Originally Published: 2002-12-01

Symbols for a title and eight nameless tracks doesn't give the downloaders (shall we call them freeloaders?) much to go on, so they'll have to go out and actually purchase the great new full-length release by this acclaimed Icelandic group. Immaculately recorded by Ken Thomas (who did great things with Psychic TV and Test Dept in the 80s) these pieces bring a new sensitivity to the audience for guitar-oriented bands (who filled Massey Hall to see Sigur Ros recently). Adding piano and string section to the shoe-gazing blueprint of the Cocteau Twins etc, these Icelanders achieve a strange mixture of joy and sadness as their music wells up in their resonant studio space built in a converted swimming pool. Vocalist Jonsi Thor Birgisson's fragile delivery tops the emotional waves of sound, out-feeling Radiohead's Thom Yorke in the sensitive guy sweepstakes. He could be singing about doing the laundry for all we know, but it sure has an impact.

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