Iceland review - 2014, Qupperneq 18

16 ICELAND REVIEW
1. More than 17 Million people have watched the
video to your song ‘pretty Face’ on youtube, Many
More views than björk and sigurrós have had.
what happened?
Simply the so-called snowball effect.
People listen, like and share.
2. KrómantíK, your new ep, was released this
suMMer. can you describe it?
It’s an EP with very short piano pieces
I wrote while studying at the Icelandic
Academy of the Arts. I always wanted to
write music for the piano, my main instru-
ment. My last album came out in 2011,
then I went touring for two years and had
a daughter last March, so this album is a
bridge between records.
3. you write your lyrics in english, why?
By accident I wrote the texts for We Sink
in English. I thought it was an interesting
challenge to write in a language I don’t
speak one hundred percent. The texts
are simpler and stranger than if I’d done
them in Icelandic. I like writing poetry in
Icelandic, though. I’ve done that since my
childhood.
4. what’s the diFFerence between playing the
piano and the guitar?
I studied both classical music and jazz on
piano for years before I started to learn
to write music. Piano is my instrument.
I really like to play the guitar, but I’m an
extremely bad guitar player.
5. will you play new Material at the upcoMing
iceland airwaves Festival?
Yes. I’m working on my next album and
hopefully I can play some of the new
songs at Airwaves.
6 regarding your next albuM, scheduled For
release next year, have you started to record
and have you written all the songs already?
I’m just finishing recording the last songs
for the upcoming, still unnamed album.
There’s not much left, just the drums and
some decoration for the finishing touches.
7. what Musician has inFluenced you the Most?
Jeez, I can’t say… but the first person who
comes to mind is Joanna Newsom. She
influenced me so much that after hearing
her first album I started to write music.
8. what’s your Favorite concert hall to perForM in?
It all depends on the mood. Last year I
played in a grand and unbelievably beau-
tiful church in Hamburg. I like to play
in theaters and churches. Last year at
Airwaves I played in Silfurberg in Harpa.
It was fantastic and in complete contrast to
cozy church gigs.
9. has being a Mother changed how you write and
listen to Music?
No [laughing]. I try not to let the children’s
songs that I sing all day long for my daugh-
ter influence my music.
10. what song pops into your head right now?
‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ with
Whitney Houston. Yeah! *
SóLEY, SóLEY
More people than 50 times the population of Iceland have watched the video
to Sóley Stefánsdóttir’s song ‘Pretty Face’ on YouTube. Iceland Review
asked the talented Sóley ten simple questions.
Words and Photo by Páll STefánSSon.