Sigur Ros - Brixton Academy

At long last, the first ever Gig List arranged event finally happened. Dave, Andy and myself made the hazardous trek to Brixton to see Icelandic band Sigur Ros.

We arranged this one months ago when tickets were first released. Just as well as the event was a sell-out with touts looking for spare tickets but not selling any.

This was probably one of the most well-behaved gigs I’ve ever been to. This is in keeping with the style of the music which is intelligent and gently styled.

Songs were all performed in Icelandic, which I’m sure meant something to some of the audience, but not me, unfortunately. I think the performance would perhaps be better suited to more of a concert environment than a rock-gig setting. The band have guitars and drums but just as often, the featured accompaniment to the unusual icelandic vocals would be brass instruments, xylophones, flutes and/or violins. I was pleasantly surprised at how well the combinations of instruments fitted together.

Even suffering sore feet from standing on the sloping floor for two hours, the final closing numbers were still superbly moving, chilled out pieces of music. I particularly liked the enormous video imagery of birds on a wire, flying away one by one as the song came to a close and the band members also left the stage one by one.

So, a resounding success for the GigList’s first outing.

Next up, The Prodigy in December. Can’t wait!