Reykjavík Grapevine - sep. 2019, Blaðsíða 40

40The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 14— 2019Music
When the news broke that Ed Sheer-
an was going to play at Laugard-
alsvöllur in August, Icelanders
broke a national record, buying
over 30,000 tickets within minutes.
Keep in mind that 30,000 is 10% of
the nation. Sena Live, the organis-
ers, promptly added an extra con-
cert that sold around 20,000 more
tickets over the next few months.
Overall, 15% of the Icelandic pop-
ulation went to back-to-back Ed
Sheeran concerts during the sec-
ond weekend of August. I know, it
sounds like something you would
read in The Onion, but trust me,
this really happened.
Red hair and loads
of talent
Ed Sheeran has an obvious and un-
precedented star attraction among
foriegn performers in Iceland. He
is one of the biggest pop artists in
the world, with a different kind of
flair than the rest of them. He goes
onstage in a jumper, without a band
or dancers behind him, armed with
just his red hair and loads of talent.
It’s incredibly simple.
Sheeran established himself as
an Icelandic sweetheart when he
posted a picture of himself sport-
ing the Icelandic national football
shirt back when Iceland was facing
its nemesis, Croatia, at the 2018
World Cup. (Iceland still lost.)
The line
I, Valur Grettisson, decided to go to
the concert with my 11-year-old son,
Ólafur Grettir. Both of us like some
of Ed’s songs, but we also loathe
others. My favourite is “Blood-
stream,” while Óli likes the sugary
pop stuff—not all of it, though. In
true 11-year-old fashion, he made
that crystal clear beforehand.
So both of us weren’t really sure
what we were walking into, but as
soon as we did walk in, we were
greeted by the longest queue we
had ever seen in our lives. It start-
ed at Laugardalsvöllur and ended
somewhere in another district of
Reykjavík. The queue actually made
headlines in the media, with guests
questioning the management of
Sena Live. That said, Sena quickly
fixed it, and took the criticism to
heart afterwards.
Impressive setup
The field of Laugardalsvöllur, which
we use most often for football, was
unrecognisable—now a full blown
rock and roll stadium. It was an im-
pressive setup.
The first opening band we
saw—unfortunately, like most of
the guests in line, we missed Zara
Larsson—was James Bay. His most
famous song is the dreamie folk
pop, “Hold Back The River.” James
had a full band to back him up and
presented a pretty decent poppy/
folky concert. It could have been
more energetic, sure, but it was a
nice warm up for the flamehaired
wonder.
Punctual rock star
You know that times are changing
when the star of the night does not
only show up exactly at the adver-
tised start-time for the show, but
actually comes on-stage one min-
ute ahead of schedule. Yes, just a
minute before start time, the audi-
ence could see Sheeran walking to-
wards the stage on the huge screen.
It was a magical moment, and re-
vealed that punctu-
ality is also one of
many Sheeran’s great
talents.
Then, Ed started
off with a bang. The
crowd cheered. He
was completely alone on stage, yet
easily captivated the 30,000-strong
crowd like it was an intimate bar
setting. And how exactly does one
man captivate the attention of
such a massive crowd for two whole
hours with but an acoustic guitar
in hand? Well, with some kind of a
pedal, apparently, that he used to
record the beats and back up voices,
which he sang himself, and then
play back as he went along. This
man has a black belt in troubadour-
ism. And then some.
Sheeran started off slowly and
connected well with the crowd. The
slow setup was hard for some audi-
ence members, though, as the tem-
peratures dropped as the sun went
down. But boy, things picked up in
the second half. He blasted us with
his sugary pop songs, which were
surprisingly tolerable when played
live. Within minutes, the whole
crowd was jumping and cheering.
Not the best, but
we’re getting there
The concert itself didn’t really enter
the hall of fame of live entertain-
ment in Iceland, but it was exactly
how Sheeran appears to be: honest,
fun and relaxed. One could even
think that this guy was, in some
ways, an interesting reflection of
this small nation, who always be-
lieve that a small amount of people
can accomplish incredible things.
Sheeran even pushed that point,
singing his biggest hits dressed in
his famed Icelandic national foot-
ball shirt.
Overall, the concert was a smash
hit. The audience loved it, and Sena
Live’s preparation was exemplary,
despite the hiccup with the line. It
also proved that
Iceland is more
than ready for any
huge artist to visit
us in the future.
If the Grapevine
would give out
stars—which we don’t—I would
give the concert three and a half
stars out of four. There is still room
to do better, but overall, darling, he
looked perfect that night.
LIVE REVIEW
The Black Belt
Troubadour
That time 15% of Iceland went to see Ed Sheeran
Words: Valur Grettisson Photo: Visir/Vilhelm
“Overall, darling,
he looked per-
fect that night.”
We're in love with the shape of you, Eddie