It didn’t expand the genre’s boundaries so much as it smashed them altogether, likely because Sigur Rós weren’t trying to do anything other than write a damn record. Mogwai had dropped Come On Die Young in April, waving their finger in the face of Britpop while establishing a place for themselves in the post-rock pantheon, and likely unbeknownst to many folks outside the greater Austin, Texas, area, Explosions In The Sky played their first show that same month-if this YouTube video is to be believed-a few years before they’d take off themselves.Įven with post-rock enjoying a breakout year, Ágætis byrjun was something else. It’s a record that found its niche over time but may have been overshadowed by founding guitarist Jimmy LaValle’s other project, The Album Leaf. San Diego’s Tristeza put out their criminally underappreciated debut, Spine and Sensory, on June 15, just three days after Ágætis byrjun. That staying power is only made more impressive considering what else came out around the same time in 1999. It’s immediately clear this is something unique unto itself, built to last, sounding no less relevant or timeless now than when it was first released. Despite, or maybe partially thanks to, being sung in a language literally no one outside of the band can understand-and, actually, one even they can’t understand, because it’s self-admitted nonsense-it speaks directly to the emotional core of its listener you feel what you’re intended to feel without needing to consciously understand what you’re being told. Indeed, Ágætis byrjun wasted no time following through on the promise of its creators. As music critic Brent DiCrescenzo wrote in his review for Pitchfork, “To term this music ‘post-rock’ would be an insult Sigur Rós are pre-whatever comes this century.” Given the pressure that comes with those sorts of expectations, especially for a group in their late teens and early 20s, their overt confidence may have been essential for their continued existence. However, given the longevity of the album-and, indeed, the band themselves-that statement may have been more prescient than he’s willing to give it credit for. In a 2013 interview with Spin, frontman Jónsi Birgisson chalked up such bold proclamations to the arrogance of youth. They had been around since 1994 with one album already under their belt-1997’s Von, which eventually went platinum in Iceland-so it may be a credit to their own foresight that this would, in fact, be the record that launched them to global acclaim.
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While confident in their belief that Ágætis byrjun would make an impact, they were also leery of the boom-and-bust nature of music press, understanding full well that critics could tear them down as quickly as they could build them up-particularly in the U.K., where buzz cycles rise and fall with merciless efficiency. However, the band would probably deflect that praise if they heard it coming from someone else. When their website boldly proclaimed, “ We are simply gonna change music forever, and the way people think about music,” it would have been easy to dismiss them as delusional, another cog in a PR-driven hype machine bound to flame out and disappear. Sung entirely in the band’s self-invented language of Hopelandic, it remains as forward-thinking and emotionally resonant today as when it upended “post-rock” as a concept back in 1999-a genre tag the band themselves have never claimed, nor appear interested in. It’s an apt descriptor of the record’s bold vision and legacy. That might be the best word to summarize Sigur Rós’ Ágætis byrjun, the landmark second album from the influential-yet-inimitable Icelandic four-piece. Twenty years later, End Of The Century looks back at some of the most iconic albums to drop right before the new millennium… Whether you were stockpiling canned food in preparation for Y2K or dancing your ass off to Prince, 1999 was a hell of a year. Track Premiere: The Cutthroat Brothers and Mike Watt – ‘Bad Candy Girl’.News: L.A.’s VATTICA Drops Explosive New Track ‘Gasoline’.Video Premiere: Grant Armour – ‘Wrap My Arms Around You’.Album Review: The Supervillains – Drones.
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