Music > Album Reviews

Sigur Ros // Kveikur

21/05/13

Wow.

Kveikur is Sigur Ros’ 7th studio album, and marks a massive change to the band following the departure of multi-instrumentalist Kjartan Sveinsson at the end of last year. This exit, however, to my ear has had a positive impact on the direction of the band. The downright filthy, distorted sounds contained in opener, Brennisteinn, and the wonderfully clangy percussion in track 2, Hrafntinna, are a fantastic display of their ability to change, develop and innovate. Kveikur is, overall, a darker outing than the majority of the band’s previous work, containing hints of Penderecki’s Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima in the instrumentation (a work which I would recommend to anyone unfamiliar with it), amongst other things, but still retains that specific beauty that you associate with Sigur Ros. Kveikur also provides an amount of layers that, sadly, are often lacking in ‘pop’ or ‘rock’ and, having listened to it about a dozen times before finally sitting down to write this, I’ve found it still delivering something new on each occasion.

I’ve read in various fan forums of concern for this album due to Kjartan’s leaving the band, but those concerns are completely unfounded and Sigur Ros have delivered an incredible record that will go down as one of their best.

It's not perfect, but it's pretty close - 10/10