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Amiina
Nov 30, 2006
Lee Ryan |
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Amiina
Most people familiar
with Icelandic quartet Amiina first discovered them
accompanying Sigur Rós
during one of their many stops around the world.
Now, Amiina have stepped out on their own with ‘Seoul’,
a new single taken from their debut album, due early
in 2007.
Tell me a little about how Amiina began.
The four of us met when we were in music school together
here in Iceland when we were teenagers. We played
some classical music together for years and really
liked working together. Slowly we got more and more
into doing studio work with different Icelandic bands
and in 1999 we were asked to work with Sigur Ros
and started touring and recording with them. Doing
non-classical music together, and working differently
with our instruments inspired us in wanting to do
our own music and about two years ago we finally
had the chance to do some. We recorded our first
EP, AnimaminA in the summer of 2004 and then the
ball started rolling.
Your live performances are what have introduced most
people to your music. How have the performances evolved
over time?
Now that we are doing our first headline tours we try
and take the space and time we need on stage. We try
and connect the songs together with sounds and stuff
we sample live. We play a lot of instruments in our
set, we move a lot around the stage and we are more
and more using that as a big part of our performance
instead of rushing around trying to hide it. We have
also made some special live versions of some of our
songs. We basically want to create a special atmosphere,
a journey that we take our audience through.
Can you tell us what some of the many instruments
you play onstage are?
Well, if I just make a list, these are the main ones:
Electric strings, a saw, a glassophone, a metalophone,
harmonium, cuadro (small 10 stringed guitar) electric
guitar, a mandolin, bells, glockenspiels, a music box,
a celtic harp, table harps (cimbalos), a micro korg.
The glassophone and the table
harps are partly home made, they have some contact
microphones on them. The music box has that as well.
It’s the kind were
you make your own melody on it by cutting holes in
a paper strip that you run through it. The saw is just
a musical saw, with its teeth and everything.
We just like to pick up instruments and sound sources
along the way that fit into the songs we are working
on at the time.
One of the things that comes across so well in your
performances is how confident each of you are with
the many different instruments you play. Are there
any instruments that were particularly difficult to
learn?
Hmm…well, I wouldn’t really say that we
know how to play all these instruments very well. If
a professional player would see us he would tell us
that we were playing them all wrong. But that is maybe
a big part of our sound; we have a fresh approach to
these instruments, because we don’t really know
what is the right way to play them.
I can’t really say if there is a more difficult
one, they are all so different.
I know that
Iceland and Reykjavík, in particular,
is small, but how did you begin working with Sigur
Rós?
They had heard of us through our work with other bands.
They needed a string quartet to play with them on the
release concert of Ágætis Byrjun in 1999.
We all liked working together so a year later they
asked us if we were up for touring with them. And so
we did for 6 years!
There are many aspects to the music you create. Strings,
bells, percussion, computers: Are there particular
roles that each member of Amiina fills?
No, not really. We write all the music together, one
of us might be playing around with a simple idea and
the rest joins in on whatever instrument they feel
like fits in. Then the song slowly takes on its shape.
However there are some instruments that only one of
us plays, like the saw and the glassophone.
The instrumental
music we¹ve
heard so far is quite beautiful. Are there plans
for any future Amiina songs to include singing?
We have already started singing in our songs. There
is one with singing in it on our upcoming EP and even
more on the next album!
What are some of the inspirations you draw upon when
composing?
It’s hard to pinpoint. We don’t think about
it a lot. I guess we are just inspired by everything
in our lives, our environment, people and music around
us. It’s all a big melting pot of the four of
us.
The main concept of our website is CD recommendations,
in small groups. Would you list for us 7 current favorites
from Amiina?
I can only answer on the behalf of myself, but I think
the others like them as well. Colleen, Joanna Newsome,
Efterklang, Ólöf Arnalds, Sufjan Stevens,
Four Tet, Final Fantasy, and, of course, our friends
Sigur Ros.
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