#Einar Örn Benediktsson

[all-rock-and-roll-is-homosexual]

Select Magazine February 1992/the Sugarcubes

📸: Aki

if you like my scans and want to help out you can do so here I'm currently trying to raise around $100 to buy a better scanner any help is appreciated!

[dbstaches]

Ornamental – No Pain From No Pain (1987)

Ornamental was an “Anglo-Icelandic” project of Dave Ball, Rose McDowall (Strawberry Switchblade), Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson (Psychic TV) and Einar Örn Benediktsson (The Sugarcubes). The first three members performed together as extended line-up of Psychic TV on Thee Fabulous Feast Ov Flowering Light event in 1985, and Einar appearead there with the his band Kukl (which also included Bjork). Dave Ball worked only on band's debut record No Pain, contributing music and production. They would later release another single with plans to record an album, but nothing came out of it.

[drawingeinarorn]

Út úr mátunarklefanum / Out of the Fitting Booth

English below Frá árinu 1981 hafa Einar Örn Benediktsson og Bragi Ólafsson unnið saman sem tónlistarmenn, textahöfundar og útgefendur. Þeir stofnuðu saman hljómsveitina Purrk Pillnikk, ásamt Friðriki Erlingssyni og Ásgeiri Bragasyni, og voru báðir meðal stofnmeðlima útgáfufélagsins Smekkleysu SM árið 1986. Samhliða því störfuðu þeir saman í hljómsveitinni Sykurmolarnir til 1992. Smekkleysa SM,…

[bunnywand]

huh.. was wondering if damon albarn knew björk considering his love of iceland and the fact he's worked w/ another member of the sugarcubes (einar örn benediktsson) a few times, and apparently they've known each other since the early 90's and he's always wanted to work with her.. but i guess she's never felt the same 😆

[t-jfh]

Björk, The Sugarcubes

(Photo: Andrew Catlin)

THE SUGARCUBES

Björk Guömundsdóttir — vocals, keyboards

Einar Örn Benediktsson — vocals, trumpet

Sigtryggur Baldursson — drums

Pór Eldon — guitar

Bragi Ólafsson — bass

Einar Melax — keyboards 1987-1989

Margrét (Magga) Örnólfsdóttir — keyboards 1989-1992

YouTube video >> Björk, The Sugarcubes - Birthday (English) 1987 [Released: 1987 / 4mins.+4secs.]:

Birthday video released: December 1987 Directed by: Kristin Jóhannsdóttir / Saga Films Song written by: The Sugarcubes Song produced by: Derek Birkett & Ray Schulman

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YouTube video >> Björk, The Sugarcubes - Regina 1989 [Released 1 July 2007 / 4mins.+2secs.]:

Regina video released: June 1989 Directed by: Óskar Jónasson / Thorgeir Gunnarsson Song written by: The Sugarcubes Song produced by: Derek Birkett & The Sugarcubes

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YouTube video >> Björk, The Sugarcubes - Cold Sweat 1988 [Released 1 July 2007 / 3mins.+23secs.]:

Cold Sweat video released: January 1988 Directed by: Óskar Jónasson / The Sugarcubes Song written by: The Sugarcubes Song produced by: Derek Birkett & Ray Schulman

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www.bjork.com

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[beatdisc]

Out tomorrow! Long overdue vinyl re-issues of The Sugarcubes' complete discraphy.

"Over their six-year career (1986 - 1992) The Sugarcubes gained international renown for the unique sound they cultivated, garnering fans such as luminary John Peel (indeed, it was said DJ whose show’s listeners voted ‘Birthday’ their Single Of The Year in 1987), achieving unprecedented success for an Icelandic band at the time and influencing the country’s musical scene dramatically.

With a line-up featuring Björk Guðmundsdóttir (vocals, keyboards), Einar Örn Benediktsson (vocals, trumpet), Sigtryggur Baldursson (drums), Thor Eldon (guitar), Einar Melax (keyboards) and Bragi Ólafsson (bass), The Sugarcubes emerged from the ashes of numerous Icelandic acts, including Benediktsson and Ólafsson’s Purrkur Pillnikk - later (with Baldursson) K.U.K.L (‘Witch’ in Icelandic), who released several singles through the fiercely independent British label Crass Records in the early 1980s. K.U.K.L eventually morphed into The Sugarcubes who, following their dissatisfaction with the ideals of many major labels, eventually signed to One Little Indian in 1987, cueing the start of a working relationship that continues to blossom some 20 plus years later."

All 3 original studio albums plus their posthumous compilation are all available again on vinyl, with their classic '88 debut "Life's Too Good" re-pressed on multiple colour formats. See below for pricing options and get in touch to pre-order. Stock available from tomorrow (Friday, December 1st)

Life's Too Good (1988) - Clear Vinyl - $65 - Orange Vinyl - $65 - Black Vinyl - $60

Here Today, Tomorrow Next Week! (1989) - Black Vinyl - $60

Stick Around For Joy (1992) - Black Vinyl - $60

The Great Crossover Potential (1998) - Black Vinyl 2xLP - $65

#thesugarcubes#bjork#lifestoogood

[damonalbarn]

Damon and Einar Örn Benediktsson, the first of three TNTF shows in Paris, 4 March 2022

photos by Amel

[blow-wow-harakiri]

The Sugarcubes

[theorderovdeath]

Rose McDowall in the music video for “Pain” by her one-off project Ornamental feat. Einar Orn Benediktsson of The Sugarcubes

[sunset-supergirl]

Happy birthday Einar Örn Benediktsson

[music-crush]

Einar Örn Benediktsson

Til hamingju með afmælið, Einar Örn Benediktsson!

[sykurvatn]

B and E.

[holdoncallfailed]

photographs of KUKL, one of björk’s early musical projects, included in a 1984 press kit handmade by the band. formed in 1983, the band was comprised of björk, birgir mogensen, einar arnaldur melax, guðlaugur kristinn óttarsson, sigtryggur baldursson, and einar örn benediktsson. KUKL disbanded in 1986 but several of its members, including björk, would go on to perform together as the sugarcubes. (via)

[drawingeinarorn]

Örn&Orn exhibition Spring is here

Einu sinni voru Davíð Örn Halldórsson og Einar Örn Benediktsson á göngu. Ekki saman. Einar Örn var á göngu suður, og Davíð var á norðurleið. Þeir vissu ekki af hvor öðrum á göngu.Þar sem Einar Örn var á göngu suður upp Vitastíg, var Davíð á göngu norður Vitastíg. Báðir gengu rösklega.Til móts við Lindargötu lágu leiðir þeirra saman.Þeir heilsuðust og skiptust á hugmyndum.Þetta var fyrir þó nokkru…

[bunnywand]

also it's rly interesting to me looking into damon's other projects and seeing like, the reoccuring collaborations?? 😧

like the biggest one is definitely tony allen, damon was a massive fan of his and they ended up working together in the good, the bad & the queen, rocket juice & the moon, and then gorillaz' "song machine" a few years ago

fatoumata diawara and thundercat both featured on the rocket juice & the moon album in 2012 too, before fatoumata diawara was also on "song machine" and thundercat featured on "cracker island"

then einar örn benediktsson (from the sugarcubes, with björk 😆) he first worked with on the soundtrack for an icelandic film, then later with on the gorillaz phase 2 b-side "stop the dams"

and sidiki diabaté who appears on one of the "humanz" super deluxe songs is the son of toumani diabaté, who damon first played with on the "mali music" album in 2002 🤯

[holyrose-ethers]

03.05 Björk: -I think, people are always scared of new things. If you wanna make happen something that hasn't happen before you're gonna to allow yourself to make a lot of mistakes. Then the real magic WILL happen. Because if you just play really safe you won't get any treats.

03.21 Vigdís Finnbogadóttir (President of Iceland, 1980-1996): -You can not say that Björk is copying anybody. This personality that's absolutely unique, the warmth, the mature attitude to life, that heart of a child and her Icelandic way of being.

03.51 Björk: - I come from Iceland and this harbor is probably my roots you know. And and aah and the weather, and the mountains. - For me this is the heart of Reykjavik.

04.07 Björk: - I never try to do things that are Icelandic, you know. I don't ?surgo? my way, just the fact that that ahh like all my family a thousand year back are Icelandic and I was born here with all those things inside me and... with those fat face and this body, you know. And, and with this influence I think that's enough I don't have to... It' so much subconsciously there, I don't have to focus on it consciously as well. But I'm, but I'm... yeah, there IS a big chunk there.

07.52 Björk: - I've been singing professionally more or less since I was about eleven-twelve.

07.56 [clip: Bænin]

08.10 Björk: - It's a small town and people knew I did gigs, I played flute, I sang. And then this guy wanted to make a childrish record.

08.17 Björk: - It sold 5 000 copies which which is gold in Iceland. But but then they wanted to do... then it came out in a record company in a record company it was like they wanted to do another one. But I didn't want to. I, so I... said OK, that's it. Because I felt very ?ungood? I was doing interviews and all sort of stuff and people recognize me in the street and my school. I got much more attention that I wanted... before I asked for it. Well, I think a lot of people don't get the attention till long after they want it. So so I immediately sorted down in my head that that's not what I want. I want to make music.

14.37 Vigdís Finnbogadóttir: - The women of the sagas they are very strong. And Björk is one of them.

14.46 Vigdís Finnbogadóttir: - It is said about the Icelanders is that they are bold in art. They do not calculate the steps: "If I do this today this will happened tomorrow". They do today what they have to do today. All that is very Icelandic because we live with this nature on the elements that we have to defy all the time. We are not thinking about it every day but it forms our character of course

15.11 Björk: - I think when you come from a place where nature can kill, I mean you could literally not be here in a week... that is something that makes you humble. And I think it's healthy, it puts you in your place.

15.39 Björk: - If there's such a thing as Icelandic characteristics we're talking about an individual who is fiercely independent. It's like so self-sufficient, it's like arrogant. And like anarchy it's just like... somebody people who invented anarchy like hundred, 2 hundred years ago... you know, Iceland people, it's like "So?".

16.19 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - The Renaissance of Icelandic music was happening in 79-80 and so... that scene was like has been called "the Icelandic punk scene" because that scene, it was like so much do-it-yourself. It was not like a political thing, like right wing or left wing or anything like that. We were singing in Icelandic and we were dealing with Icelandic reality and we were putting out our records and doing basically everything ourselves.

16.49 Björk: - It was, you know, very stupid local sense of humor. Bunch of 16 year old terrorists drinking absinthe that was smuggled from Spain, and writing terrible tunes and being arrested a lot of times and having art exhibitions and making our own films and and basically act as sort of terrorism, if you want, sort of sabotaging what we thought was really snotty.

17.17 Björk: “I think the people ended up forming Kukl and the Sugarcubes, Badtaste... ah... they... they... they were bound to meet, you know, because in such a small town having same obsessions basically being terrified of mediocracy... I think that was always being our biggest enemy... that mediocracy, materialism and narrow-mindedness... aah small-town mentality. And we'd do anything to break that down.“

19.19 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - There was nothing like it. There was a void in the world of pop music and certainly there was a light. And it happened to be us and we were from Iceland and we were the Sugarcubes.

19.31 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - Somebody told me that Birthday had been chosen single of the week in Melody Maker. And my response was "Oh, shit!" Because I knew it was trouble. And boy, it did prove out to be trouble for us.

19.44 Björk: - That was like companies they came here and got offer to succeed trillion billions and... and and we just told them all you know to "F U C K off" because we were being terrorists you know that. And that took about one and a half year that we just kept sending them back.

20.01 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - The agenda of the Sugarcubes was never to become like... world famous. We were doing this for fun.

20.10 Björk: - Two or even three of the Sugarcubes were probably the most promising poets or writers of Iceland's new generation. And they were finding themselves they haven't written a letter for two years... ehhh... ehhh because they were doing sound checks in like Texas and Alabama and playing doing guitar solos. Which which is kinda funny. I mean, it IS funny. But it's only funny for so long, you know.

20.37 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - The trappings of the business, I think, were the like the end of the Sugarcubes. We just had had enough and we were all friends and so instead of spoiling a very good friendship ... we destroyed a business relationship.

20.51 Björk: - I had been making music like for theatre, for film, like pop stuff eee jazz stuff eee experimental stuff, electronic stuff... basically try everything basically work with everybody in Iceland. But always with other people's visions.

21.27 Björk: - I moved to London to make my own album. It was time for me then to write songs about me. I was 27. I thought: 'OK, you know, you're coward if you don't try move things. It was a very big decision to move, mostly because of my son. I'm a really family orientated person.

21.55 Björk: - When I came to London I was very looking. And and and I was very sure that I wasn't gonna do... I was gonna do an album that haven't been done before. So hmm... when I'm... the people I was most attracted to and and the scene I was most attracted to when I came here was people who knew as little as I did about what was gonna happen. Not people that already established things but people that was still trying to sort of entering the unknown, if you want, and and trying to discover something that hadn't been discovered before.

22.59 Björk: - The people that ended up in my band without me planning it so were like... one person form Iran, one from India, one from Turkey, one from Cypress, one from Barbados. This is a bit like immigrants united.

23.13 Björk: - For me... for whole... brit-pop thing and the Oasis thing and the whole guitar thing. It's this kind of British scare of loosing britishness. And the immigrants taking over in that.

23.27 Björk: - English people, like the brit-pop scene, they just seem to repeating on one, trying to sort of hold the Victorian flag alive but it's just... you know, dead, you know. And and it don't seem to to be doing anything fertile.

27.22 Einar Örn Benediktsson: - Björk does not need adolation adoration for her to make her music. And being stared at in the street and whispering "There's Björk". It does her more harm than anybody people can ex... no, they don't know how much harm they are doing.

PART TWO

29.12 Narrator: - Much of the past year Björk has been living in Southern Spain where she recorded her third solo album.

29.24 Björk: - I think there's something very special about living at the ahh edges of of continents. And it fee.. it just feels completely different and it shouldn't, you know. That you look out the window and you can see another continent other there. And and it's just kinda like... is a really healthy turn on somehow. The idea that every morning you could wake up and literally go to Africa.

29.46 Björk: - When I lived by the ocean there I used to wake up every morning and have to walk for like an hour and and like cross ("p-hhh" shows a splash). And then I felt like I was in Spain. And then I could work. And I wake up the morning after and I still hadn't just grasped the idea. So I did do that for a month. And then I moved up here to the mountain. And and the only way I can take all this in, because it's just so outrageous... And and I keep just thinking on that not just looking at the backdrop or something ... and it's just like... you gonna pull the curtains in the sack.

30.33 Björk: - These are the thing that I owe, that I usually have in my house where I do only demoes. So we we set this up in, brought these down to Spain.

30.47 Björk: - When I did Debut and Post they were very much like greatest hits of my musical passions for all my life. And I knew it would take two albums to do that. That's why I called them "Debut" and "Post" - "Before" and "After" of getting rid of the the back catalogue almost, you know. Gracefully, you know. Because you can only move on if you do that, you know. So this is like a fresh start for me and that's why I want to call this album "Homogenic" or "-genous" or "-genius" or whatever, I'm still working on that. Because it's one flavour. It's just me, now, you know, here. And and it's gonna be... instead of like all these different instruments, it's just gonna be beats, strings and voice.

32.01 Björk: - I knew that this album would be like "back to Iceland" sort of what I'm about. But it's very hard to get a start from a complete scratch with no tradition whatsoever. But there were some pioneers who were trying to hmm look at the landscapes and the country and try to change that what they saw and what they felt into audio.

32.21 Sibbi Bernhardsson (violinist): - There are certain Icelandic composers and when they compose Icelandic music they, you know, try to imitate... geisers or volcanoes. 'Cause the landscape in Iceland is very rough. It's, you know, we don't have like this, you know, trees. We don't barely have any trees. We've lot of lavas, we've lot of volcanoes and there's a lot of outburst stuff, you know. Weather is only the wind comes or snow storms. And that kind of sounds, I think, she's looking after. And she has talked about that, she wants more this raw sound, not this beautiful european sound maybe.

32.55 Björk: - To find that voice is is very chalenging, you know. And it's almost like you have to invent your own roots. And that's one of the reasons why I got the eight string players. I wanted them all to be Icelandic.

It needs more vibrato... - ...more drama - ...just very Mata Hari - It's almost too... - It can be a little bit...

33.29 Sibbi Bernhardsson: - Well, I've picked up some her uses of intervals, for instance, fifths. And it's very traditional in Iceland and actually very unique. Icelandic folk songs often use this interval of fifths. It throughout, you know, the whole song, you know. And that and she uses that in her pieces that way, it makes it very Icelandic.

33.47 Sibbi Bernhardsson: - For instance in the "Hunter" the two celloes they are playing two bar motive, and, you know, one of them plays the lower note then the other cellist plays it the fifth above. And and there when you hear that that's just right away, you know, that's Icelandic.

34.11 Björk: - I wrote a song called Hunter and it's based on... what my grandmother told me on Christmas about two different types of birds who are aahm birds that always have the same nest all their life like swans. And they always have the same partners, all life. And the birds that travel all the time and they always have different partners all the time. And kinda like ehh to make a concsious decision to stay a hunter.

34.36 Björk: - It kinda ended up being a little bit of a bolero, I guess. Maybe because it's Spain.

34.41 Björk: - That's the only song with the string arrangement I asked Deodato to do completely.

34.46 Eumir Deodato (strings arranger): - One of the notes that we had and we discussed maybe trying a figure such as a bolero, you know, Ravel's Bolero. In the course of the recording we've decided to exaggerate certain aspects of of the string parts by having the strings doings lighting notes and kind of lugish and a sluring.

- ... so lovely if the one person could do a solo... on top. - Ah? - One person could do a solo on top. - Sure. - There have to be stun.

35.28 Deodato: - When she says me something it's prety much done... What she what I understanded and and I was correct in understanding it that way is that she really wants a colour. She really wants the humanizing factor into tracks that are basically...ahm I just say sequenced, using different sounds or using electronic sounds.

35.50 [clip: Björk and Deodato in studio]: - It's good if we just put one take down and have that as well. We come tomorrow ..(Deodato: We can do more scenic sense...) we can listen to it. And then we know what to fix (Deodato: - Absolutely), if that works or not. But at least we put it down,OK?