Bedroom Community

Iceland hasn’t exactly been the flavour of the month lately, has it? From collapsing banks to ash clouds, there’s been very little love heading from the UK over there. However Iceland has a lot to give back to us – mainly in the shape of amazing music. It has long been a country which has punched way above its weight, as if making awesome tunes is a core subject in their schools curriculum.

And there’s an impressive breadth to their output too – from the Sugarcubes to Sigur Ros, from Bjork to Mum, there’s stuff to cater for most musical tastes. And right at the bleeding edge of the Icelandic music scene at the moment is the productions of The Bedroom Community, a collective and record label formed in 2006 by Valgeir Sigurdsson, along with non-natives Nico Muhly and Ben Frost. They’ve already been responsible for one of the best albums of 2010 – Sam Amidon’s I See The Sign – and now they’ve given us a very different beast in the shape of Processions, the debut album by composer-conductor-pianist Daniel Bjarnason.

I say ‘different’ because it’s classical music, a genre I’m unfamiliar with, and as such I have no reference points to help me in this review. I don’t even know the right kind of language to use. Unsurprisingly there are no choruses and no lyrics, but even the tracklisting is not what I’m used to – tracks aren’t discrete elements, but grouped together into three pieces comprised of different movements (I think that’s what they’re called).

But despite being in alien territory, there’s a lot here to admire. Like with the other Bedroom Community stuff, Sigurdsson is in the producer’s chair again, and this is another album with all the exacting production values that has come to define this collective. There’s absolute precision, and you get the sense that everything is honed to perfection. You want to take notice of every perfectly-judged second. But don’t stand and stare at the detail for too long, because you’ll be missing the big picture, and the music’s ability to sweep you along. But it isn’t just intellectual admiration. This isn’t tricksy or difficult, an impenetrable modern classical piece that conforms to awkward stereotypes. There’s a lot of pure enjoyment to be had here, whether it’s the beauty of the muti-tracked cellos on ‘Bow to String’, the propulsive rhythms of the last movement of Processions or the more introspective beauty of ‘Skelja’, there will be something that you can take away to excite or inspire. Whether it makes up for having the flight to your dream holiday cancelled is another matter.

Tim Murray