Bjork - 2017 album

I skipped Vulnicura because of how hard it was for me to get into Biophilia; I am probably going to go back to it as these first two songs are glorious and reminding me why I was obsessed with her in the 90s.

i like Utopia a lot, and i enjoy her more abstract melodies and structures.

i have to admit, though, that after listening to Utopia yesterday, spotify "radio" kicked in and played "Unison" off of Vespertine and it felt like such a euphoric lift when the slightly more conventional structure kicked in with the beat. the bjork albums of the last several years sometimes hint at the possibility of tapping into pop structures, but always seems to turn away before getting too close. i do miss it, on occasion.

i'm certainly not saying she has to write like 3.5 minute v/c/v/c/bridge/c type songs or anything, not at all

My point/observation is more that she's staying pretty close to that type of structure on a macro level but has a adopted a wandering anything-goes approach within those sections, with usually the chorus as the only piece that retains repeated structure in her melody line. This threw up a big barrier for me on Biophilia that I literally only just got through this past year; am finding the musical arrangement on Utopia a lot more engaging overall.

If you managed to get into Biophilia I'd say you will definitely get into Vulnicura.

I get the idea that Bjork is not really going for "songs" in the typical sense. But then again why is everything mostly 3-5 minutes long? Like it's still all presented in a typical album-full-of-songs package. If her real intention is to make some kind of big overarching experience I'd like to see her go all the way and make something that really breaks away from expectations.

Originally gave it a grudging duty listen, the last three having mostly left me cold, and I keep coming back to it, and getting into it more. What a pleasant surprise.

don't know whether i LOVE it yet or not, but i'm pleasantly tickled by how the arrangements on here seem to refer back to "fourth world musics" tropes. it feels like a nice complement to the visible cloaks album from early this year.

cover art for this album is horrendous

the first two tracks on this are decent but then it quickly loses me - 75 minutes of Bjork at her densest and most abstract is far too much for me

Vespertine is still my favourite album of hers for the way it successfully bridges her 'pop' side with her then-new more abstract side, especially in the second half.

Wow, this serpentwithfeet remix of 'Blissing Me' adds an amazing hook. Would love to hear a longer collab between them.

A couple days ago i listened to this big folder of every bjork b-side up through Vespertine and my god was that a good time

i have folder envy

cool bjork mash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2HByXNKBwY

Recruiting: POLL Neon Like -- ILM artist poll #88 -- BJÖRK (voting open until April 27, 2018)

This album is very good

The tour for Utopia started last night in Reykjavik, BTW, with the stage set up as a rotating floral vaginal court (of course), lined plants, with footage of birds projected on the screens, and Björk being backed by seven dancing flautists, a drummer, an electronic person doubling as a trombone player, and a harpist. Theatrical as expected! The show is scheduled to tour for the next two years, so here's hoping I manage to catch it somewhere.

https://i.imgur.com/rPTMQe2.jpg

going to see her at primavera and this is what I wanted to hear

looks like her older set list tracks this time around are “Thunderbolt”, “Pleasure is all Mine”, “Notget”, and “The Anchor Song”

Is zeena parkins the harpist?

^ It's Katie Buckley this time:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BhfIYMfnUGX/
(She also plays harp on the album.)

She was on Jools tonight:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W60dqZCEpiY

o_0

Lucrecia Martel to direct new @bjork show in #newYorkCity @TheShedNY #argentina #theshowofthecentury https://t.co/EFKpRy3fgg pic.twitter.com/np5LT2Ti4x

— Cinema Tropical (@CinemaTropical) February 5, 2019

She has just put out a video for Tabula Rasa and it's just astounding.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYbZw04ba78

The staging of Utopia/Cornucopia at NYC's The Shed looks incredible.

https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/09-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_20_.jpg
https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/09-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_12_.jpg
https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/09-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_32.jpg
https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/12-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_17_.jpg
https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/12-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_9_.jpg
https://www.bjork.fr/IMG/jpg/12-05-2019-bjork-cornucopia-the-shed-ny_16_.jpg

Setlist:

01 The Gate
02 Utopia
03 Show Me Forgiveness
04 Arisen My Senses
05 Venus as a Boy
06 Claimstaker
07 Isobel
08 Blissing Me

09 Body Memory
10 Hidden Place
11 Mouth's Cradle
12 Features Creatures
13 Courtship
14 Pagan Poetry
15 Loss
16 Sue Me
17 Tabula Rasa

18 Future Forever
19 Notget

tickets starting at $300

I repent. Courtship is a banger and Future Forever is one of her most gorgeous songs.

This is really good! Turns out the vocal really shines with production that's a little more inside-the-lines.

https://youtu.be/AEdsAQ3GzFk

The Knife one is amazing too, but more for the music than for elevating the song imo

https://youtu.be/3Ghjaf_V6xw

Last night Björk performed the first of her 'Björk Orkestral' acoustic live streaming shows from Reykjavík - the theme was strings (the other three are choir/organ, brass/flutes/harp, and chamber ensemble). It was very good, even though she seemed quite shy/nervous during the first half of the show.

https://i.imgur.com/4g4kikO.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/R3mVNvm.jpg

The setlist:

01 Stonemilker
02 Aurora
03 I've Seen It All
04 Sun in My Mouth
05 You've Been Flirting Again
06 Isobel
07 Hyperballad
08 Harm of Will
09 Bachelorette
10 Unison

So no new songs but a new album is rumoured for late spring/early summer 2022 release.

'Björk Orkestral'

more like Björkestral imo

that looks amazing, and i would love to see any one of those 4 shows!

Should've included the link in my original post but you can get streaming access (if that's your thing) here: https://dice.fm/search?query=bjork

They're quite pricey though for a one-time streaming experience, and they're not available to re-watch; you have to view them at a set time. They're all supposed to be 10-song sets (+1 non-broadcast encore track for the people in attendance; last night it was "Generous Palmstroke") and you can read which albums each concert will be based on here: https://www.harpa.is/en/whats-on/event/bjork-orkestral-live-from-reykjavik

She's also been doing 'stories behind the songs' posts on her social media leading up to the gig, I hope she keeps it up for the future ones as well, some interesting tidbits.

Sorry for spamming this thread but the second orkestral show with Hamrahlíð choir and various keyboard instruments took place last weekend and it was pretty fantastic.

https://i.imgur.com/X14lIhl.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/I0gGYP7.jpg

Setlist:

01 Show Me Forgiveness
02 Pleasure Is All Mine
03 Hidden Place
04 Cosmogony
05 Sonnets/Unrealities XI
06 Unravel
07 Vertebrae by Vertebrae
08 Oceania
09 Who Is It
10 Mouth's Cradle
11 Where Is the Line
12 Human Behaviour
13 New World

It's been great fun to watch her dig into her back catalogue thematically and I would love to see these shows get a proper release at some point.

Also, new album confirmed for release sometime next year, apparently made "for people clubbing in their living rooms" during lockdowns lol.

iirc indication has been the album will be out in may or so, it was mentioned in the announcement of an exhibition she's doing at a french museum

I love how she’s splitting these. Iirc correctly she did something similar for family tree but nowhere as ambitious. It was split into beats and strings.

Night 3 - flutes, brass, and harp!

https://i.imgur.com/RTLtymc.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/Gevk6FA.jpg

01 Tabula Rasa
02 Utopia
03 The Gate
04 Courtship
05 Pagan Poetry
06 Losss
07 Sue Me
08 Generous Palmstroke
09 Aeroplane
10 Wanderlust
11 Mutual Core
12 The Anchor Song

I go through stages of spamming Bachelorette and Hyperballad, the jools holland performances, just gorgeous.

Fourth and final streamed show of the Reykjavík residency took place last night. The theme was 'drama', with Björk backed only by a 15-piece chamber string ensemble.

https://i.imgur.com/bTEG3fG.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/HDF5Lak.jpg

The setlist:

01 Jóga
02 Come to Me
03 Hunter
04 Lionsong
05 History of Touches
06 Black Lake
07 Mouth Mantra
08 Quicksand
09 5 Years
10 Pluto
11 Notget

And that's a wrap on these retrospective performances, looking forward to the new album in 2022.

Looking forward to the release of these performances on limited edition colored vinyl for $79.95 a pop.

amazing setlist on that last one, omg

"come to me" was my #1 on the bjork poll <3

Yeah this one and the first one are my favorite ones.

Surely all of these shows were professionally recorded and she'll release them as a box set or something? Sounded amazing, but was never able to "attend" digitally...

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/aug/19/i-got-really-grounded-and-loved-it-how-grief-going-home-and-gabber-built-bjorks-new-album

new album fossora out in the northern hemisphere autumn, based around gabber beats (!) and bass clarinet & featuring production from indonesian duo gabber modus operandi

idk why but this is giving me flashbacks to Volta, which sounded like a dream on paper and I even loved it at the time, gave it a glowing review in the local alt-weekly etc but has not aged well at all

'bjork gabber album' sounds incredible on paper but i'm expecting it will be fairly dense & impenetrable like most of her post-vespertine output & i have no idea how any of the ideas are going to fit together

Can't wait to be challenged yet again

She gives me a visual description of Fossora. If Utopia was a magical retreat from the black lake of misery she plunged into on Vulnicura (“pull all the teeth out, no violence – like a pacifist, idealistic album with flutes and synths and birds”), then Fossora shows life in this dreamland. “Let’s see what it’s like when you walk into this fantasy and, you know, have a lunch and farrrrt” – another gleefully rolled R – “and do normal things, like meet your friends.”

'Bjork Gabber album' sounds great but we know from experience that means 2 - 3 tracks at most.

I'll be disappointed if there are only 2 or 3 fart songs on this.

She also described it as her "mushroom album" and indicated it will feature "flutes and synths and birds" so it could sound like anything since Vulnicura really (also sextet of bass clarinets boxing like Public Enemy, she certainly has a way with words and marketing).
I haven't returned to Utopia at all, so it must the occasion to catch up on Björk.

^ The "flutes and synths and birds" part actually referred to the sound of Utopia. This one is apparently all earthy, grounded, organic clarinets.

I'm moderately excited -- unlike some commenters online I have no delusions that it will be more of a pop/dance record than anything she released in the past decade (the gabber-influenced elements are apparently mostly outros of a bunch of songs -- so I guess think "Crystalline" and the d&b outro? -- and the Guardian piece even stresses the "resistance to easy melody" lol) but I find her latter-day albums fascinating to explore, even if I rarely return to them after that initial heavy immersion.

Also sad to read about her mom.