MEÐ SUÐ Í EYRUM VIÐ SPILUM ENDALAUST

As wonderful musicians Sigur Ros is composed of, this album will be a dissapointment for prog fans. Maybe it's the lack of balance between the highs and the lows on the album. Maybe the tracks are too sparse at times. The thing is, there will most likely be some dissapointments when it comes to Sigur Ros' latest album which I cannot spell.

Not to say there aren't high points on the album. The first couple songs are energetic and upbeat and shouldn't fail to put a smile on the listener's face. "Festival", although taking too long in the beginning to pull together musically, has an excellent buildup in the second half of the song. And the song "Ara Batur" has a wonderful climax with huge orchestral and choral sounds creating something akin to an epic movie soundtrack.

However, these tracks are mostly the only highlights. As for the rest of the tracks they rarely get out of the box that Sigur Ros has made themselves, quiet piano with sparse guitar and vocals creating a small atmosphere that really could use a bit of volume kick to get the music across. To say this album lacks something is a bit of an understatement, since the band seems to lack energy through most of the album (although they are nothing but energetic at the beginning). Once about halfway through the album, nothing really sticks out, leading to perhaps a nap by the listener. Even the somewhat different track "All Alright" which is sung in English seems rather gimmicky and is still in this quiet zone with a lack of energy.

To top it off, there is really little prog on the album. The album highlights mentioned earlier do contain a few progressive elements, from the clever odd time signatures of "Gobbledigook" to the climactic buildup of "Festival". However, these elements are put in to sparsely, and many prog fans will probably not listen to it a lot. All in all though, it is a nice indie type record, though not all that suitable for the prog fan.