Words by

Jóhannes Bjarkason

Photo by

Atli Finnsson for GRÓA

Faster than lightspeed

There are fewer bands active in Iceland truer to their craft and ethos than GRÓA. Whether it’s dropping a huge SXSW showcase opportunity in support of Palestine, or letting all tethers loose during their live performances, GRÓA’s energy is unmatched. Their latest LP, Drop P, came out on June 6, and sees the troupe dive further than ever before. 

birdshit

The song came to us on a sunny day when we were in an extremely good mood. Suddenly, a bird pooped a toxic green, big fat crap on Hrafnhildur’s cap. It took us all some time to realise what had just happened and Hrafnhildur was left with mixed feelings. And she sang and sang and sang, “I got birdshit on my cap, one big fat splash, fat splash on my hat birdshit on my cap yeah.” Then we figured it was all fair, because we used to eat a lot of chicken when we were younger. In the end, shitting is the free bird’s revenge. And we wanted to make a song about that.

ugh

“ugh” grew out of the live version of “Grannypants” from our previous release What I like to Do. We layered tons of different instruments to capture a sound of extremeness, playing the same notes on all of them at the same time. Eight recorders, eight guitars, four pianos, trumpet, saxophone, bells, glockenspiels and more. Then the rock bangs one string, just bangs it ugh and bangs it ugh and bangs it ugh until the rock rips the string and the sound turns into a ringing tone of a glockenspiel.

screwdriver

“screwdriver” is about losing your keys and needing to use a screwdriver to get inside your locked home. When you get inside after the intense mission, the next chapter begins; you do something nice for yourself, for example boil water and pour it in your favourite cup or think about your life in context to all the stars above you.

eldingar í Prag

“Eldingar í Prag” recounts a surreal overnight drive from Slovakia to Prague through a thunderstorm, involving frogs, snakes, a wolf, and a man with a gun. All that seen through faces painted with corpsepaint and animals.

beauty Tips !

Features Blanco Teta, an experimental punk rock band from Buenos Aires, or like we want to say, our loves hhihiihihiihihihihihihihiihihihihihhiihihihihihihiih. Shout out to them !

cranberry

It is about the supposed health benefits that cranberry juice has on your urinary system.

drekk ekki kekki

“drekk ekki kekki” is an ode to puddle-sitting. Capturing the urge, questions and dark feelings of rolling around, amusing yourself, in a puddle.

allt sem er gott er gott was sung through a flute and composed inside big tubes. “allt sem er gott er gott” is the calm version of us, gaining energy through tones.

kim

“kim” is the first track we wrote for the album. It explores “light” hopelessness. In the end of an emotional rollercoaster, you want to do something about it, and you want to do something about everything you hate and everything that is unjust, you want to do something on your stay on earth, and you want to give. The lyrics are about a person that goes faster than light and can’t stop spinning down hills, spinning in circles but hits a big gray brick wall. In the last two minutes of the song, the whole album wraps into a parade with people and other species walking together in the direction towards the world of snouge.