Iceland in Pictures

16 year old Björk playing at Reykjavík’s Melarokk concert with Tappi tíkarrass in 1982

My old music teacher was also Björk’s music teacher and she was the one who initially got her onto Icelandic radio when she was 11. This meant that in virtually every class, we would get to hear how Björk was such a talented student. The teacher was quite ambitious in setting up multi-voice choirs  creating class bands etc. And if we weren’t quite performing well enough (usually the case) we would almost always hear “Oh if only Björk was still here. She could always play all of the instruments perfectly.”

You can read a bit more about Björk’s early career here.

(Source: ojosdemosca, via new-verisimile)

Björk just launched the song Mutual Core along with this video. This may be the weirdest Björk video I have yet seen. It is like a very strange educational video on tectonic plates and the Mid-Atlantic ridge that Iceland sits upon. The video does remind me of an even stranger Björk video, where she explains how the insides of her television work and how the “wires take care of the electrons”.

Björk talks about her TV

Björk disassembles her television set and explains how it works. She speaks with a perfect Icelandic accent. “These wires they take care of all the electrons when they come through here. They are powerful enough to get all the way through here. I read that in a Danish book this morning.” Oh and be careful of what Icelandic poets tell you. They sometimes lie to you.

Björk - Scientific Music - Icelandic Comedy

This is a sketch from the Icelandic “Áramótaskaup” I mentioned in the post about New Year’s Eve in Iceland. It is a satire tv comedy wrapping up the main events in Icelandic politics and social life shown just before midnight on December 31st. It is watched by nearly 100% of the population.

This scene is a comical view of Björk and the Inspired by Iceland campaign. She has the same hairdo in her interview about the Biophilia album.

“Hi. I am Bjork. I will play scientific music, for you, that will kill you, slowly.”

(Source: polyopoly)

Short interview with Björk on her new Biophilia album.

(Source: glowinthedarkthreads)

Björk on a German talkshow

“Young people in Iceland drive big 4w drive jeeps. On weekends, they drive into the unknown and fall into cracks in glaciers and die. And people in one jeep have to rescue the people in the other jeep. Then they come back and have very good stories to tell.”

The Sugarcubes - Eat the Menu

Go ahead, just eat it. Have you not heard the Sugarcubes before? It’s one of Iceland’s first bands to reach international popularity charts and is the band that launched Björk to fame.

(Source: greenteadragon, via bleach4kidz)

Björk Medulla

Love this video. Haven’t seen it in years.

(Source: shuntseries)