Here's a slightly embarrassing confession: One of the more personal rules I have when measuring my true feelings about a CD is that if it makes my eyes well up on first listen, it gets a five-star rating. (The one default being, of course, that the tears are brought by fits of laughter -- but that's another story.)

While Iceland's Sigur Ros will hardly spark such a reaction in everyone, their new Agaetis Byrjun is a profound disc all the same.

Tracks float forth in a fog of ambient guitars, strings and piano, punctured occasionally by distant horns, deep, punishing drums and, in some of its most gripping passages, long periods of silence. Sometimes that fog slows down to a crawl, the band's hum breaking down into a throb as warm and murky as the blood pumping to your ears. Other times it lifts to reveal a vast, cinematic score.

Seeing as my Icelandic is a little rusty, the siren-like vocals -- high, distant, hauntingly sexless and ageless -- are refined into pure emotion rather than meaning, binding the entire sound into a something that is strangely familiar, if not commercially accessible.

A simpler recommendation: If you just picked up Radiohead's KID A and are interested in exploring the further fringes of rock-based experimentation, track down this mood-altering gem at a savvy CD shop near you -- I got mine at Soundscapes on College St. -- and give it a cautious whirl.

As for fans of Cocteau Twins, My Bloody Valentine, Mogwai, Godspeed, Dirty Three, etc., you're already there.

Saturday, October 21, 2000

Bizarre sounds shine on Sigur Ros disc