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Aug 9, 2004 · Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, who served as the country’s President from 1980 to 1996, once compared her to the strong women of the national sagas, like Brynhild and Aud the Deep-Minded. Björk has ...
- It’S in Our Hands
- Quicksand
- Triumph of A Heart
- Play Dead
- Army of Me
- Earth Intruders
- Venus as A Boy
- Pagan Poetry
- Arisen My Senses
- I’ve Seen It All
An overlooked gem, tacked on to the end of her fan-selected Greatest Hits collection, It’s in Our Hands is a sublime slice of future R&B conjured up in collaboration with the avant-techno duo Matmos. There is a particularly spicy and formidable version included on the Vespertine Live album.
Vulnicura at its most agitated; the arrangement would be beautiful if it weren’t for the fact that it is allied to sudden sampled vocal interjections and a furious barrage of post-drum’n’bass rhythms that seem to stop, start and shift randomly. Björksounds as if she is barely keeping her emotions under control. Tough but powerful listening.
The perfect example of Medulla’s ability to conjure up magic from unlikely ingredients, Triumph of a Heart is built around a cacophony of rhythmic voices, recalling human beatboxing and the vocal representations of Indian percussion on Sheila Chandra’s Speaking in Tongues. It gradually builds momentum until it sounds unstoppable; the melody, meanwh...
Björk’s first two albums often feel like scrapbooks of musical ideas floating around the non-Britpop 90s: house, trip-hop, the Chemical Brothers’ distorted breaks, Aphex-y electronica. Co-written with the Bond composer David Arnold and Jah Wobble, Play Dead keys into the era’s revival of interest in soundtracks and easy listening, but never sounds ...
The opening track of Post was, apparently, the sound of Björk telling her brother to buck his ideas up. But Army of Me also works as a ferocious statement of individual artistic intent (“Self-sufficiency, please! / And get to work”) bedecked with John Bonham drums and dirty synthesiser. Either way, it sounds electrifying.
Björk has always had great taste when it comes to collaborators – never more so than on Earth Intruders, which pitches the hip-hop auteur Timbaland against the Congolese “all-powerful likembe orchestra” Konono No 1to startling effect. It is a fizzing, electrifying blast of beats and distorted thumb-piano that embodies the lyrics: “metallic carnage ...
Apparently Björk’s most-covered song – something like 30 different versions exist – Venus As a Boy sounds utterly lovestruck: “His wicked sense of humour / Suggests exciting sex”. Its infectiously giddy mood is potentiated by the sound of an Indian orchestra, recorded in Mumbai by Talvin Singh.
Björk’s original concept for Vespertine involved having “icy”-sounding musical boxes specially made. You can hear the results fluttering alongside a harp on Pagan Poetry, a track that starts out being serene and chilled, and gradually works up a striking erotic charge as it goes. The moment when everything dies away except Björk singing “I love him...
On one level, Arisen My Senses sounds like chaos: crashing rhythms and overlapping voices that render the lyrics largely incomprehensible, alongside unpredictable scatterings of harp and explosions of electronics. As a musical representation of the dizziness of new love, however, it is perfect.
The problem with pretending to lay an egg on the Oscars red carpetis that it will overshadow the song you are there to perform: more people know about Björk’s swan dress than Selmasongs’ centrepiece I’ve Seen It All, a disturbing, dark duet with Thom Yorke. Its luscious, swirling strings are underpinned by a train-track rhythm and its eerie mood is...
Mar 24, 2021 · Björk seemed like a glorious weirdo. An alien. Or that’s how she had been fetishised by a mainstream that had welcomed her to their bosom following 1993’s Debut. Her eccentricities were baked ...
- Michael Cragg
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Apr 2, 2014 · Björk is an Icelandic singer-songwriter and founding member of the band the Sugarcubes. She went on to a strong solo career with songs like "I've Seen It All" and "Human Behaviour," as well as...
Life and career 1965–1984: Early life and career beginnings. Björk was born on 21 November 1965 in Reykjavík. She was raised by her mother, activist Hildur Rúna Hauksdóttir (7 October 1946 – 25 October 2018), who protested against the development of Iceland's Kárahnjúkar Hydropower Plant, after having divorced from her father, Guðmundur Gunnarsson, a union leader and electrician ...
Jan 21, 2015 · January 21, 2015. Interview: The Invisible Woman: A Conversation With Björk. by Jessica Hopper. January 21, 2015 Photo by: Andrew Thomas Huang courtesy of One Little Indian. With each album she...
