Sigur Ros - 'Glosoli' (EMI)
4/5
By: Thomas Hannan
One of the nice things about spending a few years, on and off, delving in to Sigur Ros is that you probably gain a more unblemished perspective on their development than that of someone who has fallen blindly, irretrievably under their spell. Naturally, it's impossible to not find yourself occasionally enraptured, but call it a short attention span, an apathetic nature or simple misguidance, but we can't be the only ones who find that it's very difficult to actually find the time to sit down with an entire Sigur Ros record, no matter how rewarding the experience is once you've made the effort?
It's not entirely a bad thing - we're still able to spot things from this distance, notice progression rather than repeatedly keel over at its beauty. The case in point is 'Glosoli', being a combination of the eerie wails and dying whale guitars that littered '( )' with the playful clicks and music box tones found on the curious 'Ba Ba Ti Ki Di Do' EP. Of course, like every time their violin bow aches out noise from a guitar, it's utterly beautiful. But no more so than you'd expect.
That is, until about a minute and a half from the end where all hell (or more accurately, heaven) breaks loose in some kind of heavy metal epiphany. It's like Trail of Dead being fronted by a cherubic choir. And just with that one slight moment of surprise, it makes the fact that they spend the rest of the track doing, well, exactly what Sigur Ros always do absolutely fine. When you're light years ahead of anybody else already, why change? 'Glosoli', rather magnificently in its way, gives us all a chance to catch up.
Artists in this article: Sigur Ros
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