Sigur Ros

When this album came out in 2000, no one anywhere sounded anything like Sigur Ros. Heck, their frontman sings in his own made up language ("Hopelandish") and plays his guitar with a violin bow. Combine that with atmospheric keys and ironclad bass lines for a liquid sound that doesn't so much rock as course. "Svefn-G-Englar" was the deserved hit, but the brass band that shows up for "Olsen Olsen" is equally epic. This is music to listen to while sailing your Viking ship home from battle.

Sigur Ros are the most bizarrely beautiful import from Iceland since Bjork -- Fairport
Convention playing with new fuzz boxes, singing in what sounds like Latin and drowning in
psychedelic syrup. Their international debut album (the title means, roughly, "a good
start") swirls with cathedral-organ chords, scraps of white noise and languorous rhythms.
"Flugufrelsarinn" is achingly gorgeous, swelling with tape loops, heart-tugging str... More >