The Playlist: Bjork

Welcome to my imaginatively titled series, ‘The Playlist’, where I take a deep dive into the music of a particular artist, genre, subject matter, place, or year. I’ll write about the songs that mean the most to me, and put together a playlist of my favourites.

This Time — Bjork

1993 was the year I really fell in love with music, and was also the year of Bjork’s ‘Debut’ (which was not her actual debut, as she had released an album of covers aged just 11). My musical diet was almost entirely made up of Britpop and Grunge at the time, but even I knew Bjork was something special, and my love for has only deepened over the years. I can’t think of anyone else I was listening to in 1993 who is still producing great music now (except maybe the Breeders).

The Anchor Song

‘Debut’ is full of some of Bjork’s best loved songs, such as ‘Venus as a Boy’ ‘Human Behaviour’ and ‘Big Time Sensuality’, but it’s The Anchor Song that I’ve grown to love the most. A masterpiece of minimalism built around a simple organ refrain.

Hyperballad

Hyperballad is at the opposite end of the spectrum as far as Bjork songs go, an absolute epic. I owned it on CD single back in 1995 when it first came out, and have probably listened to it more than anything else in her repertoire.

Bjork has the knack of describing a feeling we’ve all known in a completely unique way, and never more so than in this song. We’ve all felt the need to get rid of frustration and anger so we can be calm around those we love, but only Bjork would turn this into a tale of waking up early and throwing car parts and other assorted items off a cliff.

When I saw Bjork perform this live in 2008,and segue it into a version of LFO’s Freak, it was genuinely one of the greatest moments of my life, one of those times at a gig where you enter an almost transcendent state.

Headphones

Headphones is the closing track and Bjork’s second album, Post, but in some ways feels like it belongs better on either of the following albums, Homogenic or Vespertine. It is a beautifully atmospheric evocation of the joy of listening to music, alone, headphones on, something that no other artist I know has captured in song before. The first Bjork track that felt like not only a great song, but something more, almost like an instrumental piece, where her voice is just another instrument (an idea she would explore more deeply on later records). “a love letter to sound” in her own words.

Joga

Bjork’s back catalogue is full of wonderful string arrangements, but none more so than the spine chilling Joga. The strings on the first chorus in particular are astonishingly beautiful, and combine perfectly with one of her most powerful vocals. When she sings the phrase “emotional landscape”, it is almost unbearably intense.

Unravel

Immediately following Joga on Homogenic is Unravel, an entirely different but equalling stunning song, the subtle, understated ying to Joga’s yang. You wouldn’t think it was possible to write a love song that was in any way new, after the thousands of years people have been writing love songs for, but Unravel manages it. The concept is that each time you are parted from your love, you have to rebuild that love when they return, using the typically beautiful and unique metaphor of a ball of yarn unravelling and being put back together again.

Cocoon

Cocoon, from 2001’s Vespertine, is a deeply sexual song, but unlike most songs about sex, it is neither couched in innuendo or in your face explicit, but direct, raw and intimate, an ode to both sex and love. It also has the most gorgeous production from Thomas Knak, all glitchy, tumbling beats, deeply indebted to Bjork’s other collaborators on this album, Matmos. Ironically though, the standout moment on the song is when the music cuts out completely, leaving just Bjork’s voice wondering “who would have known?”

Black Lake

Where Cocoon was written at the start of a relationship, the album Vulnicura (15 years later) marks the end of the same relationship, exploring a break up from all angles, sometimes with humour and fondness, sometimes with anger, but never more powerfully than on the 10 minute epic Black Lake. Perhaps the greatest recent Bjork song, certainly the most intense.

Playlists

And finally, all of the above and more as a Spotify playlist (find an Apple Music version of this playlist here)

Originally published at http://colourthecortex.wordpress.com on May 24, 2021.