Live Reviews: Reykjavik Grapevine: Musiktilraunir 2013! The Fresh First Pressings!

A few weeks ago, I decided to go back to the site of many a troubled moment for yours truly and review once again the unsigned bands competition, Musiktilraunir. And, after some finicky editing work from the masters, the article is now available HERE at the Grapevine site to read in all it’s glory,

It wasn’t too bad an experience (although they wouldn’t allow me to walk into the venue with my beer – FASCISTS!!! etc), but this time my wingman was the ever effusive (Yet totally cynical) Birkir Fjalar, who was there to provide a second voice and some context. Birkir is actually the second person I’ve been with to this who was once a judge at the contest (The other was Sindri Eldon), so his opinions on the contest are something that people should take good notice of.

Musiktilraunir seems to have really changed now since I started laying my eyes and ears on the thing 4 years ago. Since OMAM have signed to Universal, and now Samarís have signed to One Little Indian in the UK, the contest is now seen by many people as a clear fast track to the top. Win this, and you are at least guaranteed a big shot at something. In fact the prizes this year were also shifted with pretty much the winner getting everything (Including 250,000 ISK from record label Sena), and the runners-up getting comparatively fuck all, not even a spot at Iceland Airwaves.

Because of this the acts show a more polished and professional schtick with everyone seeming to exhibit clear signs of over earnestness. In fact only the acts Skerðing or In The Company Of Men seemed to have no fucks to give about the austere sense of the occasion. A lot of the contestants are a lot older now with most being in their early/near mid ’20s (perhaps a sign of the growing delayed adulthood that most of society exhibits these days?), and the “Craft” is so much more evident now. Yes, the “Craft.” I had to explain this to my editor, being that you get people who are so proficient on their instruments, but when it comes to actually making really interesting songs or doing something that would make you sit up and take notice, they lack that certain spark. Some of the acts such as CeaseTone showed this in spades.

Indeed what was not conveyed in the review was Birkir’s views on the how the event looks and feels now compared to previous years  He was frankly bored over the first half,  and apart from a few acts that did interest him (Such as Kjurr), it wasn’t really raising his blood pressure that much. He noted that back in the day, many of the acts were much younger, near to the age of the kids that were in Yellow Void. He also noted that in past contests, there was also more of a sense of youthful aggression and snottiness, that they were doing things THEIR way. It was interesting to note that the GV Facebook page that day posted a video of cult ’90s Icelandic band Botnleðja performing at the contest back in 1995. the fact is that this is way rougher, harsher and brighter than what was played this year, yet I honestly think that if this band entered this year, they’d never actually reach the final. 

But there were some good points. Both of us did think that for the best part, the judges got it right with the final three, especially the winners, VÖK. I do hope that they can really expand on their sound and try to do their own thing away from the meddling of many of the more established scene heads. What was impressive and made them more distinctive than Samarís was that they had better melodic hooks and a much more powerful, and more sensual vocalist. There is some real potential going on there

Ahh, perhaps all of this comes in waves. Perhaps in a year or two, we’ll see bands kick against this sterile nonsense and try to do something to stir up the established order of things. If it does, I certainly hope to be there at the front laughing my head off.

To sign off, here’s the best song from the winner Vök. I’m off to the pub now…

 

Reykjavik Grapevine: Live Reviews: Musikltilraunir 2012!!

So a few weeks ago i went to my fragrant friend Rebecca Louder to the annual unsigned battle of the bands contest MUSIKTILRAUNIR. Our report on it is now online and you can read it for yourself! Most of the thanks should go to Louder on this one. I simply provided the recordings and my own notes on the evening events.

Oh and if you really want to, then you can hear the live radio broadcast of the bands RIGHT HERE:

OK…. lets start this off. Last year, with hindsight, when they paired Sindri and myself to cover the contest, it pretty much brought out the inner misanthrope in both of us. And it certainly showed. We were fair, but also incredibly harsh with some of the acts. Even before this year’s contest, a colleague at the paper told me that they really didn’t like the way we wrote the piece (our initial thoughts on the bands were simply recorded and transcribed) because we stuck the boot into acts who, whether they sucked or not, were playing on an occasion where it was probably going to be their only chance to shine. And we were basically shitty to them.

All this is all fair comment. Ho hum….

But here’s the thing. Last year it would have been harsh, because several of the bands, even the winners Samarís, had that “let’s get together and practice in our garage” level of expertise. Add to this, you also tend to see a lot of the awkwardness that you would see if you were performing, for some bands especially, the first time.

But since last year something had changed. That something had been the 2010 winners of Musiktilraunir, Of Monsters And Men, getting signed to Universal and rapidly infecting the US with their brand of bland folk rock. Now the game had changed with Musiktilraunir. In the past, you got some friends together, made a few tunes and tried your luck out. If you won, you got some really great prizes, but after that, you were pretty much left to your own devices afterwards with your careers as musicians.

Now, although it’s not a given, if you win the contest and you have the desire to want to make it big, there are a lot of interests backing you. As I’ve talked about before on here, the whole apparatus of the music and cultural industries in Iceland over the last couple of years have become much more connected, better organised, with a lot more contacts with publications, PR guys, blogs, and radio stations, etc outside of Iceland. And in winning Musiktilraunir, and becoming the “new” sound of Iceland, you now have a lot of clout and possibilities to get yourself seen that didn’t exist in the past.

Is this a bad thing? you decide. But that meant that this year’s saw the vast majority of acts reaching the final being VERY slick, VERY tight, and playing music that perhaps they thought would do well to win. They also had this sheen of being total pros who had been in the game for years, barely putting a foot wrong. There was very little of the ramshackle feeling that you would have expected from acts in previous years. It was as if the acts themselves knew that by winning MTR, you would be getting placed on a fast track to wider recognition.

Take he first act, WHITE SIGNAL. At 14-17 years old, they were certainly the youngest band of the night. And they had all that wholesome, organic farmed pep you would have seen in the school band for High School Musical or something similar. And their music definitely had that upbeat high school band style that was actually incredibly proficient for their age. But during the break, while talking to people in the foyer, i found out that the band had a manager. A band starting out this young already had a manager? Also i was informed that said manager saw Musiktilraunir as a springboard to getting the band to a much wider audience. Naturally this had my inner cynic working overtime (use MTR, get recognition, work up a big media following in lceland, then go to the US and sell the idea of an Icelandic band, in the style of the Jonas brother to a company like The Disney Channel or Nickelodeon, and Ker-ching!)

A group of 14 year olds trying out for a first time contest and they already had a manager? Wow, times have certainly changed.

As for the other bands, well they didn’t necessarily suck as such (although there were a few that really made us cringe), but there seemed to be something really missing from the proceedings. It was all a bit soulless as they were playing music that for the best part lacked a lot of spark or originality. The whole emphasis on being fully formed pros seemed to snuff out a lot of the verve and arrogance of youth that you would have expected from younger acts.

When they did try to act all spontaneous and carefree, it fell like a lead balloon and was clearly staged. Winners RetRoBot, for example, while singing lines like “We’re the chaos generation” and “We’re taking things over”, some of their friends at the end of the first song started jumping up and down and running around the venue, whooping and stuff. Louder and I cringed at this. It just felt so… half-hearted. I’m sure the audience loved it though – Oh look at these wily young whippersnappers! And they were still one of the main not-give-a-fuck acts that night.

OK, enough of this pointless bitching here. What did I really think of the bands that performed? Weeeeell, most of them were OK, if a little unspectacular. By far and away the best band of the lot was the synth pop group THE YOUNG AND THE CAREFREE. admittedly they way they opened was a little muted, but when they managed to crank up the synths, it was some really well honed grown up pop music. Some real bleak cynical undertones and a very good, charismatic front man, who looked a cross between Kelly from the Stereophonics and Zac Efron. Another interesting band was the heavy rock group ICARUS. They had some decent rocking tunes that with a bit more coaxing in the performance department, they could be really interesting. Also the singer of ÞOKA was the only decent singer of them all. By a country mile.

The rest of the bands were either annoying (The Lovely Lion, Glunroði), were great musicians but couldn’t write a decent song to save themselves (Funk That Shit!), or in simple terms, sucked the sweat of a dead man’s balls (Hindurvættir).

But again for the second year running, the judges completely threw common sense out of the window and made RetRoBot the winners. Quite what was going on in their minds god knows (we saw one of the judges afterwards and the first words out of their mouths was “I CAN’T TALK ABOUT IT!”). RetRoBot weren’t shit (ok, they were just a little bit), but there was no way they were good or catchy enough to win IMHO. A friend made the suggestion that they should think about changing some of the judges for next years competitions. And i for one, wholeheartedly agree. On a separate note, it was really uncanny the way that Louder managed to almost predict the winners of the individual awards. Someone make her a judge post-haste goddamnit!

 

Oh well, the decision has been made. It going to be great fun watching these guys getting pushed as the “New sound of Iceland”. Yay!!

 

 

Notes From an Arsehole: Rekyjavik Grapevine: Bob And Sindri Go Músíktilraunir!

Yeah, so Sindri Eldon and myself went to cover the finals of the annual Icelandic battle of the unsigned bands, MUSIKTILRAUNIR. And our report is now up and online for you all to go and read!

Man it seemed like everybody got some shit for what happened at this event. Our poor editor got quite a few complaints from people and the organisers (How Dare we say that some of the bands were crap!), while some of the judges got brickbats as well (How dare they vote an electronic act as the winner!).  Hey remember guys, it was music that was the winner, right?

So in the end, Sindri and myself railed at the winner, SAMARÍS, for two reasons. One, we just didn’t think that their performance or the music they were making warranted them winning it, and two, the singer was already in a well-known band (she is Jófríður from the band Pascal Pinon) which kind of defeated the whole purpose of the event really. Now I’ve already been into this with at least one member of the group about all of this and our opinions, and I’m not really inclined to go back there.  but i did pick up two interesting bits of info about all of this.

Firstly, how did they win? Well apparently the judging is done by a points system that tallies up points according to your performance (usually quality of song, performance, key instruments, singing, etc). But your total score is taken from both the final AND the semi final. By all accounts the performance of Samarís in the semi final was head and shoulders above the other bands playing and was voted accordingly. This actually helped a lot with their scores in the final.

Secondly, i also found out that there isn’t actually a rule that bars a band if one of their members has been in another known band. Apparently it’s just the band itself that has to be unknown. Of course everyone i spoke to did admit that this flies against the spirit of the thing. I mean, whats to stop a band with a couple of members from Retro Stefsson, or the drummer from sudden Weather Change entering? Maybe that rule should be tightened for next time to make things clearer.

In the end the original article had to be chopped by half due to some of our more risqué comments (references to crack and Ketamine, plagiarism and Rick Wakeman for example). But  here are some final thoughts on the bands from my shattered memory flakes….

PRIMAVERA - Decent start to the concert, with lots of heavy 90′s style alt-rock although it was a little uninspiring. I didn’t think that the lead singer was that good in that she reminded me of Taylor Momsen (as in someone made up to look alluring, edgy and sexy, but not really pulling it off). Sindri liked her nonchalant style on the other hand, although i was surprised to find that he didn’t even know who Taylor Momsen was! Man needs to brush up on his useless pop culture references. The guitarists were very good however. One in particular had half the stage to himself and was working it relentlessly doing that professional “drunken Kung Fu monkey” lurching style. A strong start.

MY FINAL WARNING - Weezer’s “In the Garage” made flesh. Fair play to them to making the final, but compared to what had happened before, there was no way they were going to win. Four dudes who had spent some time in a garage making some ROCK tunes and living the dream. We’ve all been there. I was laughing so much at the first song, as it had the brilliant chorus “the voices in my HEEEEAAAAD!” again and again. WILD STALLYNS! the kid with the Gibson explorer guitar looked at times like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a juggernaut.

SÚR - Started off weakly but came on a bit strong by the final song. The comparisons with the lead singers voice and Brian Molokos from Placebo was evident. Slightly blues based first song. Vague post punk for the final song. Not bad, but we were really surprised when they got second place.

SAMARIS - Have said all i needed to say on this.

ASKUR YGGDRASILS - Loud, nasty folk metal. The singer was a really terrifying sight. Bald, head, MASSIVE beard and sleeveless denim jacket on a bare torso. Oh and there was the smeared lambs blood as well. Liked these guys a lot, but Sindri was right about the drummer needing to tighten up though. Was just managing to cover the basic beat. He was the Tony McCarroll of metal. But they should go far, especially if they gig with the likes of Skálmöld

MURRK - A very strong band. The Balkan beats and Progrock (king Crimson) reference was mentioned, but it wasn’tmentioned how seamless they blended the styles. One song started off all avant pop, before becoming tight seething prog rock before getting all Klezmer. Wasn’t a fan of the singer’s voice, but again Sindri disagreed, saying that he liked how his “pop” voice went against the heavy multilayered music. Oh and the drummer and bass was incredibly tight and powerful, which you really don’t see that often for these types of band. Also found out that they normally do 15 minute jams instead of songs, so they had to do some really reworking of their material to enter. Really should have won.

FOR THE SUN IS RED - Was not really that good in the end, and much of this rested with the singer. The music was rather Jangly poppy indie stuff, but the singer was jumping and lunging around almost with a “some at me Bro!” stance, like he was at a Black Flag concert or something. I think i also mentioned something about dancing while being on crack for 4 days, but that never got in the article in the end. It was as if he was in another band that played punk or hardcore and told to be on stage at 5pm, only to turn up at 5:15pm and sing with another band. It just felt so wrong. Which is a shame as Sindri noted that his lyrics were not that bad. shame really.

THE WICKED STRANGERS  - Like Murrk, they went through several different genres in a song, but weren’t able to pull it off as well and so the music felt disjointed and unfocused. One song started off like a scott Walker 60′s tune, then went a bit Emo, before going full on metal. At least the lead singer made the effort. He had a preening, jittery, taut demeanour which did seem to suit the music they were doing. He also touched his hair 254 times in one song and was a bucket of sweat by the end of their set. Damn good frontman in other words

JOE AND THE DRAGON - Man, one of the most jaw droppingly, toe curlingly awful music displays i’ve ever heard. They were BRILLIANT!! Let me explain. JATD were OTT kitsch synth pop that stole the templates from all the greats (Duo. Singer – hyper emotive, eyeliner, shiny spangly clothes, gender confusion, falsetto show tunes. Keyboard player – Bloke, still unsure as to why he has to unbutton his shirt to the waist. Big hair. Double the singers size). And when they performed, they just laid it ALL out there and as a result had more showbiz in them than nearly all the other bands combined. They got the biggest cheer of the night and it was a complete scandal that they got NOTHING from the judges on the night. For shame!

POSTARTICA - One of the much stronger acts of the evening. Man that bass and guitar sounded impressive. And the singer was also not too bad as well. The songs didn’t quite have that craftsmanship to match their sound. At one point i think their last song sounded veeeery suspiciously like a recent Agent Fresco song (i.e. – it was). I saw that the drummer from Agent Fresco was there, so i assume he was taking notes and possibly making a call to his lawyers. But besides that, they were a very good band. Could go very far.

VIRTUAL TIMES - Nope,really didn’t like these guys at all. screeching keyboard led jazzy soul funk from the 80′s that really should have stayed there.I know that liquid funk and other assorted 80′s jazz sound have been appropriated by the likes of Dâm-Funk and Hudson Mowhawk, but this just felt like a bunch of old duffers trying to jam it maaaan. Mentioned that this reminded me of these music shows that they would show on Sunday nights at 3am on UK TV in the early 90′s and would often be hosted by Rick Wakeman, where he would introduce some jazz funk band that you’d never heard of playing live at Osaka, Japan, in 1982. It would crush my soul every time i chanced upon it. Same here.

So that’s it really. Oh one other thing. The prize givers, Egill Olafsson and Jón Gnarr should be ashamed at trying to turn their 90 second slots into something all about themselves instead of it being about the bands/musicians. When Olafsson hogged the limelight as the Singer for the The Wicked Strangers received his prize for best singer and never let him get a word in edgeways, i honestly wanted to slap a plank of wood across his head. Stop trying to leech of their success! And Jón Gnarr with his “do you want to hear a song?” wasn’t much better either.

But fuck it, it’s all done and dusted for another year. Overall it was a lot better than i expected, but I’m sure I’m probably barred for life from attending another event like this again. HAHAHAHA!