But with his Chronicles Of Narnia, he became one of many creatives to map out a fantastical realm as an expression of that longing for the unknown divine. Lewis famously wrote, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” Lewis, a Christian theologian, was referring to heaven. It was like those UFOs Thom Yorke wished for on OK Computer had received his transmission and initiated contact.įor all its alien qualities, Ágætis byrjun was tapping into deeply human emotions, feelings so fundamental that it takes something startlingly intimate to arouse them. Yet the end result truly sounded like nothing else. The mammoth post-rock of Mogwai and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, the dream-pop adventures of Slowdive and Cocteau Twins, the noise-blasted beauty of Sonic Youth and My Bloody Valentine - those references and more were there to be mined out. There were traces of Radiohead in the music’s astonishing ambition, and especially in Jón Þór Birgisson’s celestial falsetto. Sigur Rós shared a mystical sensibility with Björk, their fellow Icelandic export. Even the few who encountered Von’s unremarkable longform experiments could not have anticipated this album it would have scanned as extraterrestrial even without that illustration of an alien baby on the cover. In truth Ágætis byrjun emerged out of Reykjavík, but in essence it came out of nowhere. It was self-evidently brilliant at the time, and two decades later it stands as one of the most astounding and singular collections of music ever released. In the months and years after its initial drop, the album set off a global chain reaction that yielded releases in the UK in 2000 and North America in 2001, turning Sigur Rós into legends before they even released the follow-up in 2002.
It’s one of those records for which overwrought praise feels entirely appropriate - not just an undeniable masterpiece but, for many, a religious experience that inspired evangelistic fervor. Ágætis byrjun is worthy of every grandiose adjective you could throw at it. “Great” would also be selling it short, as would “awesome,” “excellent,” “terrific,” and just about any other pedestrian expression of positivity. That’s the other reason Ágætis byrjun is a misnomer: “Good” doesn’t begin to do it justice. But soon enough it would be inciting rapture around the world. Ágætis byrjun did not immediately reach a large audience either when Smekkleysa released it 20 years ago today. As the story goes, Von only sold 313 copies in its first year on sale. Their debut, Von, was released into obscurity in 1997 by Smekkleysa (translation: Bad Taste), the Icelandic label previously best known for launching the Sugarcubes. The LP that broke Sigur Rós and blew millions of minds in the process was not technically the band’s beginning. That’s an accurate translation of the title Ágætis byrjun, and yet in precise terms it does not fit the album it belongs to.
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