that made me think of
Belle & Sebastian for no logical reason.
Made me feel so warm inside that I was
almost able to overlook the silliness of
the "Far away! Far away!" falsetto.
‘Don’t Want To Sleep’ reminds me of
the shift in Yeah Yeah Yeahs last two al-
bums. Definitely ‘I Don't Want To Go To
Sleep Either’ would have worked great
on the ‘Where The Wild Things Are’
soundtrack—both in terms of melody
and lyrics (such as they are). It’s by far
the catchiest song on the album. Look
forward to being sold fruit-themed
electronics or affordable compact cars
to this tune before the year is over.
‘Happy Winter’ is a grower not a
show-er. Drama, monotonous beat,
echoing vocals. The only one still get-
ting plays on my stereo.
All the elements are there though,
the two syllable song titles, shout-along
lyrics, dirt-simple melodies. Makes one
wonder how long they’ll get away with
it. I guess as long as they can convince
us that they're having as much fun as we
are, they should be fine for a while. Sure
there are wistful lyrics about bringing
people pain, falling down, heartbreak,
deja vu, getting lost and driving off into
the distance. But at least you're with
your friends while you're driving to your
far-away place—plus you're learning
a foreign language which sounds like
sound advice when moving to far-away
places.
It's an album that took some figuring
out, but with his as so much art it's not
about what you do as much as what you
don't do, and FM Belfast managed to
avoid a lot of easy mistakes. The sound,
the lyrics, their appearance, the live
shows... it all fits seamlessly together
without feeling pre-packaged. They are
playing with the feel and texture of the
music but the basics have stayed the
same. Not everything works and they
don't always pull off the sombre kid-
ult reflecting on the future, but there's
enough charm and interesting ideas
to carry on these beautiful shambles.
‘Don't Want To Sleep’ has a hint of the
second album blues, but FM Belfast
have managed to avoid the jejune for
another season and we're still in love.
-RAGNAR EGILSSON
FM Belfast
Don't Want To Sleep
fmbelfast
Paint your bowties black—FM Belfast
are hung over and loving it!
selves and when you do that people will
be carried with you. At that first gig,
the audience started singing along,
which never happens the first time a
band plays. What is so incredible about
them, both today and when they first
started, is this unbounded happiness
and joyous manner they have. I hope it
isn't whittled off them by all the work
they're doing now."

THE ROAD (IN A NON-CORMAC
MCCARTHY SENSE)
From these chaotic beginnings a pro-
fessional band has emerged. In 2010
they were on tour for ten months out
of the year. According to Árni Rúnar:
"It looks like this year will be the same.
We have a three-week holiday right now
and then a short holiday in August, but
the rest of 2011 is all booked. That's a
lot. Right now the most difficult part
is starting, the festivals. They're so
far apart that we'll be f lying so much
that we'll end up rather spent. Though
right now we're feeling pretty good. In
the fall and winter we drive more, four
hundred kilometres per day. That isn't
as tiring as f lying."
With all that work and all that trav-
elling, things sometimes go wrong. At
a recent London gig there was a near di-
saster that was averted, as Lóa explains:
"We were in London and a bag that I
was supposed to take care of went miss-
ing. It had a MacBook, recording equip-
ment, lights, an iPhone and an endless
amount of stuff. But then, an hour af-
ter it had vanished, this happy man in
a Bob Marley t-shirt walks in carrying
the backpack and asks: 'Is your name
Lóa?' He had found the bag, which I
had left on the pavement in East Lon-
don, in some moment of madness. I
don't know how I did it."
Árni Rúnar tells her not to beat
herself up about it: "We were all sleep-
deprived wrecks. Don't worry about it.
The guy had seen the bag on the street,
walked into the bar it was outside of
and asked: 'There's a backpack here,
aren't you gonna do something about
it?' The bartenders did nothing so he
took the bag with him to see if he could
find the owner. Half a million krónur's
worth of equipment, and he got it to
us, this lovely man. Something like
that doesn't happen usually". Árni Vil-
hjálmsson added: "We were walking in
circles for twenty minutes like we were
having a manic episode".
Every once in a while during their
tours they get little breaks. Árni Rúnar
mentions a vacation day they had re-
cently: "We were in the Alps eating fon-
due with donkeys. At the end of one of
our tours we were driving to Strasbourg
from Neuchatel in Switzerland. Our
driver and tour manager had planned
a trip without us knowing. Suddenly
we're driving up this mountain, and
then we're on a gravel road and we end
up far up a mountain, with an amazing
view. There's a restaurant in a log cabin
and we go in there, eat fondue and look
out over the Alps. It's very rare when
we're travelling so much that there's
any time. We're always in a hurry to get
to the next venue to do a sound check,
then sleep before the show, then the
concert, then back to sleep, then back
to driving".
"We're not a band that parties a
lot", says Árni Rúnar. "Our party is on
stage. We hibernate in between. We try
to save up our energy for the shows,
like it's a sport". Árni Vilhjálmsson
says: "Once a promoter in Denmark
was stressed out over how calm we
were before the concert, and got even
more worried when he saw we weren't
drinking". Árni Rúnar adds: "It doesn't
suit us to be drunk on stage"
At the end of the interview Örvar,
the fourth member, calls Árni Rúnar.
The three core members ask him if he
wanted to add something to the end of
the article. Örvar says: "Fellow country-
men, let our zeal not vanquish beauty".
I ask if that was FM Belfast's message
to the world. He replies: "Yes, but also
I'm really excited to see that sentence
translated into English".
23
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 8 — 2011
TWIN PEAKS