Hauschka, Trentemøller, Spacestation, Virta

Iceland Airwaves, Reykjavik, Iceland, November 2-4, 2023,

Nov 20, 2023
By Irina Shtreis
Pictures by Thelma Arngrims (Lead photograph)
Internet Unique

Over its twenty-five-year historical past, Iceland Airwaves has gone by means of a sequence of transformations. If there was a tour round all ever-existing pageant places, the accompanying map of Reykjavik could be purple with dots in all places. Previously primarily based at Harpa, the nation’s largest live performance corridor, the present headquarters of the pageant took over town’s flea market Kolaportið with the ticket workplace and convention house occupying the realm usually crammed with stalls and bric-à-brac. This someway displays a realistic technique of the present administration.

Though the pageant nonetheless maintains the standing of the most important occasion in Iceland, some artists imagine that the showcase captures solely a fraction of the native music scene. Others really feel dissatisfied both with the present effort to maintain off-venues to a minimal and cost the remaining ones a excessive price or with the truth that sponsoring firm IcelandAir is concerned within the deportation of immigrants. No matter their motivation, fairly a couple of Icelandic musicians teamed as much as run another programme.

In response to the Airwaves hierarchical method, the place the line-up is break up between on and off-venues (for ticket holders and free-entry respectively), some artists joke saying that they run “a really off-off-venue”. A two-dayer, organised by the native paper Reykjavik Grapevine, discloses and emphasises the acts that will in any other case be much less apparent. 5-piece collective Spacestation are a cross between Spacemen 3 and Blur with one among their Gretsch enjoying guitarists wanting like younger Pete Kember. They play at Djúpið (interprets as The Deep), a cave-like cosy basement place with an entrance dealing with the most well-liked scorching canine place on the town. Therefore, vacationers pop up and cheer the band.

In contrast to Spacestation, additionally performing this yr on the pageant’s off-venues, four-piece artwork punk collective Skoffin runs a present exterior the programme. At a yard of native bar Lemmy, the band let off steam by means of vigorous leaping and guitar riffs so intense that frontman Jóhannes Bjarkason’s fingers bleed, spraying the bridge of his Fender with a skinny layer of purple. In some unspecified time in the future, the communal frenzy is ignited and the viewers begins slamming with gusto.

In 2018, when the pageant administration modified and Iceland Airwaves was taken over by the live performance firm Sena, the off-venue programme ceased to be a various showcase of worldwide expertise. Since then, up-and-coming and, particularly, international acts have appeared much less, and precedence is given to native better-known performers. Oddly, regardless of being well-established in Iceland and past, these off-venue acts don’t have an in depth profile on the pageant website.

One of many off-venue artists is Steinunn Eldflaug Harðardóttir aka DJ Flugvél Og Geimskip (DJ Airplane and Spaceship), doing her solely present in the course of the pageant at 12 Tónar, an iconic vinyl file retailer and cafe. On Friday night, it’s chock-a-block with the artist’s followers of all ages. Geared up with synths, a sampler and accompanied by a toy alien, the artist begins her space-y set with a composition that she wrote shortly earlier than the occasion to increase her help to the folks of Palestine. “I hope we are able to all take into consideration all human beings collectively tonight and keep in mind on this planet many issues taking place on the similar time. We’re right here, feeling good whereas I’m enjoying music, and there’s additionally somebody, feeling unhappiness. It doesn’t must be one or the opposite, we are able to maintain every part in a single open coronary heart”. Disarmingly playful and charming, DJ Flugvél Og Geimskip reminds everybody current of the enjoyment that individuals, distracted by overwhelming information, generally miss out on or intention for.

On the identical night, at Nineteenth-century Lutheran church Fríkirkjan, composer ​​Kristín Björk Kristjánsdóttir aka Kira Kira delivers an analogous message suggesting the viewers consider their family members. “Bear in mind we’re not simply enjoying music right here – we are literally performing magic”. With the refined association comprising keyboards, strings and tubular bells, Kristjánsdóttir and her band create a gossamer of sounds that conjure up the mythological Moirai and their cloth of future. There’s something imponderable on this music, sparse and dense directly.

Whereas off-venues internet hosting native acts usually have a full home, international well-known musicians enjoying at larger areas don’t get pleasure from equal consideration. Unusual to see Berlin-based pianist and producer Hauschka performing earlier than roughly 200 folks at Gamla Bíó, an outdated cinema transformed right into a live performance venue. American composer Dustin O’Halloran, showing on stage shortly after, will get a much bigger viewers. Nonetheless, the distinction between attendance at on and off venues is putting. One may surprise how the pageant workforce manages to maintain their head above water financially.

Nonetheless, some headliners are extra on-demand than others. On Saturday night, most attendees head to Reykjavik Artwork Museum. The queue for the present of Danish digital producer Trentemøller begins practically 5 hundred metres away from the venue. Going through the museum, Gaukurinn bar has smaller queues that keep exterior till the safety employees is instructed to let folks in. This takes 5 minutes and longer whereas the bouncers clarify that the venue is at full capability. Getting in, one can see that the bar and venue space is half-empty.

Enjoying at basement room Nýló in Kex Hostel, a venue on the fringe of the pageant space, Finnish trio Virta is a affirmation that Iceland Airwaves remains to be able to shocking a customer who will get jaded simply. With the title that interprets as “electrical energy, stream”, their freeform compositions incorporate components as contrasting as up to date jazz, drone-y post-rock and hypnotic conventional tune. Their album Horros was launched earlier this yr on Finnish label Svart Data whose signing Mikko Joensuu performed Airwaves in 2017. The connection between Svart and the pageant has seemingly remained robust. Gratifyingly, the label’s artists are all the time a breath of recent air within the considerably predictable surroundings in any other case.

What’s the decision? To some sceptics, Iceland Airwaves could be previous its prime time. Subsequent yr, the pageant turns 25, with its first version organised in 1999. Regardless of all of the adjustments and incarnations, Iceland Airwaves is actually a catalyst for the native creative neighborhood, who’re both professional or anti. But, it’s vital to concentrate to issues taking place past the pageant bubble. No less than, earlier than Airwaves may determine to return to its extra all-inclusive earlier model.