Reykjavík Grapevine - 26.09.2014, Síða 26

How did you two first meet?
Steini: We were working together in
a skate park.
Sölvi: On top of Faxaskáli [a ware-
house built in the 1960s. It operated
first in regards to imports and exports,
then as a fish market (and briefly as
an office space for Reykjavík Grape-
vine), until it was torn down in Sep-
tember of 2006], where Harpa is now.
I was working at a community centre.
Somebody was aware that I kind of
knew these guys, Steini and his skater
friends. “Won’t you oversee the skate
park?” they asked. I said, “Sure.”
Steini: It was me and a couple of
other guys overseeing the skate park.
Basically skaters don’t have a reputa-
tion of being trustworthy, so Sölvi was
brought in to maintain some level of
order, to make sure we weren’t smok-
ing too much pot. [Sölvi laughs]
Sölvi: That’s exactly what it was. You
were just getting stoned out of your
minds. The City of Reykjavík felt very
uncomfortable about that whole situ-
ation.
Steini: We were supposed to open at
ten in the morning. We never opened
before one p.m.
Sölvi: We founded Brettafélag Reykja-
víkur [Reykjavik Skating Association]
there.
Did your duties of keeping pot-
smoking to a minimum transfer
over with you into the music ca-
reer?
Steini: We started hanging out, par-
tying together. Sölvi started letting me
listen to beats he was making. I had
started to work on lyrics and...
Sölvi: “Keep pot-smoking to a mini-
mum.”
[Both laugh]
Sölvi: That’s exactly what I was doing.
Steini: And you were somewhat suc-
cessful. In the skate park, anyway.
[Sölvi laughs]
What sort of a concept did you guys
have for your latest video?
Sölvi: We wanted it to be in black and
white. We wanted to reference our
hometown, Reykjavík. We wanted it
to be raw and cool. It’s somewhat of
a circle. Steini is a skater. We wanted
that, but we wanted HIM riding. We’re
not just latching onto some skater kid,
trying to look cool. We thought about
that Jim Jarmusch, black and white
‘Coffee and Cigarettes’ look. Eillífur [di-
rector of “Rock On”] instantly got what
the texture, the shots, what the editing
should be like. We went through some
skate videos.
Steini: I’m always watching skate vid-
eos.
Sölvi: They’ve become more epic. Back
in the day they were focused more on
just tricks.
We were very adamant that we
wanted one epic shot of guys riding at
a signature place in Reykjavík, like Hall-
grímskirkja...
Steini: ...in the background.
Sölvi: We wanted... what were we
watching? The dude in L.A., riding?
Steini: Austyn Gillette. A film called
“Quik” with Austyn Gillette. Really cool.
That type of mood is insanely cool.
Sölvi: Incredibly cool. And we wanted
to capture that.
“I came up listening
to the classics…”
So you’re referencing the past, and
the west side of Reykjavík (Vestur-
bærinn)?
Steini: We’re all from the west side, of
course.
Sölvi: Me, Eillífur and Steini are all
basically from the place where we’re
walking in the beginning [of the video].
That’s our neighbourhood.
Steini: We’re all raised in Vestur-
bærinn and central Reykjavík. I don’t
know how many times I’ve rode down
Skólavörðustígur on a skateboard.
Sölvi actually came
up with the idea of
having a bunch of
guys skating from
Hallgrímskirkja, down
Skólavörðustígur,
Are those all guys
you know?
Steini: Yeah. I know
most of those boys. Good skater types.
Sölvi: We got Agzilla in there.
Steini: Aggi Agzilla, a drum and bass
legend...
Sölvi: ...from the 90s. We wanted to get
some gritty, menacing dudes.
Steini: Aggi is the man who brought
hip-hop clothing to Iceland. The dude
who imported the first rap albums. The
dude who brought drum and bass [mu-
sic].
Sölvi: This isn’t really something that
most people will notice unless they
know about it beforehand. And why
should you, you know? But it lends...
Steini: ...more credence.
Sölvi: We also had this portrait motif of
people. It’s completely by accident that
there isn’t a single girl in the video.
Steini: I didn’t realize that until you told
me yesterday.
What about the cargo truck and the
vinyl albums?
Steini: That’s because Egill [Tiny] says,
in the lyrics: “I came up listening to the
classics/that’s how I preach this.” We
all listened to '90s hip hop [growing
up]. So the idea was to cover [the in-
side of] the van with legendary albums
from the '90s. Wu-Tang, Dr. Dre, Snoop,
Mobb Deep. All that
stuff. The idea is to
give our respects to
the hip hop scene of
the 1990s.
And in the song
itself you sample
EPMD’s “You Gots
To Chill”
Sölvi: That’s a clear-cut reference to
'90s hip hop. These references are so
important. They are the benchmarks
that we work from. But I was also trying
to reference myself. The rapping starts
right away. Just like in “Switchstance”
[Quarashi’s first single, released in
1996]. Eyfi works the songs structure
into the video. The verses are all differ-
ent. It starts off with a beat in the first
one. The second verse with Steini has a
piano in it. Then there’s this punk rock
in the third and final one. Eyfi somehow
manages to deal with these different
moods in the video. It starts off with us
walking on the west side of town, and
then Steini comes in with the skating,
then it all ends in this biker-mosh-pit
thing. And the black and white look
combines all these elements.
Music video veterans
There isn’t any one person within
the group who says: “We’re making
a video that’s like THIS...”
Sölvi: No. It’s much more a discussion
within the group. The music... That’s
very clear-cut in regards to what our
roles are. The videos are much more of
collaboration within the group. It has
to be that way. The person performing
in front of the camera has to believe in
what he’s doing. If he doesn’t, it’s just
not going to happen, you know?
Steini: If you have some dude who’s
not happy with what he’s doing—it’ll
come off looking like he’s out of place.
Sölvi: You see a lot of music videos
where it is apparent that the musicians
feel out of place. Kind of like they can’t
be bothered with what they’re doing.
Something’s just OFF. And the thing is
just dead. There has to be some spark
there. Because it’s so silly. You’re lip-
syncing for the camera. Twenty people
looking at you. It’s really ridiculous.
Steini: “Do something fun. Do some-
thing cool.” This is our fourteenth, or
fifteenth video. I’d say we’re pretty well
equipped for handling this kind of thing
at this point. At least you’re not shy
about doing shit in front of the camera.
Having been away from making mu-
sic videos for ten years now, were
you surprised at how much can be
done with very little resources?
Steini: I had complete faith in the boys
making the video. But it ended up being
ten times better than I ever could have
possibly imagined.
Sölvi: That’s what it’s like, when you
have a director with vision, man!
Quarashi is an Icelandic rap group founded in the mid-90s
by Sölvi Blöndal, Steinar "Steini" Fjeldsted and Höskuldur
“Hössi” Ólafsson (Hössi left the group in early 2003, and
was succeeded by Egill “Tiny” Thorarensen). The band re-
cently resurfaced with “Rock On,” their first single after a
nine-year hiatus. We spoke with founding members Sölvi
and Steini about their history as a band and what thoughts
went into making their latest music video.
Photos
Axel Sigurðarson
Words
Óskar Bragi
26 The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 15 — 2014MUSIC
Black And White,
Beat Makin’
Ronin
The Quarashi boys are
back with a vengeance
“We all listened to 90s
hip-hop [growing up].
So the idea was to cover
[the inside of] the van
with legendary albums
from the 90s. Wu-Tang,
Dr. Dre, Snoop, Mobb
Deep. All that stuff.
The idea is to give our
respects to the hip-hop
scene of the 1990s.”
INTER
VIEW