Reykjavík Grapevine - 18.05.2018, Qupperneq 35

Cracking Harry
Knuckles
Check out his Soundcloud in the puffin stores

Words: Hannah Jane Cohen Photo: Art Bicnick
“I’m in a conceptual black met-
al band right now,” says Frímann
Frímannsson, a.k.a. Harry Knuck-
les. “You’ve probably never seen us
because we don’t play live, or make
music. It’s just conceptual, just ideas,
you know.” He’s completely deadpan,
but finally breaks down into a smirk,
then laughs.
Conversations like this are pret-
ty much the norm with Frímann. A
noise musician, DJ, founder of the
Skeleton Horse zine, and co-founder
of Lady Boy Records, he’s both the
funniest person and most prolific
troll you’ll ever meet. Give him any
topic and he’ll riff with thoughts that
sound like seasoned bits of stand-up.
Catchy tin cans
Frímann started DJing as Harry
Knuckles in 2010, and did his first
live noise show at Eistnaflug’s “May-
hemisphere” only months later. “I
had this tin can that I filled with
coins and I had a mic that I con-
nected to a distortion pedal and just
shook the can,” he says. “Wow, saying
I started playing in an abandoned
herring factory in the East fjords of
Iceland makes me sound very exotic,
right?” He’s being facetious.
But if you think tin can tunes
are unusual, you’re still barely at
the tip of the Harry Knuckles ice-
berg. Since his first gig, Mr. Knuck-
les has created soundscapes that
take loops, samples, and beats, and
morph them into something equal-
ly mind-blowing
and mind-bend-
ing. His music
seeps into his
DJing, and vice
versa, but de-
spite his noise
roots, Frímann’s
sound is groovy,
catchy, and com-
pletely unpre-
dictable.
“I think noise
is one of those
things that it’s
weird to listen to
at home alone,
but when it’s in a live session, it
makes sense,” he says. “You can hear
the vibrations and all of that stuff.
My philosophy has always been to
not cater or read people either when
DJing or playing live. Most people
have requests and it’s just some top
40 they could listen to at home."
No keychains
Frímann’s affinity for weird art
led him to start the Skeleton Horse
zine in 2012 and co-found Lady Boy
Records a year later. “It’s funny,
‘cause people are releasing albums
every day, but then it’s just a link
to a Soundcloud,” he says. “There’s
something about the process of
making something physical, and
going to a store to buy it. I mean,
what happens if you don’t have
internet? What do you do then?”
Again, facetious.
The Lady Boy label has kept up
its dedication to the underground
ever since. “We purposely don’t sell
our stuff at Eymundsson or Mál og
Menning,” Frímann says. “Have you
been to these bookstores? They’re
more like gift
s h o p s . A n d
I don’t k now
about you, but I
don’t go to a gift
shop to find the
new music.” He
laughs. “I go to
a record store
where there are
no keychains.”
But what’s next?
Frímann’s re-
luctant to say.
“If you have so
many ideas and
you tell some-
one, and get their reaction, then you
just feel like you’ve already done it.
You’re like “check,” and then you
don’t even need to do it anymore. So
I don’t like talking about that.” He
stops and smirks, before changing
his voice into what can only be com-
pared to the cockiest morning radio
host ever. “I guess you guys will just
have to wait and see.”
Share this: gpv.is/music
Harry Knuckles, shredding
“Wow, saying I
started playing
in an abandoned
herring factory
in East Iceland
makes me sound
very exotic,
right?”
35The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 08 — 2018
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