Sigur Ros: Kveikur

Sigur Rós never quite recovered from having their majestic dirge ‘Hoppípolla’ rendered into glorified muzak on the trailers for the BBC nature series Planet Earth. What once seemed as unearthly and spectacular as a geyser somersaulting under northern lights was, with the simple addition of David Attenborough and stampeding elephants, reduced to coffee-table status.
Awkward outsiders to a fault, the Reykjavik band seemed deeply uneasy in the sudden embrace of the mainstream and, in 2008, declared an open-ended hiatus. When they came back with 2012’s Valtari it was the very definition of a slight return: the melodies skulked and meandered, frontman Jonsi Birgisson’s star-child falsetto appeared to have developed a hangover. A wet squib, it suggested that, 13 years from their majestic debut, they were running dry of ideas. Recorded side by side with Valtari, Kveiker qualifies as a massive surprise, then: a squalling, screaming yin to its predecessor’s brooding yang. Opener ‘Hrafntinna’ kicks off in a gale of guitars, Jonsi’s vocals swooping in with banshee ferocity; ‘Isjaki’ suggests a conventional post-rock instrumental having a violent breakdown; and on ‘Var’ delicate pianos are in counterpoint to a lurching sense of doom. Darker, deeper and denser than ever before, this is Sigur Rós embracing the darkside and discovering that sometimes it it is good to be bad.

Key Track: 'Hrafntinna'