![]() Björk has often done the same, so I don't suggest that her appearance is out of bounds when discussing her career any more than it would be for someone like Madonna. I don't disagree with that at all - there are certainly lots of artists where their physical features and attractiveness are a key part of how they create and mold both their public image and their work, sometimes with tongue planted firmly in cheek, sometimes with complete sincerity and openness. Also: her openness to collaboration (co-writers, obviously, but also mix-artists), which takes a kind of generosity to others and a less-possessive sense for the future life of one's creation. One of them was "right" for the album context, but new contexts might liberate new possibilities one could discover or create with those same elements. On Björk's part, I think it suggests something interesting about her relationship to her own creative work that she was curious and interested in playing with it: what would this song sound like if it was remixed like this or like that? As if there were different ways, sometimes transformative ways, of looking at the same composition and the same vocabulary of sound, different possibilities for that creation. I'm okay with it and found it worthwhile, but I won't defend OneLittleIndian, other than to observe that multiple releases was just what major artists on major labels did between the early 90s and the early 2000s, if they had a large, international fanbase to support it. that kind of judgment will be in the eye of the beholder. Also, however, there tends to be a good value available: the CD-singles tend to be inexpensively priced and to have a good number of otherwise unavailable tracks, so it's not like you're paying 35 USD/EUR/GBP for just a single track - more typically, you're paying 10 USD/EUR/GBP for 3-4 new tracks, which is quite fine, and sometimes like 8-9 new tracks. ![]() Her commercial heyday coincided with the CD-single hey-day, so there's an enormous quantity of targets: 3-4 singles per album! 2-3 variations per single! Wikipedia is an excellent resource for making sense of the single variations and of course Discogs has them for sale in abundance.ģ. It's not like some random DJ makes a mix and gets it out under the artist's name.Ģ. Also, there's a sense that the artist herself is involved in the mixes. High quality mixes: if you can get along at all with 90s club mixes, you'll appreciate that she employs some of the very best. One of the most interesting and rewarding figures in music.ġ. In short: she gets a big thumbs up from me. Last thing, writing as a collector, she's awesomely collectable: great CD-singles and lots of them, challenging but not impossible to get ahold of and a rewarding set of b-sides and mixes, straight through to the Medúlla era. ![]() But, for sure, she's less commercial and a little less accessible than she was in the years up to Verspertine and Greatest Hits. So she's unafraid to be cerebral, but her music is also really physical.įor my tastes, she never really lost it - she was awesome in 1988 and she's awesome today. I like her commitment to avant pop and her interest in club mixes and dance and the body. I appreciate her intermediality and her openness to the avant-garde, even as her own muse generally transmutes those things a little closer to accessibility. I love how she makes her own way and defines her own path. I love how totally committed she is to her art. Her tone is exquisite and her accent and inflections are a heady combination. And that's just the first half of the album!Īs a vocalist, she is my favourite female without doubt. Then into the big band It's Oh So Quiet, followed by the detached, almost industrial leanings of Enjoy. Post stands as my favoured album because of the sheer variety of it the locrian Army of Me leading into the gossamer-like Hyperballad and The Modern Things. I appreciate her uncompromising attitude to her art and that she is a slave to no style nor form, taking influence from various genres and interpreting those however she wishes with scant regard for critical reception. I have less familiarity with some of her most recent work and it is more challenging, but that is a consideration of taste rather than quality. The run of four albums from Debut to Vespertine is exceptional, and I also listen frequently to The Sugarcubes output and the two KUKL albums. I think she is an outstanding talent, certainly worthy of discussion as one of the most important artists of the past thirty years.
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