Review: Jonsi's gig at Hammersmith Apollo

*New post on my expedition is below the post 'How to build a kindergarten'*

With all the bombardment of the blog with my expedition stories, I thought it would be good to share a little of what I have been up to lately.

The truth is, my life have been pretty much a routine ever since I got back to London. Right now, I am busy with my part time job and studies, so thats the two things that I spend most time on. Of course not to mention all the mindless internet surfing and facebooking in between!

So last Friday after work, I went to hammersmith apollo to see Jonsi perform live. Jonsi was the guitarist and vocalist for the Icelandic post rock band, Sigur Ros. He has a solo career now and released an amazing album called 'GO' last year.


Check out his use of cello bow on the guitar! Awesome.



Jonsi isn't typically the kind of music I listen to, but after Andy introduced his songs to me 2 months ago, I was hooked to his falsetto voice and very intense emotion of his music.

Here's a little taster of his live act.

'go live' preview from Jónsi on Vimeo.

The concert started off with the opening act of some band from Canada. It was pretty disasterous in my opinion. The music wasn't too bad, as it bear some resemblence to the experimental genre, but the male vocal was not up to par and worst of all, is extremely Elvis Presley inspired.

An hour after the opening act, Jonsi finally made an appearance with an unreleased song. Unfortunately, I do not know the name of the song, but I do know that I loved it. The main instrument was the acoustic guitar and Jonsi's soothing voice was a perfect start to the evening. Updated. The song was 'Stars in still water'.

He went on the perform several more unreleased numbers and those from his album 'Go', each one better than the previous. I was particularly looking forward to my favorite song from the album, 'kolniður', however, I was slightly disappointed as somehow, as it didn't come across as powerful as I expected it to be.

But he made a come back with 'Around us' and blew us all away with the last number 'Grow till tall'. A combination of the images projected in the background, flashing lights, and increasingly thumping beat of the last part in 'Grow till tall' made everything so intense to take in. It was definitely mind blowing for me, and I believe, many others in the concert hall would agree with that. All along the concert, I could see several heads bobbing to the music and I found myself tapping my foot to the beat too.

The performance left me with goosebumps all over and a big smile on my face. I will definately look forward to another Jonsi live performance in the near future.

He will be performing in Japan, Seoul, and finally his home country Iceland next. So for those who are in the cities, do attend as it would be well worth every penny.

Here's an incredibly powerful and beautiful song, Kolniður:



Have you experienced the power of Jonsi's or Sigur Ros's live performances? Do share them with me in the comment box!