noisedfisk

Scandinavian Culture Viewed, Reviewed & Interviewed

Labrador rules the school

2005.08.30

Labrador Records I’m back from a two weeks vacation and I feel awfully busy and kind of lost. While heading to the office in the morning, listening to my ipod, I had a nice surprise and suddenly heard a Swedish band I hardly know, [ingenting]. They’re on the Labrador label, and, as almost all the bands signed on this fantastic indie label, they’re P!O!P and worth listening to.

Which leads me to the illustration of this post: Labrador is great, really, those guys definitely love good music and the number of awesome indie-bands signed on this label is just amazing. In my humble opinion, the best are Acid House Kings, Club 8 (even if those two are kind of twee…), [ingenting] (they sing in swedish, which is quite nice), The Legends, The Radio Dept. (obviously), Sambassadeur (oh yes…), Suburban Kids With Biblical Names or Wan Light (if you like Galaxie 500).

You’ll find great mp3s of those bands on the Labrador website, so feel free to download them… I hadn’t had the time to listen carefully to the others, but there’s probably some interesting stuff as well among the less-known bands…

Emiliana Torrini: win a shirt

2005.08.22

— Music

Emiliana Torrini There’s a contest over at emiliana.nu: get a chance to win a beautiful Emiliana shirt!

For the news, Emiliana is still touring in Europe. She was yesterday in UK for the V Festival, and she’ll be at the Greenbelt Festival on August 26th. There’s also numerous concert anounced for September and October in Germany.

Contest and more informations
Emiliana Torrini

Still around

2005.08.18

— Music

Sorry for the lack of updates lately. I’ve been quite busy and I believe that it is also true for the other editors (Danielle, Stéphane and Lalli). I have some news ready for you, posted soon. If you feel like you could contribute to Noisedfisk, feel free to contact me. We will be glad to have new editors interested in Nordic culture, from music to cinema, from literature to photography, from food to deisgn, … from anywhere upnorth, Scandinavia and around, ready to share on this small blog. :)

Vores Øl

2005.08.11

— Music

Vores Ãï¿½l If you are into computers stuffs, or if you are just alcoholic, you will likely be interested in this beer. A bunch of informatic students from Denmark decided to apply the free software philosophy for a beverage, making the first open source beer. The recipe and all the fabrication secrets are available to anybody ready to brew his own beer.

Vores Øl, its name (“Our Beer” – sounds quite communist), is a medium-strong beer (6% vol) with added guarana, a caffeine source for a natural energy-boost.

More about Vores Øl.

The Power of Lutefisk

2005.08.10

— Music

Dried fish Lutefisk is the Norwegians’ attempt at conquering the world. When they discovered that viking raids didn’t give world supremacy, they invented a meal so terrifying, so cruel, that they could scare people to become one’s subordinates. It’s an infamous dish composed of fish soaked in lye.

Important points to remember about lutefisk:

Ingredients: 1 kg dried fish, 100 g caustic soda, 30 liters of water;
Preparation time: about 2 weeks;
Lutefisk dates to the Viking era and literally means “cod soaked in plutonium”;
Environmental Protection Agency classified lutefisk as a toxin in 2001;
You can’t eat lutefisk more than once a year;
You must have aquavit with lutefisk.

Testimonials:

Lutefisk is not food, it is a weapon of mass destruction.
I gladly eat worms and insects, but I draw the line on lutefisk.
Eating a little was like vomiting a little, just as bad as a lot.
But some people say that they like lutefisk. Do you think they tell the truth?

Want to know more?

Sindri Már Sigfússon, also known as Seabear

2005.08.08

— Music

Singing Arc One night I was visiting various electronic music sites, with people mentioning other people’s music. Upon coming into a forum, I saw a thread called “Seabear” with people talking of an 23 year-old icelander making good music with a link to a site where you could hear his songs. The songs were far from electronic and I was really quite impressed to hear good home-produced music with a nice warm voice. You can see & hear for youself.

Seabear website.

This site features the “Singing Arc” EP. Sindri is currently working on a new album with the working title “Waiting in the Paper Sea”. I look forward to hearing more from him.

Moods of Norway

2005.08.05

— Music

Moods of Norway is delivering supreme spotless clothing to the world. The company is based in the urban highlands of the exeptional country of Norway. Different clothes for different moods are the underlying philosophy. All products are made by combining international trends with traditional Norwegian design and traditions. All products from Moods of Norway are telling a story from the country known for polar bears and extremely expensive gasoline.

Moods of Norway website.

Deserted Farms

2005.08.03

— Music

Nökkvi Elíasson has quite a uncommon hobby: he spents his free time hunting Icelandic deserted farms. The result: some superb pictures in a dramatic, magical and never outmoded black & white format. The galeries nature and people worth also a visit and definitely prove that Nökkvi is a gifted photographer.

Nökkvi Elíasson website.

Summer festivals in Iceland

2005.08.03

— Music

Krutt festival Summer is the festival season, as you all know. But you’d better forget Glastonbury, Reading and La Route du Rock. ‘Cause Iceland (which is not only a nation of great designers but also a nation of great musicians) rocks in July and August.

The annual Reykjavik music festival, Innipúkinn, took place in Reykjavik a few days ago, at club Nasa. If you were in Iceland at this moment, would you please leave a comment and give us yor impressions on those local bands who played, bands such as Hjalmar, Trabant, Mugison, Apparat Organ Quartet, Hudson Wayne, Dr. Gunni, Skatar, Reykjavík!, Rass, Dr. Spock, Brim, Singapore Sling, Bob Justman, Vonbrigdi, Ampop, Helgi Valur, Lára, Alpa, Tonic, Donna Mess, Dyrðin, Norton, Bacon, Hellvar, Kimano, Thorir, NineElevens, KGB or Bibbi??? A nice introduction to the Iceland Airwaves, isn’t it?

But Innipukinn is far from being the only summer festival. The Krútt festival (“krútt” means “cute” in icelandic, apparently) will be held at Lýsuhóll Music Hall, Snæfellsnes, Friday and Saturday evening (5-6. August). Visual arts will be exhibited too in a horse-rental housing nearby, opening on Saturday. On Sunday there will be a screening of a theme movie. Guests are welcome to put up their tents on the Lýsuhóll premises. Tickets are available at 12 Tónar, Smekkleysa Record Shop and Hotel Budir in Snæfellsnes. The prgramme looks great: Múm, Hudson Wayne, Reykjavík!, Skátar, Skakkamanage, Brite Light, Hundslappadrífa, Benni Hemm Hemm, Kimono, Borko and í“lína Gunnlaugsdóttir…

[Via Smekkleysa]