Not trying to spoil it for you, I used to listen to this album on endless repeat for days on end and I can totally see why I loved it, and yet I‘ve been completely put off by some of the people involved to an extent I don‘t care about it anymore at all.
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Rest assured: Sharing your personal opinion didn’t do any harm. 
I’d probably have had similar experiences (from idealisation to boycott ignoring?!) with other artists for various reasons, so in a way I can relate to the sentiment. It’s been a while, though.
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Killer Mike - Michael
Best hiphop album of the 21st century IMO. Flawless album from start to finish.
My person favorite track is exit 9 because growing up in Atlanta, trapping on the same streets he talks about it, at the time of the release it resonated so much as I was so tired of the life, getting older and knew if I wanted to walk away clean I had to get out soon.
With my sixty-nine, fire bird from the curb
I done had to work it like a square and had to serve
I’m listenin’ to B.I.G. and Dre and crumblin’ on herb
I’m pushin’ down MLK with a quarter pound of herb
Was my life at the time of that record coming out. I had actually fucked up a deal with his label like a year before because I couldn’t leave that life alone. Also had my demons. Went to rehab and gave up the streets last summer and this was my graduation song getting out of the program. 8 months later and things are looking like I’m getting a third chance musically and things could be taking off, a little older a little wiser, and a little more desperate, and finally prepared to capitalize. The album still gets me through the hard days when we struggle just to eat well because I’m working a shitty job instead of illicit, and are paying wayyyy more than we can afford in rent because we had to move to get away from the violence.
Music comes to us at the time we need it most is my experience.
OutKast, Goodie Mob, TIP who I also used to work with and didn’t capitalize on, all incredible. This is still the best album that truly epitomizes my city.
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Sigur Rós – Ágætis Byrjun (1999)
Sigur Rós showed me the true power of music. Their blend of pure emotion and sound spoke directly to something inside of me that I didn’t exactly know existed. They gave me the most intense experience I had ever had in my life – which was a blessing and a curse. Their music thus taught me an important lesson about life that everyone has to learn when becoming an adult. Ágætis Byrjun is also just a phenomenal album.
Like so many bands, I’ve discovered Sigur Rós because they were playing at a festival. Southside Festival in southern Germany in June 2006, to be more precise. It was a huge and quite commercial festival, which meant that many of my friends and even my sisters went there because you just went to a festival in summer when you were young. Luckily, Southside still had incredible booking for the many slots dedicated to less mainstream bands at that time. Just to give you an impression from their 2007 lineup (which I remember as being the best one): Aereogramme, Blood Brothers, Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, ISIS, Bright Eyes, Bloc Party, Mogwai, Interpol, Sonic Youth, Biffy Clyro … So basically every indie and post rock band that was great at the time. This booking meant that you could join all of the people you liked who listened to different music, or didn’t care too much about music in general, but wanted to go to a festival, and still experience a ton of exceptional concerts.
I had read about Sigur Rós a few months before I decided to go to that festival. I had to spend every other weekend at my mom‘s place after my parents got divorced, which I wasn’t a big fan of because she lived around 40km away from all of my friends at the time. The upside was that I got to read magazines when I visited her. First, this meant that I got to read magazines dealing with society and politics that she had free access to through the hairdresser that she shared rooms with for her cosmetics studio. I now realize that this was crucial for discovering my interest in politics, history, and reading and writing about it. Second, it also meant that I could buy a magazine and she’d pay for it so I could read while she was still working on Saturday mornings. I had chosen videogame magazines up until that point, but now that I was gradually more interested in music than games, I decided to give „Musikexpress“ a shot.
I remember album of the month being Beck‘s „Guero“, and that they had a big story on the history of „New Order“. But me still being mostly into emocore and metal, I didn’t resonate with much of the music that was written about. I did read the review of Sigur Rós‘ „Takk …” though and listened to opener „Glósóli“, which was included on the magazine CD. I found that song to be quite interesting, especially when the loud guitars finally kicked in. But only when I studied the lineup for the festival and saw that the band would be playing there did I download the full album. I remember mostly listening to „Takk …” on my shitty boombox when taking a bath. So naturally, I was only familiar with around half of the album and had no idea how much more powerful that music is when played loud on a good stereo system. As a result, I found the music interesting, but wasn’t blown away. Nevertheless, I was interested enough to give their festival concert a shot.
Sigur Rós closed the first night of Southside Festival 2006 with what was called a „late night special“. I remember spending a big chunk of the festival alone, running from concert to concert. I find it curious that I didn’t feel awkward doing this at my first festival. I guess I was just psyched that I get to see so many bands live and the people I came with didn’t want to see many shows or were into other bands. Anyways, here was 17 year old me at the Sigur Rós show, and as soon as opener „Glósóli“ exploded into its post rock finale, I was captured. I already wrote about Mars Volta changing my understanding of sound and arrangement in late 2004. But nothing had prepared me for this: a song that was as basic as it gets but builds on a single idea for minutes until it gets loud and then louder and then a bit louder. Pure emotion conveyed through a wall of sound, without any distracting words, counter melodies or complex structure. I was instantly hooked and had goosebumps all over my body. Then the band went into „Ny Batterí“ from „Ágætis Byrjun“. This was different than the songs I knew from „Takk“, much darker. A stoic bassline wrapped in guitar drones and dystopian horns, later joined by stoic drums that mimic the bassline. I had never heard such music in my life, but felt like I had been searching exactly for this.
They mostly played songs from „Takk …” for the rest of the show, and I loved it. Naturally, I was a big fan of Jónsi bowing his guitar to drone and stretching his body to press these vocals out of him as if in pain. But what really made the music special were the string and wind instruments. That became especially clear when they played „Olsen Olsen“ late in the show, another Ágætis classic that crescendos into one of the most simple and beautiful melodies I‘ve ever heard. Or when the chorus of “Sæglópur” makes time stand still for a minute. What I didn’t know is that they still had „Untitled 8“ in store, a 12 minute epic that might be the best piece of live music ever written. If this sounds like hyperbole, you better stop reading, because the next paragraph will be full of that.
Sigur Rós had already completely captured me from the beginning of the concert. The goosebumps never left and every song sent a wave of shivers over my whole body. „Untitled 8“ somehow still managed to take that to another level. If you’ve never heard that song, it’s basically the quintessential post rock song that consists of only two parts with the last one growing more tense and louder until the band finally unleashes a wall of sound that you will feel in your whole body. And boy did it work. I can only describe what that song did to me as an outer body spiritual experience. I was standing there in front of a stage being blasted by loud music, yet I was transported into a world of its own, where there was nothing but my deepest feelings and emotions. It was like my truest self was revealed to me for a moment, with all of the distractions of daily life and all of the layers of rationality and self restraint removed.
It was the most profound experience I’ve ever had in my life. I remember telling this to my father and sister around two years later and they laughed it off as something only a young and naive person could say. Yet writing about this twenty years later, I can say with confidence that my judgment still stands. A lot has happened since, and I’ve had a lot of outstanding experiences during concerts and in life period. But nothing has ever felt as intense since.
I’m very thankful I’ve had this experience so early in my life. It showed me how beautiful the world can be. How powerful music is. And what kind of person I want to be. Yet it also felt like a curse sometimes. I’ve spend years chasing that rush during concerts or when listening to an album. A few times, I’ve come close (like when I was listening to Sigur Rós while watching the northern lights), but never close enough. I’ve put a lot of pressure on myself and often ruined what could have been a great experience by fixating on making sure the circumstances are perfect to replicate what my first Sigur Rós concert felt like. It took me at least half of my twenties to realize I have to let go and stop chasing that feeling.
I think I can overall appreciate concerts and music more since I did. I also think that whole episode made me stay off of harder drugs, because I knew what is possible without them, and it also made me afraid of chasing that high once I knew it. At the same time, it required me to accept that I’m not as moved and open as I was when I had less experiences to compare things to. I guess that’s growing up in a nutshell, and I’m glad I already went through that process in my twenties in a way. But I’m not gonna lie: it would be incredible to be able to feel as deeply and unfiltered as that 17 year old boy did, at least from time to time.
Anyways, now that all of this is out of the way, we can talk about the actual album, “Ágætis Byrjun”. While the live experience is inextricably linked to Sigur Rós (and post rock in general), they also recorded some exceptional albums. And their sophomore is without a doubt my favorite one. What sets it apart for me is that it has all of the soundscapes and wall of sound elements that made me fall in love with them - but weaves all of that around a core of actual songs with clear structures and great melodies. This becomes most clear on the title track, which is basically just a nice folk song with acoustic guitar and piano. There’s also songs like the aforementioned “Olsen Olsen”, centered around a simple melody that could have been made up by a child goofing around, that is eventually blown up to epic proportions with a full orchestra and choir. It’s remarkable to compare these songs to the meandering drones of their debut “Von”, which makes you wonder how they evolved from having a nice concept for a band to making one of the best albums of all time within just a year.
Of course, the megaton melancholy of albums like ( ) is also present in almost every song. This is a dark and heavy album that’s too sad for many people. Yet, there’s almost the same amount of lightness, whimsy and playfulness. Take “Hjartað hamast“, which could be perceived as a pretty depressing song. Yet its subtitle is “(bamm bamm bamm)”, which is hilarious in and of itself, and probably describes the swaying keys that are accompanied by a harmonica. An element you will also find on “Flugufrelsarinn”, that layers all of its heavy sounds on chill bass and drums. Or that short B-section of “Starálfur” that sounds like a cheerful marching band interrupting the song (something they’d later perfect on “Sé lest”, where there’s an actual marching band walking into the audience on the live recording for “Heima”). And of course, the “Olsen Olsen” melody returning one last time, when you thought the song was over, but this time it’s played on a flute, receding into the background like an elve disappearing into the woods (I know, the biggest cliche when writing about Sigur Rós).
The best thing about this album though is that almost every moment of every song is both sad and happy at the same time. These songs can amplify your mood or change it into its opposite. “Starálfur” is probably the best example of this, with a melody that’s so beautiful that you want to cry tears of joy from your right eye and tears of sadness from your left eye. Even small details like that one person coughing repeatedly during the wind instrument intro of “Ny Batterí“ contain that ambivalence. You can see it as a funny little joke that breaks the fourth wall and makes sure you know the band doesn’t take itself too serious. Or you can perceive it as the saddest moment of the whole album, when that poor (sick?) person can’t even play their instrument for more than ten seconds without falling into a miserable cough. I think this emotional ambivalence is a hallmark of truly exceptional music that manages to transcend clear moods and touch something more fundamental in you. I think that’s why that concert hit so hard for me.
There’s one song on “Ágætis Byrjun” that exemplifies everything I love about the album: “Viðrar vel til loftárása”. It ends with a breathtaking ensemble of strings that sound like they’re pulled straight out of a classical concert. Yet at some point, these strings start to collapse, becoming more and more dissonant and broken until they’re finally cut off. Which feels like a wink at the listener, telling them “yeah, we know this might be a bit too much”. Which, of course, couldn’t be farther from the truth, because we just heard what’s probably the most rewarding crescendo of all time. When there’s just Jónsi singing and that piano, before orchestral drums kick in, the piano and strings rise, and Jónsi finally unleashes his bow on that guitar and the whole orchestra explodes along with it, it feels like a well earned victory lap, a confident statement of “yes, we know this is fucking incredible and exactly what you’ve been waiting for”.
This moment is still as beautiful to me as it was when I first heard it. And, more importantly, the whole song is. Because before it’s a wall of sound, it’s just a beautifully written song that I’m sure will work just as well with only a piano and vocals. Which makes it different from the Sigur Rós of “Untitled 8”, that either grabs you completely and shakes you with its sheer force, like it did when I first heard it at that concert. Or kinda sounds like just another post rock song that is a bit too long for how simple it is. As I’ve hopefully made clear, I’ve pretty much exhausted that first path years ago, very reluctantly. But luckily, “Ágætis Byrjun” is still there for me to give me everything I love about Sigur Rós and music in general, because it’s just a collection of well written songs at its core that will make you appreciate you’re a human being, with conflicting and contradictory emotions.
Quintessential track:
Viðrar vel til loftárása
Could have also been:
- Mogwai – Happy Songs for Happy People
- Godspeed You, Black Emperor – Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
- The Antlers – Hospice
- Aereogramme – My Heart Has a Wish that you Would Not Go
- Efterklang – Magic Chairs
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Sorry not sorry if these latest entries have become pretty long and rambling at times. I found that the texts that are long and full of references to a soecific time, place, personal experience or cultural artifact are the ones I enjoy reading the most. I also discovered that writing these texts is a nice way for me to organize my thoughts, archive precious memories and make sense of my life.
I might be influenced by Tim Roger’s style of rambling about video games and how they shaped his life through hour long tangents about seemingly irrelevant details of his personal life:
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It’s all good, I enjoyed reading your thoughts about Ágætis Byrjun. I certainly appreciate a good, deep narrative about a personal experience.
I’m finding I’m getting much the same effect as you in revisiting these albums through such a deep lens. I’ve actually a much better understanding of how these albums impacted me due to going so deep, which is interesting as the albums I discuss are albums I had certainly though about through the years.
What I find most interesting in reading everyone’s entires is how important the emotional impact that these albums had on most of us. While we may mention aspects of technique and tools that we enjoy about these albums, the emotional response is what people seem to spend the most time discussing and those emotions compelled people to seek out other musical experiences. That is to say they lit some kind of fuse in all of us.
It’s been a few years since I’ve listen to Ágætis Byrjun and you’ve motivated me to put it on the headphones this evening when I do my nightly wind down.
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I saw Killer Mike once in Berlin - unfortunately the crowd was really small. I think this was before Run The Jewels came out. He did a great show nevertheless. Amazing guy. I love R.A.P. Music and I will revisit Michael.
Thank you too for opening up why this album is so important to you. I wish you all the best regarding your music career. 
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This and their prior debut album
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3gFs648HCQ&list=PLL-NbN8uTOiiWCx_-GC5xB7BH2z5nTJ8m
were very regular minidisc mix sources for me back in the 90s.
‘Psychedelic’ was a musical interest to me - as much for its roots in 60s rock in 13th Floor Elevator’s case, stretching a garage‑band lineup into something simultaneously mystical, bluesy, and hypnotic with a sort of quirky raucous surf-rock vibe - as it was into Pink Floyd, FSOL, Spiritualized, Ozric Tentacles and (many many) others.
Slip Inside This House - 1st track on the album above - rough Texan garage and cosmic ambition, influencing alternative and neo‑psychedelic bands for decades to come; from Van Morrison, R.E.M. Spacemen 3, Primal Scream, Echo & the Bunnymen to electronic psych-techno and post‑punk, shoegaze, space‑rock, grunge, Nirvana …
So I’d put this down as one of my favourite ‘blueprint setting’ groups that future bands keep rediscovering and reinterpreting.
Roky Erickson, a force of nature
And if you’re interested in a bit of history
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i’m only just now getting into The Smiths cuz a really good song of theirs also happened to have a music video on that VHS tape that introduced me to Lush (“Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before”), but they’re a great band.
that MTV Dream Time tape is the gift that keeps in giving lol
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Radiohead Amnesiac.
This was probably the most pivotal Radiohead album for me. In a completely separate way from my previous entry, Homework by Daft Punk, this album helped me realize I actually love electronic music.
Packt like Sardines. Probably my favorite Radiohead song all together. I am still chasing that drum sound (I ought to cave and buy a machinedrum someday.)
Pulk/Pull. This really solidified my love of more abstract, ambient and texture based music. Some of Radioheads outros and interludes are my favorite parts. of the song This song is basically one long interlude.
I Might be Wrong. Man what a jam. Electronic mixed with rock can be so corny most of the time but these guys never fell into that territory. It was always just two sides of the same coin. I attribute a lot of that to Nigel Godrich, their “6th Beatle.” Also whatever the fuck that resonant hi hat thing at 4:07 is, it has played an outsized role in me getting into synths, drum machines and just production in general.
Knives out. One of the first songs I learned on guitar (with the actual first being My Iron Lung.)
I could have picked many of their albums but this was one of the first I really fell in love with, in tandem with Kid A. Amnesiac always won, if I had to choose, with just a few more songs that land just right for me but I view both albums as very combined.
Given that they are my favorite band, I’m gonna gonna gush over two notable mentions.
The Bends - Technically the first album I had from them. I actually discovered Radiohead through an AMV (anime music video) with the song My Iron Lung set to the FLCL anime. I promptly Limewired the whole album. Good times. I love their whole catalogue but I really miss these days of the raunchy electric guitar and whiny vocals from songs like Just. I like Pablo Honey a lot for the same reason. It’s just a damn good late 90s rock album start to finish.
Hail to Thief - Not my personal favorite but I think it’s their best. Maybe “Peak” album in a literal sense. To me, it’s the culmination of the rock/electronic thing I love with each reaching some really high highs here. In Rainbows felt like a perfect come down after that, with everything since still trending in that more mellow direction but HTTT just fired on all cylinders. I was a full fledged fan by the time this came out and it was the first (and last so far) time I was able to see them on tour.
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https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_llSi9nQD5gO1dnc7wdcxGLNvibvbKv55M&si=Z_Vafui5cX55zoK4
Bit late to the party and missed a couple months.
Thought I’d put this one out there - Avalon Sutra, by Harold Budd.
This album represents the more studious and contemplative aspect of a self.
People don’t always see that side, it can be pretty private, and it often doesn’t really come across in spoken word - moreso written word I’ve realised lately.
In person you might be more jokey, emotional or energetic, or all other emotions. But the writer or researcher, someone that sort of quietly thinks about ideas or other aspects of art and life, kinda represents a center that isn’t always manifest, but part of your internal world.
Harold Budd provides a real accompaniment to that vibe I think. Alone in a room, hot drink in hand, window gazing, thinking things through. It’s not an always self but it’s a self people around you don’t often see, and it’s a more a personal definition than one that’s exposed or defined by others.
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That album had a huge impact on me too. I have a very vivid memory of listening to it on a long 2 bus journey home from work in heavy snow on a dark evening, last working day before Christmas. It made the long cold journey very enjoyable and it felt like the soundtrack to my life at that moment. I don’t usually pay much attention to lyrics, but the line “I’m a reasonable man, get off my case” from Packt like Sardines somehow made me feel stronger about issues I was facing at work at that moment and helped me release the anger I felt about them. I feel that music can be very powerful in that sense. I remember The Downward Spiral by NIN had a similar effect on me, that simply listening to it helped me release some anger I was feeling at the time. I agree about the drum sound on Packt like Sardines and would love to get a Machinedrum someday myself. The period of Kid A, Amnesiac and HTTT was my favorite period of their music. I also saw them on the HTTT tour, they were amazing, one of the best gigs of my life.
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Another very iconic band from the late 80s. (at least in their early phase)
I had a crush on Miki Berenyi for some time. And other than The Smiths I saw them live a couple of times.
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I‘m still internally debating which Radiohead album I‘ll pick. It definitely won’t be Amnesiac, so I‘m glad you chose that one. It’s the only post OK Computer album I can’t get into, and I don’t know why. Because I absolutely love Kid A and also love the rock/electronic blend you describe on HTTT especially.
Sardines is one of my favorite Radiohead songs though and that’s mainly because of the beat you mention. So that’s an MD playing? One of the first more electronic songs that I fell in love with. Like Spinning Plates is also a very fascinating song you didn’t mention.
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You can still post something in the other threads if you want to, it’s not like that’s forbidden after the month is over 
!
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Is anyone interested in putting in some extra effort to make our lists even more exciting? I don‘t have the time to do this, but would love:
- if somebody sent me a text for each month that contains a list with Artist, album, user and a hyperlink to their text
- if somebody sets up and updates something with an external tool that represents the cover art of all albums we‘ve mentioned. This idea came from somebody else when we were planning the whole project and I‘d love to take a look at this expanding mosaic throughout the year
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Now that we’re 1/4 done, I thought some of us would like to share some meta discoveries they made when making the list and writing their pieces:
Could be fun to do a quarterly check-in!
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A special guest came at the mythic Wheelclub in Montreal last week. The Wheelclub welcomes all kind of venues, from EMOM to blues. Unfortunately, I wasn’t there to see the man in action. Someone from the EMOM nights posted a video of the performance in the EMOM thread. The man sang two songs : Spanish Train and Lady In Red.
So, this month, I present a 1975 album from Chris de Burgh, Spanish Train And Other Stories. I’ve listened to this album on repeat at home or on my Walkman. It’s such theatrical and well written. I like every song on it, all great stories but as a poker player at times, the song Spanish Train is one hell of a song (pun intended).
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How is it already the end of March? Every time I sat down to write something here, I got distracted by something or other.
My first two entries were about albums that were important to me growing up. I still enjoy them, but I don’t come back to them all that often. But I still listen to Stereolab every week, and I have for almost twenty years. Nobody else has taught me more, or done more to shape my taste and sensibility. Hell, even their visual style has influenced me: I have a weakness fo Op Art and Space Age visuals that is directly tied to those album covers.
It’s funny: I got into CAN, my last pick, by working backwards from Radiohead, but I got into Stereolab by working forwards from CAN, looking for modern bands that carried the krautrock/kosmische torch after the 1970s. Stereolab came up early and often in the searches, so I put on the “Ping Pong” music video and was floored: shimmering harmonies, sugar-rush rhythms, antique electronics, the nonchalant bubblegum Marxism. I had an instant crush on Laetitia Sadier (I still do), and Tim Gaine became my unlikely guitar hero.
I like all of their records, from the early NEU! exercises to the Italo-disco fantasias, but if I had to pick one album that’s resonated with me the most as a musician, it would be Dots and Loops (1997). This is when the Groop fully dedicated themselves to becoming a studio-centered band, building up everything out of loops and sequences in Pro Tools. And unlike a lot of records from the early DAW era, the songs sound unbelievably lush and uncompressed. I still find new bits of sound and ear candy when I listen to it, after almost twenty years.
The music itself is endlessly inventive. Bossa nova electro jazz! Acid Farfisa IDM! Bubblegum modular pop! So many weird time signatures! I still think of this a high point in that late 90s moment when “post-genre” music was thrown around so breathlessly, and it felt like you could fit any sound together if your taste was impeccable enough. It still influences so much of my own taste today that it’s almost tautological to call it a favorite record: Dots and Loops is the standard I judge most music against.
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This record has been on my “To Properly Absorb” list for far too long. I always find myself taking that easy dopamine from Mars Audiac Quintet and Emperor Tomato Ketchup!
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