Reykjavík Grapevine - 10.10.2014, Blaðsíða 66

T H E R E Y K J A V Í K G R A P E V I N E I C E L A N D A I R W A V E S S P E C I A L14
Making Icelanders dance since the early
90s, Margeir has been DJing since be-
fore DJ was really a verb. If you don’t
know Jack Schidt or Gluteus Maximus,
some of his monikers, then you prob-
ably know him as the guy crowdsurfing
over the Blue Lagoon. For eight years,
he hosted dance parties for audiences
in that murky water during the Iceland
Airwaves music festival. But his connec-
tion between that space and the music he
now makes for it began long before Air-
waves was even founded.
The party monster from
the Blue Lagoon
Almost thirty years ago, Margeir began
to visit the Blue Lagoon regularly. “My
grandfather had psoriasis, the skin dis-
ease,” he begins. “I went there quite a bit
with him because the water really helped
him. Of course the place was also magi-
cal back then. Even more, really. It was
just an open space, no spa or anything. It
was just the water, the power plant, and
all that fog. I was just getting into music
at that age and I thought, ‘With music,
this would be perfect.’”
The spa facilities were built around
the pool about the same time that Mar-
geir began to play DJ sets in Reykjavík.
He’d played around Europe and North
America by 2005, when he finally ap-
proached the Blue Lagoon with his
childhood fantasy. Why not play a DJ
set to an audience in the lagoon? “I ap-
proached them with my take on it and
five minutes later, they said, ‘Yeah, do
it! Let’s do it!’” After the initial event’s
success, he compiled and released Vol. 1
of his Blue Lagoon Soundtrack series in
2006, which went gold in Iceland. The
series continued with Vol. 2 in 2009 and
Vol. 3 in 2014. “The concept was a huge
success here,” he says. “It was like it was
meant to happen.”
Infusing the Blue Lagoon with sound
requires a certain amount of musical
finesse. Other DJs have tried since but
couldn’t quite get it right. “When I make
the compilations and when I play there,
I try to keep in mind, ‘I’m here. I’m with
nature.’ It’s not appropriate to play bang-
ing rave music and there’s no need to.
The energy comes from something else:
the connection to music and all the other
things there. My stuff is more electronic-
driven, more sub. A little dance-y, but
also atmospheric. I try to respect the
original Blue Lagoon concept and keep it
intact.”
But too much of a good thing can be
just that: too much. At least a dance party
at the Blue Lagoon during Airwaves. “In
the beginning, it was very small,” he ex-
plains, “but it always got bigger and big-
ger as word spread, and all of a sudden,
people couldn’t get in because it was
full.” Then things began to get out of
control. “There is a bar outside, but there
is a limit. You can only buy maybe three
or four drinks maximum in the lagoon.
Nevertheless, I think the amount of alco-
hol already in the blood caused the party
to be quite”—he smiles—“demented.”
In 2013, they stopped holding the
event in the lagoon itself. Margeir did
not play a show there during the festival
last year, nor will he this year. Instead
of a dance event, the Blue Lagoon part-
nered with Airwaves to produce a seated
lunchtime performance with a folk band
in the dining space. Then they allow the
guests into the lagoon afterwards. “That
was their decision,” Margeir explains.
“It’s water, it’s people, and with these
conditions we have to be a little bit care-
ful.”
From mountaintop to
street-corner
Margeir keeps busy. When he’s not com-
piling a soundtrack, importing DJs from
abroad to play independent shows in
Iceland, working with a 16-piece orches-
tra, organizing Sónar Reykjavík, playing
beachfront Burning Man-eque festivals
on remote Swedish islands, running his
IT company, or raising his two children,
he’s bringing electronic music to other
new spaces. “Typical Icelander,” he jokes
about his many jobs and projects.
“I recently did a DJ set on top of
Esja, the mountain peak,” he says. “We
actually moved the sound system to the
mountain via helicopter. In total, we got
almost 1,000 people to the top: around
200 of them came by helicopter and the
rest just walked. I’m always looking to do
something extra, something more than
I’ve done before.”
Case in point: for this year’s Culture
Night, which coincided with his fortieth
birthday, he threw a micro-festival right
on Hverfisgata. Not only were there the
usual soundsystems and lights, but he
also hired a carpenter to build the stage
and DJ booth from wood. They even cov-
ered the entire street in sod for that natu-
ral effect. “I laid the grass down myself,”
he says. “It was very organic.”
On meditating and
working out
In addition to challenging electronic
music’s relationship to its exterior sur-
roundings, Margeir also considers it
in relation to the listener’s interior: the
mind. He meditates twice a day, every
day, for at least twenty minutes. “I use
the technique called TM (transcendental
meditation), which is the technique that
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi taught The Bea-
tles in the 60s,” he explains. “If there’s
one thing that I would recommend that
you could do with
your life, I would say
‘meditate.’ That’s my
advice—to everyone.”
The deafening
sounds of live dance
music and the silence
of private meditation
may seem polar op-
posites to some, but he
explains how they are
not. It’s a process. “If
you dig a little deeper
into TM, you get a
mantra. The mantra
is just something you
repeat, you keep it for
yourself. You repeat
it and repeat it. It’s al-
most like dance music,
a loop. It just goes on.
Then the magic hap-
pens! In this way, techno can be a sort of
meditation as well.”
If the crowdsurfing didn’t get it
across, he’s not always strictly medita-
tive or moody. He likes a bit of fun too.
As Gluteus Maximus, he partners with
Stephan Stephensen (aka President Bon-
go of Gusgus fame). Their performances
include professional weight-lifting teams
powerlifting to the music. “One guy in
front of a laptop on a big stage gets a little
bit boring after a while. We like to put on
a show.” I joke that the performance fits
perfectly with the band’s muscular name
and we laugh. “It’s an important muscle,”
he assures me. “You cannot dance with-
out it. You have to exercise this muscle,
so we’re also promoting good health”—
we both crack up again—“which is very
strange coming from techno!”
Return to the Blue Lagoon
For those of us upset to have missed our
chance to get demented in the Blue La-
goon, there is hope yet. “For Airwaves,
unfortunately, we can’t do this any-
more. But I did my release party for the
soundtrack there. It
was on Midsummer
Night in the 24-hour
daylight. We put up
a stage in a new part
of the lagoon with
the mountain in the
background and it
was magical—totally
amazing. So that’s
probably what we’ll
do at least once a year,
maybe more often.”
And until then,
you can plan to work
your booty with new
beats from Gluteus
Maximus. “Actually,
we will put the most
energy in the next
couple months into
new work. We have so
much material that we want to produce a
debut album.” Here, he adds an intrigu-
ing non sequitur: “We’re also working
with numerous vocalists.”
I take the bait, unashamedly ask-
ing for a sneak peak on the debut. I was
met with Margeir’s mischievous smirk.
“Well, I found this new singer called
Ásdís and she’s”—he pauses for empha-
sis—“really good. She has been perform-
ing with us now for a few months.” But
there’s a cliff-hanger: “The other col-
laborations I cannot talk about yet!”
By the time I make it to the top floor of the building, the door
to a large, airy apartment has been left open for me. I enter
but see no one. It’s all warm wood, clean lines, and art. There
is a calm, ambient beat coming from above. I can hear Margeir
Ingólfsson in the kitchen before he walks into the living room.
Tall, dark-haired, and soft-spoken, he greets me with a hand-
shake and a smile. After heading up the creaky stairs to turn
the music off in his studio, we sit down at a white mid-century
table and Eames-style wood chairs to talk about atmosphere.
Beyond The
Blue Lagoon,
Literally
DJ Margeir muses
on music, mood,
and meditation
WORDS BY GRAYSON DEL FARO
PHOTOS PROVIDED BY DJ MARGEIR
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“When I make the
compilations and when
I play there, I try to
keep in mind, ‘I’m here.
I’m with nature.’ It’s
not appropriate to play
banging rave music and
there’s no need to…”