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Darkness Rising: The Ascension MMXIX Metal Festival Shrouds The Midnight Sun
As the summer light increases and festival season takes off, Ascension MMXIX brings together the blackest of the black metal and dark music in Iceland. Risen from the ashes of the Oration festival, held for the past three years, the newly christened…
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Making Of An Artist: IDK IDA’s Bees, Beauty And Anarchy In The Bleak North
Ida Schuften Juhl is IDK IDA, a young producer, performer, artist and organiser who has become a firm favourite at the Reykjavík Grapevine. Her debut album, ‘The Bug,’ is out now, and she has some stunning new material in the works, which…
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Eyewitness Records: Ívar Sævarsson’s Search For Different Angles
Eyewitness Records—E.W. for short—is a Reykjavík-based record label releasing a range of electronic music. It launched last year as a sub-label of Robotdisco Electronix (or R.D.E.)—an Icelandic outfit that has been releasing electro music for the past decade. We met up with…
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Music News: Sigur Rós Celebrate Ágætis Byrjun, Sacred Arts & Kælan Mikla
‘Ágætis Byrjun,’ the breakthrough album by Sigur Rós, is twenty years old on June 12th. To celebrate, the band are staging a variety of events looking back at how the album was made, and unveiling a time capsule of unseen archive materials.…
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Kira Kira’s Sonic Meditation: Music, Medicine And Miracles
Kristín Björk Kristjánsdóttir, better known as Kira Kira, is a visual artist, composer and producer who creates sound sculptures with a focus on experimentation, new technologies and group improvisation. Collaborative practise has been a key aspect in Kira’s development throughout the years,…
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Queer Musician Bashar Murad: “Just Being Palestinian Is Political”
Few Icelanders had any knowledge of musician Bashar Murad until May, when anti-capitalist BDSM techno lads Hatari dropped a post-Eurovision video—shot in Palestine during the Israel-hosted competition—for a new song called “Klefi/Samed.” Co-written with Bashar, the single spotlights his powerful, haunting vocals,…
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Intensity, Drive And Power: Meet Icelandic Techno Producer Fascia
Fascia is the brain-child of Björn Leó Brynjarsson. Currently residing in Berlin, he works as a full-time script-writer, but spends as much time as he can on his hobby—producing techno tracks that have found favour with some of Reykjavík’s most popular DJs.…
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Icelandic Music News: Kælan Mikla Play US, Valgeir Sigurðsson Awarded
Folks from the Icelandic music scene have been out touring, getting on TV, putting out records, winning awards, and stirring controversy: here’s the latest news. The rise of cold-wave goth queens and 2018 Grapevine cover stars Kælan Mikla continues. Next on their…
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Mikael Máni Trio’s Linear Chamber Jazz
Mikael Máni appears on the screen, fresh-faced and smiling from amongst the digital distortion of a slow Skype connection. He’s in his current hometown of Stockholm, where he lives with his jazz singer girlfriend as she studies for her MA. Back home…
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Track by Track: Bagdad Brothers – ‘Sorry’
Bagdad brothers are a sunny indie-pop band who’ve been taking Reykjavík by storm over the past year. They’ve also become well-known as political activists. We asked them to talk us through their latest EP, ‘Sorry.’ “Like everything else we’ve released to this…
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Grapevine Playlist: Icelandic Music From Kira Kira, GusGus, Dadykewl & More
It’s Grapevine Playlist time once more. Like seven sea eagles shooting out of an erupting volcano, here are the latest squawking expulsions from the Icelandic music scene. GusGus – Fireworks “Fireworks” is one of the better cuts from GusGus’s latest LP, ‘Lies…
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Björk’s ‘Cornucopia’: A Utopian Reverie For A World In Peril
“Imagine a future and be in it,” Björk sings in “Tabula Rasa,” the final song before the encore of ‘Cornucopia,’ an elaborate audiovisual production commissioned by The Shed, Manhattan’s brand new, state-of-the-art performance space. The line appears earlier in the show, projected…
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Siri, Where In Reykjavík To Watch Hatari’s Eurovision Triumph?
As you may have picked up if you’ve looked at the internet today, Hatari compete in the Eurovision Song Contest semi-final tonight. But where to watch it? There are plenty of options. If you’re a homebody, you can watch it on the…
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Hatari’s Eurovision Song ‘Hatrið Mun Sigra’ Lyrics Translated
With so much hype around Iceland’s 2019 Eurovision song, there have been various translations of the “Hatrið Mun Sigra” lyrics doing the rounds. As you might expect from Nocco-crazed Cyberdog twinks Hatari, it’s not your average Eurovision ditty. “Life’s purposeless confusion /…
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Six Times Icelandic Eurovision Stars Hatari Trolled The World
Empty-eyed homeless leather-daddy millennials Hatari have caught the attention of the world media for their controversial Eurovision Song Contest run this year. However, here in Iceland, people are used to their antics: they’ve become well-known from their pranks and relentless trolling of various…
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Eurovisions: Hatari, Israel and Allyship
Since their formation in 2015, Hatari—an anti-capitalist synth-techno band comprising core members Matthías Tryggvi Haraldsson, Klemens Hannigan and Einar Hrafn Stefánsson, alongside numerous contributors—have provoked, excited, and defied expectations. Their live shows come replete with theatrical staging, gothic-industrial aesthetics and BDSM overtones,…
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Throw Those Horns Up! Reykjavík Metalfest Is Back And Bigger Than Ever
“It’ll be one hell of a time,” Ingólfur Ólafsson says with a grin. One of the creators of Reykjavík Metalfest, he’s seen the festival evolve from a small one-day affair at Gaukurinn to the three-day extravaganza it is now. This year features…
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Grapevine’s Ultimate Iceland Road Trip Summer Playlist
Summer is here, and with it comes road trip season. Here’s our essential Icelandic playlist. Roll down the windows, turn up the volume, and off you go. Buddies and beats There’s nothing like cruisin’ in the sun with your buddies and some…
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Weightless World: Marteinn Sindri’s Light Work Of Many Hands
In Greek mythology, the god Atlas carries the weight of the world on his shoulders. For Marteinn Sindri’s debut album ‘Atlas’, the creation involved lifting the weight away and engaging in a deeply collaborative process. With a 20-year background playing classical piano,…
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Devine Defilement Write Death Metal In Their Underwear
It is May 1st and I am meeting the four members of Devine Defilement in the smoking area of a bar in downtown Reykjavík. When I get there, the band are enjoying their day off with beer and cigarettes, and all of…
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Sólveig Matthildur’s Constantly In Love: Track By Track
Sólveig Matthildur is a member of Kælan Mikla, an acclaimed solo artist, and a Grapevine Music Awards winner. Here, she talks us through her new album, ‘Constantly In Love.’ Constantly In Love by Sólveig Matthildur CONSTANTLY IN LOVE The title track is…
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Electric Dreams: NonYoBiz Records Is Back In Business
NonYoBiz is an Icelandic electronic music label run by one Kári Guðmundsson—formerly known as Kári Hypno and currently part of the Hidden People music project—and DJ Dolphin, who manages the label’s look and design. It started a few years ago as an…
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Festival News: Of Monsters And Men For Airwaves, LungA Lineup & More
Of Monsters & Men have been announced as one of the headliners of Iceland Airwaves 2019. A vastly popular pop/rock band, they were the first Icelandic band to pass 1 billion plays on Spotify, beating stars like Sigur Rós, Björk and Bjarki…