Twenty-six years into an experimental career where he’s still generally thought of as the indie boy Enya, Jónsi Birgisson has recruited a 30-year-old co-producer to help change his game. Step forward AG Cook: Charlie XCX’s creative director and a master of glitchy, peculiarly skewed modern pop. On Jónsi’s first solo album for 10 years, Cook encouraged him to strip each song to its bare bones and add stranger, steelier muscles.
The results veer between the kind of palatably edgy, ethereal fare for which Chris Martin would give his eye teeth, and crunchy electronica ripe for club remixes. Jónsi’s voice takes on different incarnations, at times being heavily processed, at others floating free. Good gentle moments come early, like Cannibal, on which the Cocteau Twins’ Liz Fraser guests delicately, and Sumarið Sem Aldrei Kom [The Summer That Never Came], which carries in its slowness a soft, fluid sadness.
More thrilling are the metallic scrape of Swill and Wildeye, the skittish robotic choir on Hold, and Salt Licorice, which features Robyn, synth melodies that appear to be disassembling themselves and lyrics about “Scandinavian pain”. More of this, please: Jónsi suits the shock of the new.
