Oor (NL) 9/97

"Homogenic is Iceland, my native country, my home" (translated)

Written by Erik van den Berg

Photography by ?

Translated by Thomas Stevens

The shortly to be released new CD from Björk is called Homogenic. That word doesn't exist, but is simply Björkish for homogenous (of the same kind). Which immediately sums up the music on it and takes us to the 'problem' of Homogenic : nice record, but a bit boring. Uniform. Homogenous. How come? "My first two CD's were : Björk goes on a journey and meets inspiring people. Homogenic is : Björk stays home."

"Homogenic is Iceland, my native country, my home"

July 1997. Björk Gudmundsdottir doesn't make it easy for the massive musicpress that's been lured to London. On the program is a concert (especially for intimate friends, guests, press and other parasites) on an appropriate location in East London: an arty looking and smelling building with adjoining complex of halls that serves no apparent function (Gallery? Studio? Fitness centre? Trendy club?), but which is now clearly part of Marketingplan Björk 1997. Many VIP's, a lot of fuss, lots of mobile phones.

During the concert that evening, the 31 year old singer will perform material from her new album Homogenic, due out at the end of September. Always fun, a nice, exclusive first look, you know. Nothing wrong so far. And as a bonus, before the concert there's a press conference in an adjacent room. Starts around dinner-time.

Once that time has arrived and the place is crowded with journalists, photographers and record label executives from all around the world - the REC-buttons on dozens of taperecorders have already been depressed - there is no sign of Björk yet. 15 Minutes later she's still not there. The REC-buttons are out again. 45 Minutes later : still no Björk. An official gives the excuse. Technical problems, elsewhere in the building. After half an hour: nobody. The crowd yawns, moans, sits back, waits. Two hours go by without a trace of Björk. A lady from the record company takes the stand. Sorry, still technical problems, but Björk will be here within 15 minutes. 30 Minutes pass. Waiting for exactly two and a half hours now. Sandwiches are brought in to feed the hungry. When the official shows up again to announce that the technical problems are almost solved and that Björk can really show up any moment now, he gets laughed at.

Finally, after another half an hour (total duration : three hours!), the biggest Icelandic star of all times strides into the conference room. During half an hour she politely answers the questions. She tells about her mostly in the South Spanish El Madronal recorded new CD. A CD she has wild plans for, especially for the singles. Remixes, remixes and more remixes, with the sober album versions - made with Mark Bell from techno-act LFO and an eight-piece Icelandic string section conducted by Eumir Deodato - as 'basic material'. The names of Atari Teenage Riot, Howie B. and The RZA from The Wu-Tang Clan are mentioned. She talks about her eleven year old son Sindri, about her leaving for Spain and about the traumatic period she went through after an obsessed American fan had sent her a (by the police intercepted) bomb letter and had committed suicide afterwards. A final question in Icelandic is answered in Icelandic and then it's over. End of press conference. Björk is carried off.

July 1997. Björk Gudmundsdttir doesn't make it easy for the mass of photographers that's been lured to London. Just after the press conference there's a so-called photocall, when Björk will pose for a few minutes for an international army of press photographers. It becomes a bizarre scene. An enormous bunch of people is gathering in front of the singer, who is put on a small bench for the occasion and who bades for a few seconds in the blindingly white light of dozens of flashes. Seconds, mind you. Not minutes, as promised. Even before the photographers have managed to get into position and take another shot, Björk has flown. Bewildering all around. Is this what the photographers have come from all over the world to London for? First that ridiculously long wait before the press conference and now this? Protest doesn't help however; Björk is gone and stays gone. The first careful mumbling about 'disregard for the press and thus for the public' arises. And slowly becomes louder.

The concert on that evening makes up for a lot however. Björk wants to approximate the musical contents of her new CD as good as possible and therefore lets herself be guided only by the electronic beats of Mark Bell and the string players of Deodato. The new songs sound well, but what is especially striking is the old material, that is surprisingly beautifully reinterpreted by merely violins and electronics. What is remarkable also: the complete absence of modern dance influences. No jungle, no big beat, no techno. At most some triphop ambiences. Jungler and ex-boyfriend Goldie shows up, but only amongst the public.

July 1997. Björk Gudmundsdottir doesn't make it easy for the Dutch journalist that's been lured to London. In her hotelroom with nice view over Hyde Park the day after, she's suffering from an enormous hang-over. Lots of promising theories about Homogenic are talked about, but are abandoned halfway through. "Sorry, that damned hang-over..." Meanwhile she devours a box of raspberries at incredible speed. Appears to work. We won't talk about disregard for the press now. Besides, can Björk help it that, exactly at the moment that the first interviews concerning her new CD are scheduled, she can't control herself on the night before and gets completely drunk?

Yet, we still get somewhere along the way. She mentions for instance that the delay from the evening before wasn't caused by technical problems during the soundcheck at all, but that she and the musicians wanted to rehears for another hour or five. And, well, it lasted a bit longer than planned. Aha. Again we won't talk about disrespect. And stuff.
About what then? About Homogenic then. A beautiful record, which nevertheless sounds a bit boring and one-dimensional because of the limited instrumentation, especially when compared to its predecessor Post, which musically went in all directions. Or the at the end of last year released in-between album, Telegram, on which ten of Björk's musical friends and heroes (among which Mark Bell) could remix the songs of Post. Björk seems to agree with that, strangely enough. Except with the words boring and one-dimensional, naturally.

"Homogenic is a reaction to Debut and Post. That were actually two theme records. They marked de periods before and after my moving from Iceland to London. Both records deal with how I looked at my life at that moment. That was kinda Die Hard. I wanted to be Bruce Willis. I didn't want an easy life and I didn't get it. I was looking for speed, action, thrills, excitement and as many challenges as possible. The opposite of my calm, lazy life in Iceland. So I've travelled, made music, performed, partied and met inspiring people for four years non-stop. My life was a rollercoaster and I thought it was fantastic; I lost myself in it completely."
And Homogenic now marks your return to the quiet life of earlier. The big home-coming.
'Something like that, yeah. Although I haven't really, physically, gone back to Iceland. It's inside. The music of Homogenic is very close to the music I heard as a child. It's a very Icelandic record, especially as far as rhythm is concerned. But it's not a record that wasn't there yesterday; it's always been there, but just had to materialize. The sounds, the rhythms, the emotions, they've always been inside my head. I put them down on Homogenic. I look at it as a document. And the title of the record actually indicates that the music comes more or less from one direction: straight from the heart, because home is where the heart is. This time I didn't want too much intervention from others.'

Remarkable then, that Homogenic still turns out to be so one-dimensional. Two years ago you told me that Post was such a whimsical and unpredictable record because it reflected your personality perfectly. Has your personality changed suddenly too, then?

'Erm... I've definitely become more mature, yeah. And when you grow up, you need less toys. You also notice that as a musician. Debut and Post were full of little toys; it was very simple to draw the attention with that for 45 minutes. Every minute new gadgets were introduced. Later I thought: that's actually a bit too easy. It would be a far greater challenge to record a double album with only one theespoon and keep it exciting for two hours as well. So I figured, Homogenic should be made with less tools. Come as you are. Beats, violins and vocals, and trying to cover the entire emotional spectrum with that. Preferably the same spectrum as on Debut and Post. Look, those records showed the different sides of Björk, but it was also like: Björk goes on a journey and meets all kinds of exciting, inspiring people. That were all those musicians, mixers and producers who worked with me. Homogenic is: Björk stays home.

"I wanted to make it an honest record. Me, here, myself, at home. I asked myself if there is such a thing as Icelandic techno, and how it could sound. Well, in Iceland, everything revolves around nature, 24 hours a day. Earthquakes, snowstorms, rain, ice, volcanic eruptions, geysers... Very elementary and uncontrolable. But at the other hand, Iceland is incredibly modern; everything is hi-tech. The number of people owning a computer is as high as nowhere else in the world. That contradiction is also on Homogenic. The electronic beats are the rhythm, the heartbeat. The violins create the old-fashioned atmosphere, the colouring. Homogenic is Iceland, my native country, my home."

When did you realize that your new CD had to become totally different compared to Debut and Post? Did the incident with that bomb letter have something to do with it? Did it indicate that Björk's star had maybe become a bit too big?
'In a certain way yes. It happened right before I started the record and - apart from the drama around it - it felt like it was symbolic for what was happening in my own life, professionally as well as emotionally. I was obsessed as well. By something completely different, mind you, especially by new and exciting challenges, but still. I suddenly realized how something like that could escalate. So, yeah, I've learned a great deal from that incident. It was as if, all of a sudden, I was back into reality and, during my continuous search for kicks, had been acting so fake for four years. A humbling experience. It made me feel quite down for a while.

"It was also a matter of finding the courage to carry on. But then with something else. Because that's it: courage. It happened to me once before. In the first years of my solo career - the period around Debut - I wasn't able to record a dark or sad song. You have to know, I was raised hardcore happy. That's something typically Icelandic: to be happy, to feel good, to see everything from the positive side. So it took me a lot of courage to try something moody. On Debut it didn't work, on Post it did, eventually. Possibly Maybe was my first dark song.

"You can also hear that courage to do something totally different on Homogenic. The courage to be still, to stop for a while. When you're used to going very fast, every day again, it's difficult to do. Besides, it's not as if was relaxed all the time during the recording of Homogenic; in the contrary. But every now and then, a couple of times a month, I could do it. Then I was very calm for a very short moment. And I decided to make use of that. So if you listen to the CD, you think: wow, Björk has finally calmed down. But that's only how it appears. The songs on the record merely represent the isolated moments of calmness, amidst all the fuss.'

So you've hardly changed.

"Not really, no. I couldn't have. But fortunately I am able to make a consistent record now."

But is Homogenic, with it's homecoming-theme, closer to the real Björk or is it precisely a forced attempt to hide the real Björk?

'Who the real Björk is, remains a mystery, even to me. Today I'm this, tomorrow I'm that. People say sometimes that, except for my voice, I haven't got a true musical identity. Well, that's true. But that's never bothered me. Artists who are and then just take on a certain style, are people without identity. And they know it, or they wouldn't be so preoccupied with defining the music that alledgedly suits them; something I've never done myself. With me, everything comes natural. I can't help it. I can't be dishonest with myself. It was already like that when I was sixteen, playing in Top 40-coverbands. I never managed to sound like someone else. And I still can't. I'm the worst actress in the world. And as copycat I am completely unconvincing. I can't lie.'

Yet, many people think you're building up some kind of image: that of the happy child-woman.

'Listen, I grew up in a very small town. When I was eight, I was already on Icelandic TV. In itself nothing special, because every Icelander is on TV at least once in his life. People didn't just see me on TV, but also in the street. So I could hardly act different on TV than how I really was; people would notice immediately. What I mean is that it's always seemed completely pointless to me, to create an image that differs from my real self. That's not in me. Not even now that I live in London. I'll give you another example. Via MTV, lots of Icelandic children get to know the phenomenon of 'asking an autograph'. But to them that's something completely absurd, because they meet the Icelandic celebrities in person once a week anyway!"

Is the Icelandic community that small?

'Okay, I'm exaggerating. But where I grew up, there lived 18,000 people. There was a main street and one big square. You only had to cross the street naked once and the people would remember for the rest of their lives.'

It strikes me that you never work with well-defined songstructures in your music. That's also very apparent on Homogenic. Is that also typically Icelandic?

"My songs may seem to be without structure, but they are very structured. The confusion is probably caused by the arrangements. I look upon them as a sort of decoration, that I like to play with. But about those structures... I grew up more or less among hippies and they used to improvise and jam a lot. Initially, I thought it was fun and exciting, but later I found it tiresome. Ever since, I hate musicians who don't know where they're going with their music. Don't get me wrong, I respect spontaneity - that's what life is full of - but I also demand discipline. And a sense for direction and structure. Only when all those things come together, it's perfect for me.

"When I write songs, they have gone through a long period of growth in my head first. They're puzzles, that are completed very slowly, piece by piece. Only then will I write things down. And structure is very important for that. It doesn't matter then whether I go in the studio with nine banjo players or with 23 drumcomputer experts, the structure will always remain te same. But maybe people don't recognize those structures because they've been in my head for so long that I don't feel the need anymore to emphasize them. I'm actually already tired of them, don't find them exciting anymore and already start making variations on them. And that's how they end up on the record. So I understand your question. It's the greatest thing when people recognize the basic structure without it actually being played. It seems to work that way with lots of pieces by Charlie Parker. The listeners effortlessly pick up the structure, so Parker can simply do babble jibble. I hope it will work that way with my music one day. But maybe I should contain myself a bit with those arrangements [laughs]. At the other hand: that's just what I like about it. It's ambience, dressing. It's like standing in front of my wardrobe and thinking: what shall I wear today? Is it raining or is it dry? Is it cold or is it warm? Am I going to a meeting or to a party? Is it already Christmas? I like to connect a target to my music. A destination. And on Homogenic that destination is called: home. And can I help it that no one knows what my house looks like?