HOMOGENIC

Wow, I'm simply amazed that Progarchives has included Bjork. Not that I'm complaining. I love many prog groups, and I love Bjork's music, but I honestly never considered her in any way prog or prog-related. However, when one considers her close relationship to IDM and other electronica personnel, and *their* indebtedness to people and bands like Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, Pink Floyd et al, it certainly makes sense for her to be included. Wise choice :-)

Anyway, HOMOGENIC is my favorite Bjork album. It's recommended that newcomers start here. While her 2 earlier releases were great, they were more dance-oriented, while this one and its follow-up delve further into electronica and is clearly influenced by non-dance-oriented musicmakers like Aphex Twin, Autechre and Boards of Canada. Many of her fan favorites are on this album, including All Is Full of Love, Hunter, Joga, and Bachelorette. It also contains one of her most simple but haunting works, "Unravel." Radiohead has been known to cover this song live. Quite a compliment indeed. In fact, that's how I view Bjork - the female counterpart to Radiohead. (They are mutual admirers of each others' work, and have collaborated on more than one occasion.)

A few notes to pass on: The follow-up album, VESPERTINE, is like a companion piece to this album, so if you find you really like this one, definitely seek out the next one; it's my 2nd favorite Bjork album. HOMOGENIC contains the original version of All Is Full of Love. While that's a great song, the version that was released as a single, and which appears on her Greatest Hits album, is even better. (While many consider Bachelorette to be her best song, my favorites are the single/video version of All Is Full of Love, Unravel, Undo, and Venus as a Boy.)