Disco!graphy: Sigur Rós, Part 1

Disco!graphy is a regular feature that catches up with bands by exploring their entire full-length output.

On today's mix...
Von (1997)
Ágætis byrjun (1999)

Sigur Rós release their fifth album on Tuesday--or today, if you live in Ireland, Germany, or Belgium. In any case, it's currently streaming on their website, but before I immerse myself in new material, I wanted to step back and look at their existing oeuvre, much of which I've never gotten around to giving focused attention. As you've probably assumed given the length, this isn't an actual running playlist, but Sigur Rós really aren't the best band to be competing with the noise of L.A. traffic anyway.

Sigur Rós's 1997 debut, Von, was totally new to me as of yesterday, and it's surprising to learn that it didn't see international release until 2004. Though the band has not yet discovered their signature sound yet on Von, the album is a full-fledged epic in line with their other releases, full of exciting, atmospheric tracks. The album was years in the making, and it shows. Each track here is grand and cinematic, scoring an imaginary movie the band invites the listener to invent. The band-titled opener invites the lures into a classic horror territory, while centerpiece "Hafssól (The Sun's Sea)" indeed sounds like it would fit well in something more space-exploration themed (Sunshine?)

The majority of Von's tracks eschew melody almost entirely, preferring instead to build the atmosphere through quiet noise and percussion, and the results are exciting, though not especially memorable. If Von is flawed--the band themselves have indicated that they were not entirely pleased with the final results--it's only because these tracks neither feel quite as distinctive or personal as their later work. Ultimately, Von gives a solid impression of the band's talent, if only an incomplete picture of what's to come.

Though the intro of Ágætis byrjun continues in the same footing as Von's outro--backwards--the album is a significant change of direction for the band. The intense focus on atmosphere is still in place; however, here they're more content to fill it in with melody, and the album features some of the band's best tracks.

Despite sounding a little bit like Radiohead, "Svefn-g-englar (Sleepwalkers)" is a haunting ballad--dirty, insistent, and epic, a song that's become perhaps their most recognizable. The track does turn out to be something of an anomaly on this album, though, as most of the songwriting here works within a relatively narrow spectrum, starting off slow and spare but ultimately building up to an explosive, gorgeous finale. Usually there are violins. Though it's a bit formulaic, Sigur Rós make it work, and nowhere is this approach more effective than with track three, "Starálfur (Staring Elf)", which offers the album's hookiest melody, marries acoustic guitar with electro glitches, and ultimately soars away on violins. It's the album's best moment.

Despite such a solid start, Ágætis byrjun ultimately ends up a little top-heavy with the remainder of the album never quite matching up to the greatness promised by its opening. Though the chorus of "Flugufrelsarinn (The Fly Freer)" does do some flying, the track spends most of its time brooding. "Ný batterí (New Batteries)" skirts by thanks to the abstract atmosphere created by its hesitant horns and falsetto, but "Hjartað hamast bamm bamm bamm (The Heart Pounds)" does more trudging than pounding, as though its heart is having trouble with each "bamm". "Viðrar vel til loftárása (Good Weather for Airstrikes)" wisely cleanses the palette with a minute of ambient noise before launching into more conventionally lovely terrain, taking a welcome country-western twist before building up to an abrupt "Day in the Life" clusterfuck of noise. It's not a knock-out success, but it's the type of experimentation you'd like to see a little more of on this album. The title track, meanwhile, rides on the kind of repetitive-yet-meandering piano melody that they would later perfect on ( ).

Though Ágætis byrjun is always a lovely, worthwhile album, the Volenska-introducing "Olsen Olsen" is its only other truly great, distinctive track--a builder dominated by a haunting, fluted melody. Despite having a reputation for being their best, Sigur Rós's second album is an occasionally great but inconsistent effort, the work of a great band testing out a new, more ambitious sound and very much still growing.

Von: 7/10
Ágætis byrjun: 8/10