The gaps of memory following serious drinking makes you wonder what is missing. Reykjavik has an idea.
Iceland is geographically located between the great fortresses of England and the US and so does Reykjavik’s Rock n’ Roll music: Somewhere between The Clash and Buzzcocks in the east and Ramones and The Stooges in the west.
The previous year’s flood of bands who find inspiration in the late 70’s is apparently all consuming. Most of them thrive to place themselves close to their icons. At this point Reykjavik fails. They do not worry about neither attitude nor role models. Instead they play provocative and unpretentious rock with no idea of whether it is art rock or beer rock.
The concert stated with fuzztones from the band’s bassist who looked like a 70’s Pearl Jam fan. Afterwards there was no time for pauses and the few pauses that were, were spent on inviting the audience to fight or the sound engineer to turn up the dB. There was also time for tales of Icelandic infrastructure and yesterdays encounter with the prostitutes of Copenhagen. The cable for the microphone came off under a Roger Daltrey-stunt, two times guitars and bass were dropped. The singer strolled around among the audience and even managed to have a finishing wrestle with the guitarist.
It was all entertaining, but did not remove the focus from the music. Some songs were only semi-powerful, but were all performed hectic and loud and under wild drunkenness. Most relieving was Reykjavik’s total lack of care for the tyranny of attitude and of the bad conscience of black-outs. Reviewed by: Filip Granlie, GAFFA Translated by: Christian Jensby, mymusic.dk
