Photo by Lilja Birgisdóttir
Most people with any knowledge of music have by now heard Icelandic band Sigur Rós, which means most people are well-acquainted with Jónsi Birgisson’s fabulous falsetto through their Vonlenska/Hopelandic songs.
Jónsi recently announced the release of his solo album Go in 2010, to be arranged by Nico Muhly (Björk, Grizzly Bear), produced by Peter Katis (Interpol, The National) and released on XL recordings. Through his website, Jónsi is offering a free download of the whimsically titled Boy Lilikoi, a song which I beg you to stop everything you are doing this minute to download and listen to.
Boy Lilikoi starts out softly and slowly progresses into a beautiful, anthem-like explosion of instruments with heartwarming lyrics about the world going aflutter by. Unlike Sigur Rós’s albums, Go will contain songs in English, but it isn’t understanding the language that makes Boy Lilikoi a great song – Jónsi, Muhly and Katis individually create some fantastic music; together, they’ve created magic.
Musically Inclined 