Reykjavík Grapevine - 07.06.2013, Page 12

So. We are ten. Free street rag Reykjavík
Grapevine is ten. WTF.
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I remember the first time I heard about The
Reykjavík Grapevine. It was the spring of
2003. I was drinking coffee in Ísafjörður,
and a friend of the publishers-to-be told
me about their plans to publish a free Eng-
lish-language street magazine and asked
if I wanted to write for them. I, a young,
spiteful and dumb Ísafjörður fish-gutter,
scoffed at the idea. “It will never work,”
I thought, while on the inside my heart
raged with jealousy for not having thought
of such a brilliant idea.
I found their third issue lying around in
Ísafjörður later that summer. “Boy I am so
glad I didn’t involve my noble self with this
fly-by-night bullshit idea,” I thought. “It’s
ugly and horrible and it will never work.” I
was still jealous, of course.
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Over the next couple of years, I ceremoni-
ously ignored Reykjavík Grapevine. Or, I
tried to. I wanted to hate it, I really did. I
wanted them to fail. They were stupid and
ugly and they were not me. Eventually,
my small town insecurities faded and I
got more settled in Reykjavík. I attended
concerts and went to bars. I made friends.
I explored.
Slowly, I started falling in love with the
city; the spirit, the shape, the geography;
its batshit crazy nightlife and its mostly
wonderful music scene—all the creative,
imaginative, impulsive, damaged, thought-
ful and outstanding young people who
make it up.
Simply put, the Reykjavík I fell in
love with was the Reykjavík depicted in
the Grapevine, by the outcasts and the ex-
pats. The one that took its music seriously
enough to discuss its negative aspects. The
one that hadn’t grown up with Icelandic
nature and was thus fascinated by it in a
way that my peers and I couldn’t fathom.
The one that wasn’t afraid to offend. The
one that was of Iceland, but always slightly
out of sync from the mainstream, perhaps
due to its target market of visitors. As a ter-
minal outsider, an eternal disagreer of the
world as depicted by mainstream media
and pop culture, I felt I had finally found a
medium that at times reflected my feelings
and opinions.
I started looking up to the writers and
editors and photographers and comic art-
ists (and I still do). I had found kindred
spirits, in a tourist magazine of all places.
Every day of publication I would grab a
copy at the Austurstræti ÁTVR along with
my weekly sixpack of student-grade beer
and read it over the weekend’s first pint. It
became a bit of a ritual. I often disagreed,
I sometimes was enraged, but I always
recognized the content as coming from an
honest place, that I had more to agree on
with the writers than not.
---
Eventually, I found myself working as a
staff journalist for the Grapevine (I have
no idea how this happened), and a little
later I was suddenly the magazine’s editor
(I’m still going “WTF”). It is the hardest,
most taxing job I have ever undertaken.
Yet, getting to stand on the shoulder of gi-
ants, working with enthusiastic writers and
photographers and designers and illustra-
tors (and getting to ask important questions
in a time when such questions desperately
needed asking)—nothing compares.
The average reader probably doesn’t
know the sheer amount of work and dedi-
cation it takes to create single issue of the
Grapevine. Of the freelancer sweating all
night in her apartment over an overdue in-
terview that just needs a little more work to
get right. The designer who works 48 hours
straight to make sure it is presentable. The
photographer on a last-minute drive to
Hafnarfjörður. It is always a labour of love,
and of passion, and it continues to show.
Anything that so many people pour
their hearts and minds and souls into has
to have some value. Of that I am sure.
For a humble street rag such as The
Reykjavík Grapevine, turning ten is an
incredible feat, a remarkable testament
to the undying love and tireless work its
founders, contributors and employees have
put into keeping it alive and well. For a
humble street rag such as The Reykjavík
Grapevine, turning ten also presents a con-
siderable challenge. One could reasonably
argue that any medium that reaches such a
milestone has become de facto institution-
alized through sheer persistence. Instead
of countering the norm, it might, even in its
continued opposition, become an integral
part of it—just another outlet that tells you
who to be and what to think, rather than a
venue to express or reflect on who you are
and what you think.
Fortunately, I don’t see this happening
any time soon. We are well staffed. We are
aware. It was never Grapevine’s idea to
write the rules: the whole thing was about
providing a venue to challenge them.
Happy birthday, The Reykjavík Grape-
vine. You’re an asshole, but I love you.
1 For some reason, “magnús þór
þorbergsson,” is the 13th most popular
search leading to Grapevine. He must be a
very mysterious teacher at the Iceland
Academy of the Arts and/or the article
that we must have written about him must
be loaded with SEO.
2 Skipping over “reykjavik news,”
which is a rather boring search, “iceland
porn” is the 15th most popular keyword
search. News that Iceland was trying to
ban porn must have really made a splash.
A similar search for “Icelandic porn” is
the 26th most popular one, but perhaps
these people are actually looking for
Icelandic porn. Who knows…
3 Skipping past a few more boring
searches, “iceland revolution” is the 21st
most popular one. This isn’t surprising
given how much attention Iceland got for
letting the banks fail, banging on pots and
pans, ousting its government, bringing in
a new one and last but not least, jailing its
bankers. Some of that is myth, by the way.
4 And, skipping past a few more, there
are searches for venues like “c is for
cookie reykjavik” in 24th and “bakkus
reykjavik” in 25th place. The former is a
pretty nice coffee shop and the latter is
one of the many bars in Reykjavík that no
longer exits.
5 Then there’s “seljavallalaug” in 27th
place. That’s the name of a pretty cool
swimming pool in south Iceland. It’s
tucked away at the foot of a mountain, a
bit off the beaten path behind a newer
pool, which is not nearly as much fun as
the old one.

6 Skipping past “reykjavik gravepine,”
because that’s just ridiculous, there’s
“icelandic sweaters made in china.” I’d
want to know if my super expensive
handmade Icelandic wool sweater were
really made in China, too.
7 Then comes “hemmi og valdi” and
“hemmi & valdi” in the 30 and 31st
place. We used to throw a concert series
there called Grapevine grassroots. It’s a
pretty cosy café.
8 After that comes “hugleikur
dagsson” in 32nd. If you don’t know him,
you should Google him and check out a
bunch of the comics he has made for us
through the years.
9 We know everyone loves Sigur Rós,
but it’s apparently thanks to the band’s
keyboard that fans are organically finding
their way to us. Indeed, “sigur ros casio
keyboard” is the 33rd most popular
search.
10 Finally, skipping over “Iceland
newspaper,” there’s “sigurður kjartan,”
a former intern and current contributor.
Now, I’m sure we can all agree that it’s
okay to Google ourselves every once in a
while, but THIS MANY TIMES, Siggi?
Out of 204,443 unique searches, your
name is the 35th most popular one. No
wonder the guy’s so busy all the time!
Still pretty high on the list after these
are searches for “sex in Iceland” and
“Iceland sex,” for which we should prob-
ably thank Oprah Winfrey, the marketing
department at Icelandair, Roosh Vörek
and Quentin Tarantino. The latter spoke
highly of “Icelandic women,” which is
another popular search (incidentally tied
with “Icelandic coffee”). Finally, a few
more after that include “troll stumble,”
which maybe goes to show that dys-
lexic people like Brian Pilkington books,
“huang nubo,” who desperately wants
to own land in Iceland and “tom cruise
Iceland,” which probably has something
to do with the fact that TomKat recently
split while he sojourned here.
Who knows how much of this has
to do with our content, other people’s
interests, or the ways of Google Panda
and now Penguin, but it’s certainly some
combination of the three.
It’s perhaps not surprising that the top 12 keyword searches leading people
to our website are variations of “The Reykjavík Grapevine.” That includes
“grapewine” of course, which is almost guaranteed to be the work of Iceland-
ers or foreigners misinformed by Icelanders who, after ten years, still think
we’re called “The Reykjavík Grapewine.” Will this poor nation ever learn to
differentiate their ‘v’s from their ‘double v’s? Probably not, but that’s all right
because we own the domain www.grapewine.is too.
Barring more direct searches for Grapevine or Grapewine, the following is
a list of the next ten most popular searches leading people to the site since we
started using analytics in 2009. We’re not sure what to make of it all, but it’s
semi-interesting anyway…
by Anna Andersen
Magnús Þór Who?
Googling your way to Grapevine
Haukur S. Magnússon is your friendly
neighborhood grocer Editor-in-chief
I HATE THE
REYKJAVÍK
GRAPEVINE
12The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 7 — 2013
First death threat
Our first taste of fame was followed
by the first death threats to mem-
bers of The Grapevine’s staff. Most
of these came from American Neo-
Nazis, but local Neo-Nazis from the
town of Grindavík soon joined the
party. They did not seem pleased
about the idea of a black woman
wearing the national costume. Get-
ting such threats in the middle of the
night via phone calls and text mes-
sages is no laughing matter, but we
still felt these indicated that we had,
well, done something right. Thank-
fully, none of these threats material-
ized. Later threats have been more
civil. Mostly.
First “gourmet”
coffee machine
As you may have noticed, coffee is
a huge part of our lives. It’s not as
if we are coffee connoisseurs, we
just like the feeling of caffeine rush-
ing through our veins. In 2004, we
struck a deal with a coffee machine
vendor. This machine has it all, it
grinds beans for each cup, you can
make lattés and cappuccinos (well,
you could at some point, today it
just makes regular coffee). The cof-
fee machine receives an honourable
mention as it is considered among
the oldest staff members of the
Grapevine.
First world famous
people on the cover
The second summer of publication
also saw the first world famous peo-
ple on the cover of the magazine.
First came Björk, of course, and for
the first time we used a photo not
taken by one of our own photog-
raphers for the cover. Next up was
Gerard Butler, who was in Iceland
in late summer 2004 shooting the
movie Beowulf & Grendel. Mr. But-
ler however, didn’t really achieve
world fame until a few years later,
more due to his abs as portrayed
in the movie '300' than his Icelandic
venture, which was, in all honesty, a
bit of a flop..
First election coverage
Iceland held elections in 2004, and
as would become customary, we
felt it was our duty to cover the
elections and interview all the can-
didates. The cover featured a man
dressed for the part of president
of Iceland, and who just happened
to be father to one of the staff. The
Continued
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