The Börn Guide To Enjoying A Cheapskate Airwaves

OK, so you’ve spent most of your money on studs, glue, Rudimentary Peni reissues (those don’t go for punk prices, do they?) and renewing your MRR subscription. But, yikes! Iceland Airwaves is coming up, and you can’t afford a ticket. Yet, you find yourself stuck in shitty Reykjavík, with some extremely limited options. Now, personally, I’d advise you to just stay at home, order in some pizza and listen to Discharge’s ‘Realities Of War’ over and over. But, then, you’re maybe one of those types of people who enjoys going out. To each his own, I guess.

Anyway, being flat broke and ticketless shouldn’t stop you from having a fine time at Airwaves if you absolutely insist on leaving your apartment. As always, Airwaves week means every little mitten shop in downtown Reykjavík will try its hand at hosting an off-venue programme, and those shows are always totally free to enjoy, and often pretty great. I haven’t really come across an off-venue schedule yet, but I’m guessing you’ll be able to catch most of the best local bands in some shape or form, playing for free at one crappy bar or another.

I do know, however, that the local Girls Rock camp is curating the off-venue schedule at Loft Hostel on Thursday, November 5. So, that should be good. Go there. Also, local weirdos Ronja Records are staging a show at Lucky Records on Sunday, November, 8. Þórir Georg will be playing, along with Kvöl, Börn, Antimony and I think maybe Döpur. At least I hope Döpur will play. I love that band.

But maybe you don’t give a fuck about local bands. None of them are gonna do Millions of Dead Cops covers, so who cares, right? Well, if you’d like to see a bunch of badass women on roller skates crushing each other, you could take the bus into Pink Street Boys’ turf (a.k.a. Kópavogur) on Saturday, November 7, where local roller derby heroes Ragnarök will go head-to-head with the Brighton Rockers. Follow Roller Derby Iceland on Facebook for more info.

You could also start an amazing hardcore band with your friends, find some weird spot where you can stage a show called “Fokk Airwaves” or something, and call out all of us poseurs for playing the festival in between songs. I’d like to say that I’d show up for that but, to be honest, I’ll probably be at home, eating pizza, listening to Discharge.

For a list of both on- and off-venue shows, check out our listings page!