photos by rodrigo b. vieira
photos by kristine s. dufey
rodrigo b. vieira
went yesterday to watch sigur rós in a very nice place near my house, betong,
here in oslo..
before the band came on stage the p.a. system played some songs to get us in the mood, one being the takagi masakatsu song that was on a previous bbc6 interview. the band came on stage at just after 8:20pm... with the string quartet taking there positions also to the rear of the stage in front of the screen for the visuals. orri was located at the front right of the stage, kjartan to the front left with goggi and j nsi taking up the centre front of the stage.
the place was crowded!! the tickets sold out a long time ago, and there was half a dozen guys trying desperately to buy tickets on the spot, specially 2 boys standing on some kind of box with a huge tickets wanted card, when they finally got it they couldn't believe their luck, they ran, screaming and celebrating, to end end of the (very long) queue.
we stood there, freezing at +1c, for more than an hour, as they opened the doors at 20:40, not at 20:00 as printed on the ticket..oh well, that's part of the experience.
inside i bought von cd, i was not really expecting to find it for sale there, so it was extremely nice! also bought a t-shirt (just like the image on the left), the girl selling them was a bit confused to see a 1.90m guy asking "the smallest t-shirt you have", she looked me so awkwardly saying "small?!?", so i had to explain "it's not for me, don't worry i'm not crazy" and she replied "yeah, i was thinking that really!". that meant i spent all my money and passed the whole concert "dry", no drinks, but it was worthy! i didn't knew von's cd cover was so beautiful, btw
around 21:30 we started seeing some movement on the stage, i positioned myself as close as possible (not that difficult in a small club), the support guys started walking around putting water bottles on strategic places, checking the lights, instruments, business as usual. at 22:00 they lighted the candles, so i knew it was not that far to begin.
at 22:15 it finally begun. i won't make a "concert review" here because you guys might have read that 1000 times now, and i gotta confess i am not very good on recalling setlists. but the concert was great anyway. just to name two moments, ný batterí (when the drums enter) and háffsol, both the start when the guy plays the bass with a drumstick, sounding like a brazilian "berimbau", and the epic finish, were breathtaking. georg had some problems with his bass during vaka, it was sounding pretty bad, he spent the whole song checking the buttons and leds trying to see whadaheck was going on, but by the next song things were smooth again, and continued that way untill the end of the concert.
everyone enjoyed a lot, and after the second "thank-you-bow" they returned and
played olsen olsen, to close the best concert i've been in my life (never thought
last year's radiohead would ever lose that spot, so i'm serious about it...). to leave
the concert and have snow (mid-autumn!) felt almost a mystical finish for a magic
night..
(rodrigo b. vieira)
