HYPERBALLOT: ILM Artist Poll #88 -- Björk Resultsness

Been at work since #5, about to click "Click here if you want to load them all" to see what order Hyperballad, Joga, Bachelorette and Pagan Poetry landed in. Excited!

I echo everyone's praise for eric, the images were perfect and it's been a great poll.

my ranked ballot:

It's Not Up To You
Joga
Wanderlust
Hidden Place
Hunter
Utopia
Hyperballad
Blissing Me
All Is Full of Love
Bath
Army of Me
Bachelorette
An Echo, A Stain
Unravel
Tabula Rasa
Who Is It (Carry My Joy on the Left, Carry My Pain on the Right)
Triumph of a Heart
Undo
Frosti
Human Behaviour
Cocoon
Where Is The Line
Heirloom
Pagan Poetry
Alarm Call
Isobel
Thunderbolt
Crystalline
Arisen My Senses
Vertabrae by Vertabrae

And albums:

Vespertine
Homogenic
Utopia
Post
Biophilia

also want to rep for bath from drawing restraint, an incredible one off that sounds sort of like charalambides or something, like she's casting a spell

That was brilliant, Eric. Many thanks!

Ha, were we allowed 30 tracks? I should've read the instructions properly; I assumed it was 20 as per. Here are my ballots. The remixes/alt versions should really be seen as an extension of my tracks ballot.

Tracks
01. Hyperballad (Girls Blouse Mix)
02. An Echo A Stain
03. Saint
04. Venus As A Boy
05. Army Of Me
06. My Spine
07. Isobel
08. Black Lake
09. Pagan Poetry
10. It’s Oh So Quiet
11. Jóga
12. Lilith (w/Plaid)
13. The Comet Song
14. Alarm Call
15. Hidden Place
16. The Anchor Song
17. Prayer of the Heart (w/John Tavener, Brodsky Quartet)
18. There's More to Life Than This
19. Undo
20. Play Dead

Remixes / Alternative Versions
1. All Is Full of Love - Howie’s Version
2. Big Time Sensuality (The Fluke Magimix 125bpm)
3. Possibly Maybe (w/Brodsky Quartet live at Union Chapel)
4. Hyperballad (Over The Edge Mix by Outcast)
5. Human Behaviour (Darren Emerson Underworld Mix)

Sugarcubes Tracks
1. Birthday
2. Hit
3. Motorcrash
4. Eat The Menu
5. Traitor (Icelandic)

Not a lot of love for "Cover Me", I see. Seems to be the only track where I was all on my lonesome. And the least popular post-Sugarcubes album track until Medulla. I have however learned that I have Anne Sofie von Otter for company, of all people!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaG5EW_AHFI

I listed Bjork in late '16, and I did few changes to the list I submitted to Eric.

Didn't submit a ballot for this, but 'Hyper-Ballad' would have been my #1 anyway.

it's been a real pleasure not having you on this thread, so all for the best

i had band practice right when the top five rolled out but this was a great poll with in-cred-ible images, thank u eric

My god that top 10. If I was being churlish I'd say that Pagan Poetry was too high but it's otherwise virtually faultless.

I'm pretty sure everything of mine placed.

Hyperballad
Stonemilker
Headphones
Bachelorette
Unravel
Possibly Maybe
All Is Full Of Love
Enjoy
It's Oh So Quiet
All Neon Like
Army of Me
I Miss You
Alarm Call
Isobel
Immature
Joga
Modern Things
5 Years
Pluto
I've Seen It All

I agree, that Top 10 is pretty much wall to wall gold. Sleeve, enjoy your FP.

Thanks for doing this Eric!

I'll add myself to the Unison of praise for Eric's rollout and images. So many Björks! I spoke of being Björked out on the voting thread, only to start listening to her again almost immediately thereafter. It's been a turbulent relationship! I'd say I've been like a killer whale trapped in a bay, but I might be more like Meester Fly who, having gotten lost some time around Volta, has since emerged from the ointment and started buzzing against the screen in the darkness.

Re: All is full of love

I've never figured out what string instrument is featured in this, it sounds like plucked harpsichord strings.

Dan - that’s A harpsichord my friend

I don't know for certain what it is, but I'm fairly sure it's not a harpsichord. Sounds much more like a hammered dulcimer.

It’s a harpsichord according to wikipedia:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Is_Full_of_Love

More accurately: according to whoever wrote the paragraph on this song for a Slant best 90s singles list. No hard evidence in that wiki article.

I still disagree. I can't claim to be an expert on the harpsichord, but I have been listening to harpsichord music regularly for about 15 years, and I've heard recordings of dozens or hundreds of different harpsichords - and the instrument in AIFOL just doesn't sound like one to me. The strings sound as though they're being struck, not plucked, and the inflection and variation in volume I hear are impossible to achieve on a harpsichord. As I said, sounds like a hammered dulcimer. Or a cimbalom. If I'm wrong and the strings are being plucked, then I think it must be some kind of harp, zither, psaltery...

Anyway, all this doesn't matter really but the harpsichord comments upthread caused me to listen to this for the first time in years and I felt compelled to inscribe my opinion as a harpsichord enthusiast on this thread.

It is a sampled kora

It is absolutely not a harpsichord. It may be a harp played near the table but I doubt it. It is such a specifically kora-esque sound that I think it’s almost certainly that instrument

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmFY97JlHk8

THE KORA IS FUCKIN DOPE

The next 17 tracks, if it had been a full 77 poll:

Pleasure is All Mine
You've Been Flirting Again
Declare Independence
I Go Humble
Future Forever
New World
History of Touches
I See Who You Are
So Broken
Family
Earth Intruders
Tabula Rasa
It's in Our Hands
Gate, The
Storm
Charlene
Atom Dance
― nourish nourish your turtleheart (Eric H.), Friday, May 11, 2018 5:11 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

would've loved to see "family," though i'm sorta relieved i didn't have the chance to unload on "declare independence" at length

don't let them do that to you

five of my votes were in those 17 tracks!

I already unloaded on it in the polling thread

I can't tell what is uglier. When a successful musician writes a song that betrays their corny political views, or the fact that successful musicians will tend to have corny political views in the first place

would pay american currency for a corny political album by successful icelandic musician Björk Guðmundsdóttir

There you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holidays_in_Europe_(The_Naughty_Nought)

Declare Independence is my least-favourite of all her singles.

A side poll I had no intention of doing. Though my answer to that would have been "The Dull Flame of Desire."

Poor Volta. The singles, or most of them, are probably the least successful things on it. A brassy mini-album based around "Wanderlust" and the somber middle section etc would be great.

a long time lurker (well, i did post briefly a few years ago), finally signed up just so that i could submit my ballot but couldn't manage it in time. so before i go back to lurking i just wanted to say how stunned i am that no Mark Bell / LFO mixes were mentioned at all, especially considering how well loved I Go Humble seems to be.

Possibly Maybe Lucy mix which is more devastating than the original (and the original is devastating enough, didn't she say it was the most difficult song for her to write?). then the trio of Bachelorette mixes, Blue/Optimism and this one, which would be my #1, probably:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8TpCBmpn8s

and Hyperballad, Stomp mix / Disco Sync mix and 3am mix is just so achingly beautiful:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifSYpW6tLEE

also Come to Me Black Dog remix >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> anything else on The Best Remixes for People.

and sad Charlene and You've been flirting again didn't make it. the turn and the swell of violins in the latter when she sings "give her some time, give her some space", and the anticipation that something wonderful is about to happen, and when you hear it for the first time you're so afraid you'll be disappointed and then Isobel starts...

damn it, i forgot Verandi. i'm totally in the "vespertine b-sides" camp. the way the voice counters the falling bassline...

surprised (and glad) to see Enjoy and Crying make it - for whatever reason i also always thought that they were neglected and not widely liked tracks (and both were the first tracks i liked on both albums). funny it seems to be a shared perception.

Last-minute ballot so v.short.

Singles (ranked):

Hidden Place
Crystalline (Omar Souleyman Remix)
Pagan Poetry
Hunter
Play Dead
Venus As A Boy
Domestica
Amphibian
Human Behaviour
Verandi

Remixes (ranked):

Crystalline (Omar Souleyman Remix)
Human Behavour (Speedy J Remix)
Hyperballad (Tee's Freeze Mix)
Dull Flame Of Desire (Modeselektor's Remix for Girls)
Stonemilker (Forest Swords Remix)

Albums (ranked):

Vespertine

Poor Volta. The singles, or most of them, are probably the least successful things on it. A brassy mini-album based around "Wanderlust" and the somber middle section etc would be great.

Yeah I do quite like the album (particularly that stretch in the middle) but Wanderlust is the only one of the singles I can really get behind. Dull Flame of Desire is a slog, Innocence is OK but just feels like an inferior retread of Alarm Call.

My normie ballot, except for my questionable volta stanning --

4 / Bachelorette
1 / Hyperballad
20 / Big Time Sensuality
9 / All is Full of Love
2 / Joga
8 / Hunter
18 / It's Not Up to You
3 / Pagan Poetry
12 / Who Is It
46 / Where Is the Line
Earth Intruders
54 / Lionsong
7 / Venus as a Boy
Pleasure is All Mine
The Dull Flame of Desire
48 / It's Oh So Quiet
5 / Unravel
30 / Enjoy
49 / Violently Happy
10 / Hidden Place
Moon
50 / I've Seen it All
15 / Cocoon
Stígðu Mig
Declare Independence
44 / Wanderlust
22 / All Neon Like
26 / Pluto
13 / Undo
25 / Aurora

also thanks for running this eric h! not often i feel knowledgeable enough to jump in on an ILM poll but this was one of them :) and the pictures were BEAUTIFUL!

tbh I don't think the top 5 remixes we collectively chose were actually the top 5 remixes; they were just the small handful of remixes that people had heard. IF we all did a deep dive and actually assessed her massive collection of remixes we'd I think certainly have more Mark Bell/LFO stuff.

yeah i only managed to get through the debut/post/homogenic remixes before voting

i love the black dog remix of "come to me" but it's like... the most unsettling version of that song and i think rating it significantly over "anything else on The Best Remixes for People" is a curious choice to say the least

then again i love cheap euphoria

just kinda shortchanges what the other remixes are going for i think

That Mark Bell "Bachelorette" remix is sheen.

ok so maybe i was a bit too dismissive of the rest of The Best Mixes (and didn't realize Ned wrote the allmusic review for it, just saw it)

but the Black Dog "Come To Me" is the one i immediately turn up when it comes on. if the original is being enveloped in this warm, glowing (yet almost suffocating) blanket of safety then the black dog version is the other end of it, the person to whom the song is addressed, completely surrendered, in a trance of not worrying. which could be seen as unsettling - but that's what the Sabres version is to me, it's the person realizing the suffocating aspect of it.

as for Human Behaviour it's nice but just feels a bit too "Underworld remixes Bjork" by numbers. i'd actually prefer if Sabres remixed it instead! just think of what Weatherall could do with it.

i really wish she had a follow up to The Best Mixes / Telegram, or a singles box set..

I like the Speedy J remix of Human Behaviour more than the Underworld one. Reminds me of The Shamen, oddly enough.

My ballot; Isobel and Hunter might have placed too high, but Hyperballad was an easy pick for #1.

1. Hyperballad
2. Possibly Maybe
3. Isobel
4. Hunter
5. Enjoy
6. Venus as a Boy
7. History of Touches
8. All Neon Like
9. Army of Me
10. Pluto
11. New World
12. 5 Years
13. It's Oh So Quiet
14. Like Someone in Love
15. Unravel
16. Immature
17. Human Behavior
18. Bachelorette
19. Aurora
20. The Gate
21. Joga
22. Black Lake
23. Arisen My Senses
24. In the Musicals
25. The Modern Things
26. Come to Me
27. Big Time Sensuality
28. Stonemilker
29. Violently Happy
30. Alarm Call

Albums

Homogenic
Post
Vulnicura
Utopia
Debut

i thought i'd never want to hear her voice ever again but i listened to Black Lake because of this poll and I liked it. i still don't want to hear her singing ever again though.

AHAHAHAHHAHAHAH omg you guys Mark Bell made a fucking Miami Bass remix of "Bachelorette" I am SCREAMING!!

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

@BradNelson

have been listening to the Spotify, great job as always ILM.

my ballot

Tracks:

Come To Me
Play Dead
Enjoy
Hyper-ballad
Possibly Maybe
Isobel
Immature
My Snare/Nature is Ancient
Pagan Poetry
Undo
Pleasure is all mine
So Broken
Sod Off
Stonemilker
Tabula Rasa
Triumph of the heart
Where is the line
Unison
venus as a boy
wanderlust
who is it
it's in our hands
you've been flirting again
joga
unravel
bachelorette
5 years
hidden place
scary
one day

Albums:

#1 Homogenic
#2 Vespertine
#3 Selmasongs
#4 Telegram
#5 Utopia

remixes

#1 pagan poetry herbert mix
#2 plaid all is full of love
#3 soft pink truth it's in our hands

music videos

#1 joga
#2 bachelorette
#3 isobel
#4 human behaviour
#5 i miss you