Slipknot enthusiasts seated at balcony tables for The 9’s first ever UK display on the Astoria in London on December 13, 1999 had been greater than just a little shocked to seek out Icelandic pop famous person Björk Gudmundsdottir of their midst. However possibly they should not have been, for the Reykjavík-born musician have been enjoying in furiously noisy punk bands sooner than Corey Taylor used to be enrolled at basic faculty, years sooner than she first started to draw global reputation because the singer of acclaimed alt. rock crew The Sugarcubes.
One thing of a kid prodigy, the singer recorded her self-titled début album Björk when she used to be simply 11-years-old, however by the point it used to be launched, in December 1977, the teenage Bjork had fallen in love with punk rock. “That used to be a large scene in Reykjavík,” she recalled in a 1993 interview with Q mag. “I believe we dangle the arena report of what number of people lived in Iceland, and what number of punk bands there have been… We for sure were given over the issue of now not realizing learn how to play – that used to be thoughts over topic.”
Björk’s first band, when she used to be 13, used to be an all-girl anarcho-punk band, Spit and Snot.
“It used to be 4 ladies, and we hadn’t in reality been in a band sooner than, and I sought after to be the drummer,” she recalled in a 2017 interview with BBC 6Music DJ and previous tune journalist Mary Anne Hobbs. “Once we began rehearsals and stuff, I believe no person kinda sought after to sing, and I kinda ended up making a song. I believe it used to be an concept, greater than anything else, I will’t in fact needless to say many rehearsals.”
Talking to Q about her report assortment in 1993, Björk singled out Discharge’s 1984 compilation album By no means Once more as a key affect on her punk years, revealing that she in fact owned “3 or 4 data” through the Stoke-on-Trent D-beat pioneers.
“That they had such hardcore power,” she marvelled. “I have all the time idea this line between entire power and getting muso must be saved very thick. I wasn’t into the brand new wave scene after they began to position chords to punk. It used to be… now not natural to any extent further. That is why I appreciated Discharge, and in reality revered Crass too.”
Following a short-lived spell with jazz-fusion band Exodus, whilst nonetheless in her teenagers, when Björk used to be the lead singer of the extra gothic-influenced punks Kukl (‘Sorcery’ in Icelandic), the gang had been presented a report deal through anarcho-punk legends Crass, who had began their very own label, Crass Information. Recorded through Crass’ Penny Rimbaud, the Icelandic band’s debut album, The Eye, used to be launched in September 1984. A 2nd album, Vacations in Europe (The Naughty Nought), used to be launched through Crass Information in 1986, sooner than the gang disbanded. However those that know Björk say that she hasn’t ever misplaced her anti-conformist edge.
Speaking to Make a choice mag in 1994, the singer’s former Kukl bandmate Guðlaugur Kristinn Óttarsson stated, “I bear in mind in the midst of the ’80s, an outside competition with numerous inebriated other folks calling out for her to play a brand new pop music, or a biggest hit, or a dance music. She used to be very proud simply to play her personal tune, so that you could make her remark she jumped offstage, went to the centre of the dancefloor, and went to the bathroom at the spot. It demonstrates that she speaks out very frankly.”
A real authentic, and a real punk soul.
