Sigur Rós Live -- Their Eyes Were Watching God

At the beginning of the year, there were three favorite bands of mine that I was desperate to see live; by the end of this month, I should be able to strike all three from my must-watch list, and simultaneously making my co-authors eternally envious. You've already read the first of my journals, as I made the long-distance commute to the Land of Chowdah to witness the testament of My Morning Jacket. I now present to you the results of my trek uptown to see Iceland's greatest export, beyond some kind of fish.


I took the world-famous A-Train up past Harlem into Washington Heights, in the process exploring a part of Manhattan that I hadn't gotten to see yet. My report: um, there are hills and a lot of Dominicans in this area. Due to my lack of a ticket, I headed out early, arriving at the United Palace Theater an hour before the doors opened. (It's at this moment that I want to make a broad point of saying Fuck Ticketmaster and Fuck Capitalism, for selling out the tickets to people who wanted to charge 4 times face value on various ticket exchanges. It's a ridiculous bastardization of a simple principle: I want to see a group, I pay for the privilege of seeing that group. I don't want to pay 8 kinds of convenience charges, and then pay some asshole who swooped in and bought tickets to an event he has no connection to and just wants to make a quick buck). Despite this potential obstacle, I instantly found someone eager to get rid of his tickets, and I was prepared to haggle, but was surprised when he only wanted face value, mirroring my luck with Wolf Parade. No bullshit, and I got myself floor seats. Score.

The only drawback to my great fortune was that I had an hour to kill. I spent some time looking at the amazing theater, but mainly I spent a lot of time sending random texts to Joe Reefer and Von Bookman. It's a good thing I have the stereotypical-teenage-girl texting plan on my phone.


Now I've been a big fan of Sigur Rós for some time now, dating back to when Ágætis byrjun first came out, when I first became enraptured by their ethereally beautiful music, but I had been told that it did not compare to their live show. I had some familiarity with this, having watched the live DVD Heima a few times when I was in the need for some uplifting. If it wasn't for that disc, I would still be convinced that the band was composed of some formless aliens, because there was no way actual humans could produce such gorgeous noise. But sure enough, they are indeed people, and it was a trip to see the band somewhat costumed for the show.

The room echoed with the pinging of a sonar, which meant "Svefn-G-Englar" was going to be the opener. Once the bow first struck the guitar string, and it wound it's way through the various delay pedals and feedback and that first tone hit, the crowd erupted in applause. To give you a sense of the moment, it's the manifestation of the maxim "finding beauty in the dissonance"--it's a sound that's not a note, but it's still musical. The band really let the room help out their sound, letting the natural echo and space give their heaviily-reverbed guitars and tinkling keyboards space to breathe.


It was a lean Sigur Rós playing tonight, with just the four core members. While the addition of strings and horns often are essential ingredients to some of their work, it was an intriguing experiment to hear the group work as a quartet, and I felt their work suffered none for the effort. While that may have meant no "Starálfur" or "Olsen Olsen", the night would still be memorable. The band mainly focused on tunes from the new album and Takk..., but throwing in classics like "Viðrar Vel Til Loftárása (Good Weather for an Airstrike)" that soared to the heavens. I think this was a good decision, because the newer material has such a joyous feel to it that you can't help but feel uplifted when listening to the likes of "Glósóli" and "Hoppípolla". The second song there also provided a memorable moment, as the band launched into the coda "Með Blóðnasir", they had the audience sing the backing vocals that gave a hauntingly poetic edge to the song. The band would end the set with the crowd clapping along furiously to the deliriously fun "Gobbledigook", and the crowd ate it up.



Throughout the set we saw a band that was comfortable playing together, able to work their way through minor slipups and various technical problems. Too often the members' individual talents get ignored in favor of the group's overall sound, but if you listened closely you could pick out wonderfully melodic basslines and complex drum patterns that nonetheless provided perfect structure for the songs. The interplay between the guitars and keyboards were so elaborate that one could easily get lost in them, and of course there are the wonderfully angelic vocals that truly act as another instrument. All of this came to a head with the stunning closer "Popplagið", with the lights and smoke syncing up beautifully (as they had all night) as the band pushed and pushed toward the edge, and dare we say, rocking out, as the song reached an unimpeachable climax. Now that's the way to spend an evening.