Reykjavík Grapevine - 18.05.2012, Blaðsíða 22

22
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 6 — 2012
Visit www.reykjavikmusicmess.com for a full line-up.
Download your free sampler at www.grapevine.is.
BOB CLUNESS
ALÍSA KALYANOVA
BOB CLUNESS
KIMI
Yggdrasill • Rauðarárstíg 10
Phone: 562 4082 • Fax: 561 9299
e-mail: shop@yggdrasill.is
shop organic in Iceland
If you want to
Yggdrasill is the place to go
Yggdrasill offers a wide range of premium quality, certified organic products,
including a variety of organic fruits and vegetables. We are located down town,
next to "Hlemmur", one of the two main bus terminals in Reykjavík.
Pioneer in delivering organic products for 25 years
Music | Mess Music | Interview
Ahh, the arrival of summer. In Iceland
this usually means several things—
longer days, leaves on the trees, peo-
ple walking around in t-shirts, and this
year, more snow!
But weather aside, we have not one but
TWO summer music festivals on our May
calendar. The inaugural Reykjavík Live
festival will be wrapping up as this paper
hits the streets, and then on May 25–26,
we welcome the second annual Reykjavík
Music Mess, which sounds like it’s going
to be a leaner and meaner affair than last
year.
Festival organiser and Kimi Records
maestro Baldvin Esra Einarsson says les-
sons have been learned. “The first year
was too big,” he explains. “Basically festi-
vals are supposed to start small and then
slowly grow, but Reykjavik Music Mess #1
was too big for a first edition alternative
music festival.”
With one festival under his belt and a
smaller line-up this year, Baldvin is looking
forward to The Mess: “The line up is put
together from lesser known acts, but it is
in no way worse, artistically. We’re also set
for the weekend of Eurovision as a viable
alternative for the few people that don't
watch Eurovision. People like me!”
A Fine
Mess
We’re In...
The New Local Hotshots: Tilbury
The Reykjavik Music Mess returns
to muck around with our ears
and other senses as well
One of the hotly anticipated local acts
at this year’s Music Mess is Tilbury.
Originally founded by þormóður dags-
son as a solo project in 2010, Tilbury is
now a band with members hailing from
groups such as Hjaltalín, Valdimar, Sin
Fang and Amiina. Their debut single,
“Tenderloin,” which can be found on
their newly released debut album ‘Ex-
orcise,’ has been creating buzz that’s
impressive, even for our local music
scene.
So þormóður, you started off as a solo
project called Formaður dagsbrúnar.
When did it change from that to the
shining act we see before us now?
I remember feeling embarrassed and
ashamed after performing as Formaður
Dagsbrúnar with my cousin and guitarist,
Örn Eldjárn. I knew it wasn’t good enough
and I knew it could sound better. That was
two years ago and in the meantime Örn
introduced me to Kristinn Evertsson who
he had been studying composition with at
the Iceland Academy of the Arts. Kristinn
had been experimenting with synthesiz-
ers and electronic sounds and when we
invited him to our rehearsal studio and
played the songs I knew right away that
we were on the right track. Shortly after
that we got together with bassist Guð-
mundur Óskar Guðmundsson and drum-
mer Magnús Tryggvason Eliassen and it all
came together nicely. It was a quite a long
process, but fruitful.
Icelandic music is known for collabo-
rations/side projects, yet Tilbury has
been described as a bit of a ‘super-
group.’ How do see yourselves as a
unit? Are you like the Traveling Wil-
burys at all?
We are a busy bunch, involved in other
projects, but we really enjoy playing to-
gether when we meet. I bet the Traveling
Wilburys had assistants and companies
that organised their practice schedule. We
on the other hand have Google Calendar.
And it works great. And since we are talk-
ing about the Traveling Wilburys, I have to
say Wravelling Tilbury’s.
Good name! You’re named after the
short story ‘Tilbury’ by þórarinn El-
djárn and your single, “Tenderloin,”
contains some lovely footage from the
film of the same name. What is it about
this story that draws you all to it?
I saw the ‘Tilbury’ film when I was about
eight years old and some of the scenes
had a strong impact on my fragile little
mind. And growing up I wasn’t really sure
that the memories I had from the film were
from an actual film or just a weird night-
mare. It wasn’t until much later that I found
a clip from the film on YouTube that I had
it confirmed.
I’m also fascinated by how Þórarinn
Eldjárn combines this strange Icelandic
folklore with the wartime period in Iceland,
a period when British and American cul-
tures collide with a rather primitive Icelan-
dic culture. When those fine looking and
well-mannered men came to this isolated
country, all dressed in uniforms, a whole
new world was revealed to the Icelandic
nation—a cleaner, more sophisticated and
cool world, along with all the candy and
upbeat music.
Your debut album has some touching,
alt-pop sentiments, yet it’s named ‘Ex-
orcise’ and has a cartoon of a wartime
couple represented by ectoplasmic
goo. So you feel that underneath such
civility and sweetness in society there
is a lot of nastiness trying to get out
there?
I like bittersweet melodies. And I like
films by David Lynch, where there is of-
ten a sense of some demonic undercur-
rent creeping beneath a pretty surface.
We wanted to capture this mood on our
album, to have a melody imply something
sweet and then the lyrics or soundscape
imply something completely different.
The “exorcism” on the album is a sort of
catharsis, like most honest music is; it’s
healthy to get it all out.
For those who are wavering about
going to the Reykjavík Music Mess,
whom would you recommend (apart
from yourselves) that they should go
and see?
I’m really looking forward to seeing Cheek
Mountain Thief. And it’s always a pleasure
to see Snorri Helgason.