with your wishful thinking
hopeful embraces
don't you understand?
i have to go through this
i belong to here where
no-one cares and no-one loves
no light no air to live in
a place called hate
the city of fear..." - Björk | Play Dead
Björk is by far one of the most passionate individuals in the music scene. Actually, fuck that, the world. She's established herself from an isolated country, experimented with her music and been one step ahead of everyone else before they could predict what would become convention. She's always experimenting and never relenting to pressure from labels or individuas, designed and worked with other artists to create 'new' musical instruments and make something completely new, fresh and entrancing with each album. Fucking hell, she's an absolute music goddess.
I stumbled across her music around... 2007? I was listening to the radio and her song 'Earth Intruders' came on. I had an extremely staunch music taste and focused on music, especially metal, that focused on shouting your message rather then whispering it. I remember hearing this song and at first, ignoring it completely. Two days later, the song was still stuck in my fucking head. An internet search later and I was completely enthralled. A week later I bought her album 'Post' and to my surprise, I was in love. The album was a mixture of all these different sounds I'd never explored before. Trip-Hop, Pop, Classical instrumentation were all blended into create something astonishing. I looked back at my metal and wondered why I had ever decided just to stick to one genre. After all, didn't Oscar Wilde say "to define, is to limit." and with this I realised the stupidity of devoting time and effort to being so staunch. It made me think of how stale I'd become as a person by being so self-limiting. By disregarding anything new I just became stagnant, repressed and prevented my creativity from evolving. So yeah, this goddess had a real positive impact on my development towards my late teens.
One thing that's impossible not to recognise when you listen to her music is her distinctive voice. Its so malleable, so well trained but also aggressive and free. She can do vocal acrobatics from a whisper to a growl back to an operatic scream. In her track Its Oh So Quiet, she just plays with her vocals like a toy. The lyrics could be completely in tongues ( in some of her tracks she will growl and shout nonsensical words) and you'd be able to understand exactly how she explores love - quiet one moment then explosive and volatile the next. She's used her biggest asset as an artist to its full extent on pretty much all of her records and expresses her point so fluently its difficult not to fall in love with her.
As well as this her collaborations are pretty extensive. She's worked with The Dirty Projecters, Michel Gondry (for her music videos), Kelis, The poet Sjon, Mike Patton and even App Designers (for her latest album Biophilia). Above I've posted my favourite video from her (Bachelorette) which is one of her best collaborations with Michel Gondry. Its just. Wow. I'll let you draw your own conclusions as to how amazingly fantastically brilliantly beautiful and arty it is.
So I guess, how has she had an effect on me as a writer? I thought about this a lot whilst trying to type this blog post. It wasn't immediately obvious because I realised how I've integrated her influence into my work. She's a multi-faceted music artist who isn't immediately defined by just being a 'pop star', but she managed to gain success outside of a very small, overlooked country and managed to explore herself, evolving each time with her sound, image and views. Each album is almost a reflection on 'how have I changed?'. Its personal and thats exactly what anything - writing, painting, music or whatever, its all about regurgitating your emotions. It may not manifest itself perfectly out of your head because its not supposed to be. Its about reaching an equilibrium, about exorcising your feelings and exercising your creative muscle. To challenge yourself and introduce yourself and explore the world, explore nature and manmade things, explore intoxication and sobriety, offense and defense... Because if you stay in your room your entire life and keep yourself in a shell your just as outdated and unnecessary as everyone you deem yourself creatively superior to. Thats what I get from her. A challenge is good because it has change (see what I did there guys?) & anyone with a creative soul should be willing to explore.
And I leave you with this video of her taking apart her TV:
One thing that's impossible not to recognise when you listen to her music is her distinctive voice. Its so malleable, so well trained but also aggressive and free. She can do vocal acrobatics from a whisper to a growl back to an operatic scream. In her track Its Oh So Quiet, she just plays with her vocals like a toy. The lyrics could be completely in tongues ( in some of her tracks she will growl and shout nonsensical words) and you'd be able to understand exactly how she explores love - quiet one moment then explosive and volatile the next. She's used her biggest asset as an artist to its full extent on pretty much all of her records and expresses her point so fluently its difficult not to fall in love with her.
As well as this her collaborations are pretty extensive. She's worked with The Dirty Projecters, Michel Gondry (for her music videos), Kelis, The poet Sjon, Mike Patton and even App Designers (for her latest album Biophilia). Above I've posted my favourite video from her (Bachelorette) which is one of her best collaborations with Michel Gondry. Its just. Wow. I'll let you draw your own conclusions as to how amazingly fantastically brilliantly beautiful and arty it is.
"Everything is so designed and airbrushed and Botoxed, it makes us think, 'Oh, everybody's perfect except me. Everything's smooth except me.' But nothing is smooth."
So I guess, how has she had an effect on me as a writer? I thought about this a lot whilst trying to type this blog post. It wasn't immediately obvious because I realised how I've integrated her influence into my work. She's a multi-faceted music artist who isn't immediately defined by just being a 'pop star', but she managed to gain success outside of a very small, overlooked country and managed to explore herself, evolving each time with her sound, image and views. Each album is almost a reflection on 'how have I changed?'. Its personal and thats exactly what anything - writing, painting, music or whatever, its all about regurgitating your emotions. It may not manifest itself perfectly out of your head because its not supposed to be. Its about reaching an equilibrium, about exorcising your feelings and exercising your creative muscle. To challenge yourself and introduce yourself and explore the world, explore nature and manmade things, explore intoxication and sobriety, offense and defense... Because if you stay in your room your entire life and keep yourself in a shell your just as outdated and unnecessary as everyone you deem yourself creatively superior to. Thats what I get from her. A challenge is good because it has change (see what I did there guys?) & anyone with a creative soul should be willing to explore.
And I leave you with this video of her taking apart her TV:
