Reykjavík Grapevine - 04.12.2015, Page 6

6
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 1 — 2011
Tel: +354 511 2600 · info@bustravel.is · bustravel.is
ALL
SEASON
S!
Glacier Lagoon
Jökulsárlón
– Day tour –
This great tour takes us along the impressive south
shore of Iceland to the extraordinary Glacier Lagoon.
Availability . . . . . . . Saturdays
Pick up starts . . . . . 07:00am
Duration. . . . . . . . . . 14 hours
Price. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18.500 ISK
I C E L A N D 4 D U M M I E S
Art | It's not art
As a rule, we never, ever, ever cover crowdfunding efforts at The Reykjavík Grapevine.
Except for when it comes to honouring Biogen's memory. That goes without saying.6
Th Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 18 — 2015
That Music Festival Is Over, Now What?
Now we make a goddamn pile, OK?

By Rebecca Conway
She wished to remain anonymous, and
was understandably more interested in
getting home than talking to me. When
I asked whether the Airwaves clean-up
was worse than the one at her normal
bar job, she shook her head and sighed
an affirmation. She had been working
for the past three nights. It was the last
night of Airwaves, too late for me to be
asking, but I just had to:
What do you wish the Airwaves attend-
ees would do differently with their cans,
bottles, etc?
Our unsung hero just smiled, and said:
“At least make a pile.”
So make a goddamn pile next year, OK?
"Rassgat"
Ragnar Egilsson Explains Some Words!
So we have a word, which is this word:
“rassgat”. It 100% literally means “ass-
hole”, as in “the hole part of the general
ass area”. But unlike “asshole” in Eng-
lish, the word is never used to refer to
a person that is behaving like a jerk. If
someone cuts you off in traffic we don’t
scream “rassgat!” out the window. We
would use the much milder “fáviti!”
[person of limited wits] for that one.
But “rassgat” does have three pretty
fun meanings in Icelandic aside from
the...you know:
1) It can be used to refer to a place
that’s very far away and/or very
isolated. Example: “Þetta apótek er
lengst útí rassgati” [this pharmacy
is far out in the asshole]. It bears
some similarities to the UK English
phrase “arse-end-of-nowhere” or
the US English phrase “middle of
Bumblefuck”
2) It can be part of my favorite insult:
“Hoppaðu upp í rassgatið á þér”
[leap up your own asshole]. This is a
vivid and fun way to tell someone to
remove themselves and their opin-
ions from your presence, i.e. to “piss
off”
3) Strangest yet, is that “rassgat” is a
very common way to refer to things
that are adorable. Rassgat is basi-
cally the closest thing we have to
the Japanese word “kawaii”. You’ll
find yourself using it to refer to
puppies, kittens and tiny widdle
baby wabies. Why? Maybe it’s be-
cause babies have little scrunched
up faces like buttholes? Maybe it’s
because they make that “ppffbbr-
raffrabfhh” sound a lot?
There you have it. Assholes are good
for distant places, annoying people, and
cute babies. Maybe we could start refer-
ring to everything by body parts:
- “That place was totes off the flipping
pancreas!"
- "OMG, is that your daughter? Ocular!
- Aw, that’s so epidermis of you!"
Who Is Biogen, And
Why Should I Help
Crowdfund A Compila-
tion Of His Music?
By Jónas Thor Guðmundsson, Ruxpin!
Sigurbjörn Þorgrímsson, AKA. Biogen,
was a pioneer in the Icelandic electronic
music scene. As one of the founders of
Thule Records, and later the head of
the mighty Weirdcore collective, bright-
eyed Biogen was a constant source of
inspiration, motivating a large part of
the younger generation of Icelandic
electronic musicians to leave their base-
ments and get their music out there.
While Biogen was very active in his ar-
tistic endeavours, constantly releasing
new music and frequently giving perfor-
mances, both in Iceland and abroad, his
physical releases having grown increas-
ingly rare in recent years, with very little
currently available to the public. The
main reason for this is that Biogen self-
released a lot of his music, selling and
distributing it among friends, fans and
family, occasionally handing out copies
to wandering tourists he’d encounter on
Laugavegur.
Biogen passed away in 2011, follow-
ing a long battle with manic-depressive
disorder—an illness that had an integral
effect on his life and on his music.
He was a beloved friend and a valued
mentor to many of those who currently
lead the Icelandic music scene. The
scene itself, along with those who follow
and enjoy it, are indebted to Biogen for
his hard work and constant creativity.
We all miss him terribly, too.
This is why a group of local art-
ists decided to team up with Biogen’s
friends and family to honour the man
and his life’s work by crafting a mas-
sive compilation of his music. Biogen
may not be with us at the moment, but
through his music, through the spirit he
inspired, and through the memories of
those who knew him, Biogen will live
forever.
A POEM BY KÖTT GRÁ PJE
duck god
the mechanic and the lancer
and the old reverend and coffee at
the YMCA mare nostrum is positively a duck
pond onward christian soldiers and all the
god's mechanics into mare nostrum which is
indeed a duck pond and the lancer and the
old reverend at the YMCA mechanics of mare
nostrum indeed duck's soldiers old reverend
and lancer onward into mare
nostrum positively duck god
This song is to Icelandic Christmas
songs what Stealers Wheel’s “Stuck In
The Middle With You” is to Bob Dylan’s
late ‘60s sound—a spoof so close to what
it is mocking that the everyday listener
stands little chance of getting the joke.
It’s a Christmas song that’s all about how
boring Christmas songs are, replete with
jingling bells and pop synths. You will
hear this song playing softly in the back-
ground in Kringlan and Smáralind as you
do your Christmas shopping. You will
hear kids singing along to the catchy cho-
rus as they hang up holiday decoration.
You will hear it played at family events
and on all of the radio stations. Decades
from now, it will be a classic, as insepa-
rable from the Icelandic holiday season
as Jeff Buckley’s cover of “Hallelujah”
is from riverside funerals. And you will
enjoy it, because thankfully “Jólalag” is a
delight, and will serve to further cement
Vaginaboys—our coverstars—as one of
the most exciting new acts to emerge in
Iceland for a long time.
NOTE THAT YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO
DOWNLOAD VAGINABOYS’ JÓLALAG
FROM WWW.GRAPEVINE.IS UNTIL
DECEMBER 9! THIS IS BECAUSE VAG-
INABOYS ARE STILL PERFECTING ITS
SOUND, TIGHTENING THE RHYTHM
AND MOISTENING THE GLYPHS.
TRACK
OF THE
MONTH!
Vaginaboys
“Jólalag”
Download it FREE
at grapevine.is
EDITORIAL:
I REGULARLY RUB
SHOULDERS WITH
THE LIKES OF UP-AND-
COMING HIP-HOP
RAPPER GKR
By Haukur S. Magnússon
…and I have the picture to prove it!