If Jamaica is the small island with a big sound, Iceland must be the sparsely populated island with an improbably large number of musicians, often paddling in the pool between pop, classical and electronica. H\u00f6gni Egilsson is typical of these, having been part of both Hjaltal\u00edn and GusGus, the latter being one of those bands who wheedle their way into your collection, sneaking in on multiple compilations.<\/p>\n
Egilsson is finally coming out with his first solo album, upon which he settles into an alt.pop mode, perhaps unsurprisingly sounding as if he has heard a few Bj\u00f6rk records. That might sound flippant, but there\u2019s obviously something to be said for icy Scandinavian pop, and this offering trumps the oodles being spurted out of the island\u2019s geysers recently, those years in the GusGus songwriting salt mines clearly having paid off.<\/p>\n
Egilsson underpins the lot with the sort of extended concept (comparing industrial decay to personal tumult) of which alt.pop stars with ambition are so fond.<\/p>\n
He breathily conjures up memories of the excellent recent Anohni album, and drops an ominous-sounding male voice choir into the mix for good measure. The industrial vibes are there in the rhythms, but softened immensely by clean Scandi strings. One to keep an eye on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If Jamaica is the small island with a big sound, Iceland must be the sparsely populated island with an improbably large number of musicians, often paddling in the pool between pop, classical and electronica. H\u00f6gni Egilsson is typical of these, having been part of both Hjaltal\u00edn and GusGus, the latter being one of those bands who wheedle their way\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8023,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_cover_media_provider":"image","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_cover_video_id":0,"apple_news_cover_video_url":"","apple_news_cover_embedwebvideo_url":"","apple_news_is_hidden":"","apple_news_is_paid":"","apple_news_is_preview":"","apple_news_is_sponsored":"","apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":[],"apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,16],"tags":[],"issue":[10093],"class_list":["post-193419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album","category-reviews","issue-january-2018"],"apple_news_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\n