23-08-2008 Menningarnott Festival

Location: Reykjavik (Iceland)
By: Sabine van Gameren

On the 24th of August Reykjavik organizes a marathon. In Iceland where only 300.000 people live, the marathon is one of those events that get people to the streets. Young and old unite and run the marathon (or just a shorter distance) together. Besides that Reykjavik hosts this marathon, the city is also captured by the event that starts right after the marathon: Menningarnott. This event is also described as culture night. Not really a right description, since it basically starts at 13.00 already.

Stages are building; art galleries open their doors, many special events happen in the street. To name a few examples: Statues were wearing hats, Lines with fake birds were dominating the main street and many people gathered to knit something with pink yarn (for charity purpose as well). Walking up hills at the main street I run into the first band of today. Three guys with acoustic guitars singing pop songs. They did not mention their name, but they entertained their audience very well. Most people stopped by them, while an excellent cover of Bob Dylan was played. They did play mainly their own songs though. (edit: The band wrote me their name is Árstíðir.)

When I walked further to see what the city has to offer me on this day I walked by one of the side streets where a tattoo store is situated. Be aware that although not many people here show of their tattoos, Reykjavik still owns at least five places where you can get some ink. In this case, the store is a small garage like building, only one level high. Today they decided to build a stage on top of it, on the roof to be exactly. This street is mostly a rock n roll street anyway, on the other side of the road the local motor club has its clubhouse. They were still building up their instruments, so I walked a bit further where I came at a sort of garden of a restaurant. On the balcony a band of at least 8 people squeezed together. I only saw two songs of them because they were at the end of their set. They played covers only and a lot of people came to see them, mostly curious where the sound was coming from, since this place is not visible from the street.

I walked back to the side street and while I was enjoying the free drinks and hotdogs which got supplied to the audience the band Noise was preparing at the roof of the tattoo store. The make typical hard rock music, comparable to bands like Bloodpit, Nine Volt. They pretty much blackened the street while they were playing (and I mean that pretty literally). Seems like they are known here already. They gave a lot of energy. I found this a really interesting band to listen to. I liked the guitar work since it is placed nicely in their music. Also, the vocals were great. Not too raw and not too much sleaze. Perfect, especially in this Menningarnott scenery.

After seeing this band I felt the need to walk over to the Miklatun park, where later this evening a bigger festival was about to happen. I stopped to have some food on my road and since I was pretty early I took time to watch a performance of classical music in the museum located in the park.

Soon enough the time came to see the first band of the Menningarnott . Fjallabraedur was its name. They filled quite some space on the field of grass behind me, but when I tell you the band exists out of a complete men choir it is easy to think that if only each band member brings one relative, their audience is enough to fill up a small venue. Don’t be hold back when you read about the men choir. Fjallabraedur makes rock music, with folk influences and I fell in love with them from the start on. All of them were really enthusiastic and all those male voice singing made a huge impression on me. This together with the other musicians they made a performance I have never ever seen before. In 2007 they played on Icelands biggest festival: Iceland Airwaves. I don’t see them touring in Europe in the close future, but that has mainly to do with the size of the band. Who knows what happens, I wouldn’t mind seeing them again.

Up next here was the band Bloodgroup. This band makes electro pop. I heard some different sounds in their music. A bit of 2unlimited, a bit of vive la fete but mainly I heard the sound of a new European big hit. Their vocalist Lilja is dancing around a lot and seems to know how to work the audience. The male vocals are done by Janus who also takes care of synths and percussion. They are booked for the next Iceland Airwaves, but Tempelores is telling it already before the rest of the world sees them there: Bloodgroup is going to make it! We saw it here at Menningarnott

Hjaltalin is a band who seems to be quite popular under the young folks, but did not do too much with me. I had noticed their releases in the Icelandic music stores before, but seeing them live made me know this is not my piece of cake. They make typical teenage pop music. I did like their way of performing though. They dressed up nicely and were having a great time. They bring calm music and quite some people were singing along. In the end they brought up a guest singer en under some rain of confetti they sung a song which is probably their biggest hit since everyone seemed to know it.

Magnus og Johann did do even less for me. But I guess this music was especially for the youngest ones. They made me think of a grandfather with an acoustic guitar singing some mellow songs. They did have some Icelandic songs and that was also a point where it was for me not that interesting. They youngest ones adored it though. Even as their parents. They got everyone singing along, when they ended up with a song which was probably called Island. During this song they showed video’s of the Icelandic handball team winning the half finals at the Olympics. (When it happened a few days earlier, a lot of people were partying and everyone was watching it in pubs etc…) Everyone seemed so proud of their country and they had the reason!

When Jet Black Joe entered the Menningarnott stage the hell was broken. Their rock music hits a lot of people and the audience was jumping around. The have the charismatic way of performing that you also see when seeing a band as Poets of the Fall or many international bands have. I guess every country haves such a band and this is the one who does the trick for Iceland. No surprise to say that I liked them, because this is a band where you will hear about! They have some surprising way of changes in their music every now and then. Mostly the difference between the chorus and the couplets are sometimes funny. If you don’t know there is a chorus coming up you might think they skipped on to the next song already, making you realize they fooled you soon enough. Very entertaining.

Closing the stage of tonight at Menningarnott is a privilege hold for Ny Dönsk. This pop rock band seems to be around for many years already. They sing in Icelandic, but hearing influences of The Beatles for sure. They dress up quite classic on stage, a quick google learns me they celebrated their 20 years anniversary last year. A lot of people were crazy and climbing on each others shoulders to sing along and expose their selves to their heroes. The band even had to come back for an encore. I personally did not enjoy it that much. Mostly, because their performance lasted a little too long to my taste. They guys seem to be hold in the past as well. I wonder if they would ever to consider to go on the nowadays century. They way the songs are played could have been taken to an extra level and not all of the band members seem to be bothered by smiling. Almost like they rather stayed home on a comfortable couch at the television. The main point was that the audience enjoyed it, but I think that they could have done more.

The Menningarnott is not earlier officially finished than after the fireworks. So everyone hurried to the other side of the town, at the harbor where boats were sailing around with colored lights and the fireworks came from a huge boat. A beautiful spectacle!
This day had a wonderful end by this and of course the party went on after the fireworks.

Photos by: sabinevangameren.com

Links:
Árstíðir Myspace
Noise MySpace
Fjallabraedur MySpace
Bloodgroup MySpace
Hjaltalin MySpace
Jet Black Joe MySpace
Menningarnott festival