Sigur Rós are something of a colossus when it comes to the fine art of musical soundscaping. It's difficult to review a Sigur tune without making reference to "glacial beauty" or "epic orchestration", and that's exactly what you get on 'Hljomalind'; intensely yearning vocals, laden with emotional meaning (it matters little that you can't understand them) wrapped up in shimmering, sweeping swathes of sound. It's music so all-enveloping, so cerebrally uplifting, it should be piped through a PA on every street corner.
The pick of the rest of this week's releases...
From the cerebral to the sheer animal. There are few singers in rock so viscerally smouldering as
The Duke Spirit's Leila Moss, and on 'Lassoo' - lead track from new EP 'Ex Voto' - she uses her lioness spirit to full effect, over a grinding, menacing, fuzzed-up backdrop reminiscent of Black Rebel at their raw best. Fast-paced, adrenalised, and with a My Bloody Valentine-esque chorus, this is a blistering reminder of The Duke Spirit's animal majesty.
LCD Soundsystem are one of electronica's most prolific exponents; James Murphy's outfit are back once again with 'Someone Great'. It's a typically repetitive groove, which would find itself described by most critics as a "chilled out groove" or "mournful electro" (or something equally aggrandising). The reality is, this is insipid, soporific lift music, rescued only partially by the broken-hearted introspection of the lyrics.
Film School are one of those bands who perennially bubble along just under the radar, consistently producing better-than-average music without ever really breaking out. Newie 'Dear Me' is like a collision of Six-By-Seven and Doves, with curiously Morrissey-esque vocal inflections hovering over the top. Dark-toned, rumbling, with a multi-layered chorus; this is
almost very good indeed, but never quite makes that final click.
It'd be just a little too easy to join the media wolf pack and sneer mercilessly at
Britney Spears' 'Gimme More', so I'm not going to. Suffice it to say, it's predictably average pop - not awful, not awesome - shot through with a plethora of 'sultry' sighs and moans and an amusingly eighties-esque spoken word bit in the middle.
--Chris Watkeys
