What stripped Sigur Rós of their hype? When \xC1gaetis Byrjun dropped like a catatonic bliss bomb at the turn of the millennium, it was hailed as an astonishing breakthrough, an instant classic that struck a perfect chord between pastoral purity and neo-futurism. A serene, old-world simplicity echoed in its glacial disposition, inadvertently playing to our glamorized perceptions of the Icelandic dreamworld that gave birth to it, while the album's epic grandeur, overripe with fervid emotional outpouring, spoke to our excitement for a new era of infinite possibility, the refresh of beginning anew, and the triumph of having prevailed over the prophesied cataclysm of Y2K. Plus, it was great to fuck to.
But somehow, when the band's new album arrived last November-- and maybe this is just me, but-- anticipation for its arrival seemed lower than expected. I mean, people were interested, right, but there didn't seem to be the same kind of palpable enthusiasm as surrounded, say, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. I've spent some time speculating as to why this might have been, and initially, I chalked it up to the extraordinary sameness of \xC1gaetis Byrjun. Though notable for possessing one of the more unique sounds of the past decade, \xC1gaetis didn't offer much in the way of variety, which presumably led to fans fearing the band would be content to offer more of the same. (They were right, by the way.)
That was only half of it. I think that, deeper down, the wide-eyed optimism, innocence and cathartic joy offered by \xC1gaetis Byrjun-- as well as that of ( )-- just isn't with people like it once was. When that landmark record saw release in the first months of 2000, we were still reeling from the dot-com boom, the Dow Jones and Nasdaq habitually climbed several full percentage points each weekday, and technology was leaping at unprecedented rates; the nation's gravest concern lied with an oversexed president. Since then, a crumbling economy, terrorism, and the looming potential of WWIII have decimated our peace of mind. It's only right that the once comforting and contented Sigur Rós sound now strikes as somewhat naïve.
So there could hardly be a better time for the band to shift gears, which is what they've done, to some extent, with their Hlemmur soundtrack. There are only so many changes this band could make to their music without losing their signature sound (becoming a garage-rock band isn't one of them, though if they'd refashioned themselves as a Motörhead knockoff called "The Sigur Rós", I think the shock would wear off pretty fast), and to their credit, they've made most of them here. Where previous outings witnessed Sigur Rós mapping out sprawling, eight-plus-minute sonatas doused in spacious reverb and Jon Thor Birgisson's choirboy lilt, Hlemmur's tracks average roughly two minutes each, sans-vocals. The songs still ring with the same dampened production that graced Agaetis Byrjun and ( ), but the band's idyllic hopefulness has been replaced with a subtle malaise, and the overall effect is rarely as sweeping as on their official full-lengths.
This, of course, is likely due more to the nature of the film for which this music served as a score than to any permanent adjustment to Sigur Rós' modus operandi: Hlemmur is an independent film by director Ólafur Sveinsson, which documents the lives of the inhabitants of Reykjavik's central bus station, from which the picture takes its name. Throughout the feature, Sveinsson interviews the homeless and/or drug-addled nomads that frequent the hub while, "with unexpected candor, they tell of the monotony of their existence, their hopelessness, addiction and misery." At times, this draws Sigur Rós toward a sound of grandiose bleakness, not unlike that of their orchestral brethren Godspeed You Black Emperor!, though never as defiantly bombastic; other times, the band offers standard-fare Icelandic IDM, owing its warm, melodic tones and analog drones to compatriots Múm and Boards of Canada.
But mostly, this is Sigur Rós without the constraints of focus and melody that drew people to them in the first place. Hlemmur consists largely of empty ambiance, intended more for setting a tone in its cinematic counterpart than for home listening. As a score, the music serves its purpose, suggesting a certain mood (if always a somewhat vague one) without drawing attention from the stories told by the station's denizens. However, once the initial interest of hearing Sigur Rós in a slightly different context wears off, the music has a similar effect in your apartment or bedroom, rarely offering a moment to wake you to its presence.
These moments do come, on occasion: "Hvalir í útrymingarhaettu" features a dense, muddied drone topped with reversed piano chords and the highly processed and pitchshifted vocalizing of Jon Thor Birgisson for peculiar, squeaking/squawking effects, and "\xC1fram Island", after opening with a low-tech, preprogrammed samba beat, blossoms into a beautiful piano and xylophone prelude. But "\xDEversögn", while notable for its departure from the album's usual sound, doesn't fare quite as well: It once again employs that low-tech samba beat while the band offers an elementary keyboard improvisation that clearly means to be spooky, but instead ends up the desert music from Super Mario 2.
Interestingly, Sigur Rós never seem fully able to immerse themselves in the pale resignation that would be more suited to this documentary; there's always a light gauze of positivism in their major-chord drones-- which might even work in their favor here, were this kind of utopian reverie not such a tired theme of their records. Fortunately, the record isn't given a chance to wear out its welcome too badly, as the band throws us yet another surprise curveball: Even at 19 tracks, Hlemmur comes out at roughly half the duration of their usual 80-minute marathons. Still, the casual Sigur Rós fan won't likely find much to love here; though Hlemmur is certainly a beautiful record, beauty only stretches so far without the substance to back it.
