Reykjavík Grapevine - 17.07.2015, Blaðsíða 50

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A king is born
Grill sits back and smirks, clearly sat-
isfied with his story. “We had been
skating together,” his fellow Shades of
Reykjavík member Prins Puffin quickly
clarifies. “We were like a group of skat-
ers and we started making skate movies
and skate films.” Eventually the boys—
Elli Grill, Prins Puffin, and also SOR
member HB—started making sketches
and music videos. Living in a flat on
Laugavegur, they teamed up with Sha-
manshawarma, who now makes beats
for the group, and Elli Grill’s vision of
Shades of Reykjavík was born.
Just three years later, the notori-
ous group is taking off. After a packed
performance at Secret Solstice involv-
ing live tattooing and a crucifixion, the
group recently joined DJ Snoopadelic
at his Laugarshöll DJ Set. Having just
moved into a new studio, they are now
working on their first release. But even
without an album, the guys have a pro-
lific catalogue. They’ve made more
than 21 music videos—none of which
could be called boring.
Shades’s most-viewed video
(70,000+!), “Macaulay Culkin,” shows
the boys wearing spooky face paint
with Illuminati symbols. They eat ice
cream and roll joints in a smoky house
covered in fluorescent paint. This is
hardly their weirdest, though. In other
Shades videos, rappers eat sushi on a
speedboat, and perform Satantic rituals
in Hallgrímskirkja.
Irony and ~confusion~
But while some of these sound like
typical rap clichés, there’s an irony to
Shades of Reykjavík’s lyrics often lost
on non-Icelandic speakers. “We’re al-
ways saying things but you can’t really
tell if we are meaning them or if we are
joking,” Prins Puffin says. Their raps
are meant to be done in character. “In
music,” Puffin says, “you’re able to be
someone else. You’re able to lie.” In
Shades of Reykjavík, the boys put on an
image that is larger than life.
“I’m inspired by some green elves
I talked to. My flow comes from that,”
Elli Grill says with raised eyebrows.
The boys immediately burst out in
laughter. “Really, the fuck am I rapping
about?” Prins Puffin interjects with a
cheeky grin. “You can’t talk about the
lyrics that Elli Grill makes because
they are just too deep.” Puffin says he
raps with a super-egocentric charac-
ter. “He’s a dark prince. He has purple
blood,” Prins Puffin notes, “and looks at
himself like a God.”
Shamanshwarma describes his per-
sona as being half spiritual and half
hardcore; someone who will spout
philosophy and then go fuck your girl-
friend. “Like Anakin Skywalker and
Darth Vader, you know,” he says. But
remember, their whole thing is just
playin’ gangsta. It’s not real.
“Rottweiller mode”
“A lot of the people in the hip hop scene
have been stuck in this model of like
‘keeping it real,’” Shamanshawarma
says, illustrating their basic ideology.
The boys all laugh while mimicking
“keeping in real.” “Stuck in Rottweiller
mode,” he adds, and they laugh even
harder at this. “You know, saying how
hard they are, beating people down in
the lyrics,” Shamanshawarma explains,
“but our lyrics are a lot more humor-
ous.”
There is hope for the scene, though.
Shades name themselves, as well as
Gislí Pálmi and Úlfur Úlfur, as the first
artists in Iceland to make new-school
hip-hop and trill music, the first to re-
ally expand the boundaries of Icelandic
rap.
Shades are now focused on evolving
their sound. “We make like five beats a
day. We’re always making beats,” says
Geimgenill, one of the beats-makers
of Shades. “It’s like an addiction. I just
have to make a beat!”
Living OTT
Geimgenill is known for bringing
weapons to performances—not things
like guns but weirder weapons like
fishhooks. “We always have a lost and
found after the show and there are
always weapons there.” The group is
quick to assure that they’re not trying
to hurt people, it’s just part of the the-
atrics.
“We like to shock people,” Prins
Puffin concludes. “But it’s not all about
that,” Shamanshawarma says, raising
his eyebrows. “If people are laughing
then it’s good. If people are smiling,
that’s good, ‘cause then they’re having
fun.”
Do they have any superfans? “Our
friend, our DJ, has Elli Grill tattooed on
his ass,” Prins Puffin answers. Elli Grill
is quick to add: “He got permission
from his mom though.”
MUSIC
CONCERT
Fifty Shades Of Reykjavík
Getting intimate with
Iceland’s most chaotic act
July 24 21:00 Gaukurinn Tryggvagata 2 I D3 Admission: 1,500 ISKHip Hop DJAMM
“I was walking in downtown Reykjavík when suddenly everything changed into this endless
desert,” rapper Elli Grill of hip-hop collective Shades of Reykjavik recounts. “Out of the desert
sand came a crystal. I drew it—the crystal—but instead it was a potato head like smoke in a
pipe and the smoke made the letters Shades of Reykjavík. And I was like Shades of Reykjavík,
we’re gonna do something and it’ll be called Shades of Reykjavík.”
Photo Shades of Reykjavík
Words Hannah Jane Cohen
6
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 10 — 2015