In musical terms, Iceland is probably still best known for its 1980s export, the Sugarcubes, featuring pop oddity Bjork. In recent years, Sigur Rós (pronounced See’er Rose) have been adding their name to the list of famous Icelandic exports with their freaky trip rock featuring songs with lyrics comprised of a language they made up themselves. While this might not leap out as a PR and marketing man’s dream job, add in the fact that the songs seldom fall short of the 6 or 7minute mark, making any radio plugging tasks nothing short of a nightmare.

Nightmare is a word I stumbled upon more than a few times while doing my research before we met Sigur Rós. They are notoriously monosyllabic and extremely introverted in their approach to selling themselves. Interviews often degenerate into yes/no sessions. As I pondered what to ask, it dawned on me that with my reasonably strong west coast Scottish accent where people often misunderstand me was I really the best person to interview Sigur Rós? Probably not, but interesting, well, hopefully it would be….

From the bare-footed stage performances to the fact the ‘Jonsi’ (singer/guitarist) plays the guitar using a violin bow, nothing seemed remotely standard about Sigur Rós. The violin bow had me thinking of Led Zeppelin but there is no standard guitar rock to be found. The eccentric singing style and tripped out whale like sounds had me thinking Radiohead but it’s typically slightly less intense and, as Liam Gallagher one described Thom Yorke as a “googly eyed little fucker”, with Sigur Rós, thankfully there are no “googly eyes” on display.

As you can imagine, the amount of contradiction with an act this untypical is quite impressive, relentless in their refusal to change or play the corporate rock game, they are actually signed to a major label. Even more impressive is the dismissiveness about their collective output. “Our songs are about nothing,” they proclaim. The complete lack of desire to succeed has seen them cut their touring from the long gruelling schedules normally associated with bands at this level down to 3 and 6 week stints. Commercial success, or fringe amounts of it, found its way to Sigur Rós with their most accessible album to date, Takk. While many bigger names in music are waxing lyrical about the genius in their soundscapes – supposedly Chris Martin of Coldplay had their records playing in the background while wife Gwyneth Paltrow gave birth – the commercial radio station still seemed nothing short of sceptical.

After many years of making music, there was perhaps a definite intention to make the 2005 ‘Takk’ album more accessible if not commercial, Sigur Rós disagreed choosing to employ the ‘natural progression’ argument. They later followed up with the 2008 ‘Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust’ which was well received. Currently we eagerly await the release, reportedly sometime next year, of their latest effort which they announced at the end of May had finished recording.

We met up with Sigur Rós to discuss life on the road, life off the road, imploding band stories, flirtations with fame and a desire to be awkward in the face of stardom. Here is what they had to say…

Eddie Leonard: Seeing as you’re far better known now than when you started out, is there more pressure to make an album a specific way. Is there a difference in being popular from trying to become popular?
Sigur Rós: No not really. Who do you mean from?

Is there more from yourselves, pressure in the group?
No, no, not really

What about pressure from major labels. You do have a major label deal in the USA?
No, no, we wouldn’t have signed for this label if that were the case. EMI knew what they were going into with us, so it’s just the same.

In previous years you seemed to have spent a long time touring compared to now, although you say it’s because of people having families. Is there also an element of not being too close together for too long to minimise tension in the band?
All about the families, yes. We try to keep it as short as we can, but still economically ok.

Yeah, short touring becomes more costly, how do you balance this?
We just try to make it all work out?

So you have a large merchandising stall, then?
Ha ha, yes yes, we try…

Does the shorter touring help keep you settled into life in Iceland? It must be very different from the quiet life when you’re on the road?
Yeah, eh, on the road there is the lifestyle, we just try to get into it, other times we just relax and don’t do anything, you know?

How do you combat the radio play problem? Would you do shorter songs?
Now is the first time we’re getting radio play actually, mainly in the UK, but not too much. Yeah we have problems but you can’t think about that too much….

Is it deliberately anti-commercial?
No no we just do the music like it is. Be adventurous.

So have you ever tried to make a 3-minute pop song?
No no we don’t really try to do anything. We just see what happens.

Do you still say that your songs “are about nothing”?
I like the idea that people connect to the music and think about things but no, the songs are not about this; we all have our own ideas.

What about people’s perceptions of the songs? Do you ever laugh at what some people think the songs are about?
No ‘cus they are about nothing, so it is only people’s ideas.

Do you ever write negative or angry songs then?
No, no we just always see what happens. I think when we write music we have to get into a certain state of mind you know? It’s very hard to pinpoint an exact emotion, it’s always open.

You are quite famous for one-word answers, so if you could choose one word what would it be after a bad interview?
Probably ‘tired’ you know?

What about after a good show, how would you sum that up in one word?
Oh, energetic probably, ‘good’.

What about people leaving your show early, what word would you have for them?
I don’t know, eh…

Do you wonder what they think?
I don’t really see anything. I’m concentrating.

More info www.sigur-ros.co.uk | www.myspace.com/sigurros

© Henk Langeveld http://www.henklangeveld.nl

Otto Wicher or Lucky Fonz III, as he goes by is a star. I could whittle on for a few hundred words here thus wasting more of my nine-till-five time or I can spit it out in one – 100% pure entertainment and quite the merry little minstrel.

His songbook is three parts traditional American folk, with the obligatory Dylan-esque nod, to one part kooky Dutch bloke with an odd take on his existence. This is where you’ll find the magic. From the opener of ‘I used to be a lady’ with its lyrics of “running like a girl” and “enjoying tea as that’s what ladies do”, to “the boys made of cola and girls made of wine” in ‘Lowlands’ it’s a bit of a puzzle as to where he’s taking himself next. Normally a song that started with an explanation that “it might be easier to understand if you think of me as a lighthouse during this song” would have me reaching for a plastic bag with which to suffocate myself, but this time I’m still entertained by the third sing-along, or rather whistle-along chorus.

Reading this back to myself before posting it online for your beady little eyes to scan and for your brain to pick a fight with, I can see some might say it sounds like a load of random bollocks. Had I not seen it I might be inclined to think that too, but it’s the first time in a long time I’ve thought “f**k me, he should be a superstar!”

Go the mass has ended.

More info: http://www.myspace.com/luckyfonziii

Rarely has a band, especially a Scottish band, split the indie guitar crowd into two opposing camps quite so much. Several reviews already published are calling them the Marmite of 2008, but I detest the ‘Marmite’ analogy so I’ll keep it nice and clear and say either you will fucking love them so much you’ll want their name tattooed on your forehead, or you will think they’re the most contrived bollocks you’ve heard in a long time and you’ll want to smash the arrogant twat of a singers face in with a baseball bat.

In my extremely important opinion (oh yes baby), for far too long has Glasgow rested on every word that, the less than aesthetic coke-head who is, Alan Magee, spits out. For even longer we’ve (I’m from them parts) been trying to recreate the Jesus and Mary Chain, in fact so poorly that the Jesus and Mary Chain even got back together to have a pop at it and for the first time I had something in common with Amy Winehouse, cos I said NO! NO! NO! Adding their own personal touch, what you get is a cross between The Mary Chain, the Ronettes, Phil Spectre and the Grease soundtrack pushed through a few fuzz pedals.

Parting with a tenner in your local store will buy you an album of the re-recorded, produced and sexed up songs that did the rounds on the net called Glasvegas Home Tapes. James Allan’s voice goes for heartfelt and often comes up sounding ‘how to speak Glaswegian for dummies’. It is, thankfully, much less hills and heather than the Proclaimers, but it still tries very hard to say look at me, I’m from the east-end slums and I’m going to tell you all about poverty, abandoning parents, empathetic ladies called Geraldine, getting stabbed, young offender institutions and social workers pronounced ’soshul wurkurz’.

My old granny used to say ‘where there’s muck there’s brass’ and that, I’m very glad to say, does ring true. Amongst an album that sounds gloriously better than the Home Tapes, there is a gem or two hidden away amongst a collection of songs trying to sound ‘important’. My own cheating heart is without a doubt the most genuine aural gift laid to tape or hard disk that I’ve heard in ages and anybody who can make “liar, liar, liar, liar, liar, pants on fire’ sound the way this does deserves a pat on the back for a job extremely well done, even if he does have an extremely dodgy haircut.

Slicing out the key tracks you’ll find an abundant amount of joy that could have made the best EP your money can command but, fillers included, you get a very solid debut if you like that sort of thing.

MORE INFO: www.glasvegas.net

The whole sound is a wash of delay, distortion and there are three guys with guitars swaying about the tiny stage in time with the drummer, the sound is quite pleasant to be honest, nothing too challenging sticks out of an extremely melodic set. Looking round the room 75% of the punters are quite literally with bums on seats, with the only standing attendee’s propping up the bottle bar upstairs.

The biggest problem here is the band is actually tight, able and ready, but it all kind of looks like students playing around for the evening. For a band who communicate so little it has to be pretty visual to make any real impact live, this set on a large stage with a light show and backdrop could have been dope smokers heaven, instead the swaying starts to grate after a while.

The set itself is shorter than I had bargained on, to their credit the arrangements were kept to the specs of the recorded versions, no jamming, no extended solo’s, no chat between songs, you have to kind of admire the boldness of such a minimalist affair.

In nutshell, its stadium indie rock minus the stadium, or instrumental punk for yoga and Thai-chi enthusiasts, sure it’s quirky, but it’s not without its charms.

MORE INFO on thatSpace