The album name roughly translates to “with a buzz in our ears we play endlessly,” which may or may not reference the Icelandic band’s possible affliction with Tinnitus. Nevertheless, Sigur Rós deliver a new album that has some nicely crafted differences to their previous releases.

The first track “Gobbledigook” has a really infectious quality to it; acoustic instruments prominently feature, as well as naked bodies in the music video, and the acoustic sound is further utilised and emphasised throughout the album. Their previous epic sounding composition scapes, for which I know them most for, feature secondary to some really great almost pop sounding tunes in the first few songs (that almost rival The Arcade Fire). An interesting deviation to their typical sound but it only emphasises their musical prowess and flexibility. The rest of the album becomes more minimal and idiosyncratic. From start to finish, a nicely constructed album that’s easy on the ears.

Matt Scheurich