Friday, 08.03.2019
Today is the day with the least program. But therefore it’s going to be a long evening. Only at 11:30 we have to be at the Nordic house, the Norðurlandahúsið. We just walk there by foot through the park. At first, we get a guided tour through all rooms. Here they have rooms for art exhibitions, an own room for the Faroese chain dance (but it is not danced during lent) and of course the big hall where tomorrow the FMA will take place. People here are already working hard to prepare everything. Also the history of the building is explained to us. The Nordic House belongs to a series of Nordic houses all over Scandinavia. In the building materials from all over Scandinavia have been used. The steel girders and the glass are from Denmark, the floor is made of Norwegian granite, the walls are covered with Swedish wood and the visitors sit on chairs from Finland. The roof construction origins from Iceland, while the grass itself comes of course from the Faroe Islands. Therefore it fits perfectly into the landscape. For this reason the Nordic house is not only interesting for people with cultural interest but also for people who are interested in architecture.
After the guided tour there is a brunch for us and nearly all meals – unusual for the Faroes – are vegetarian. And organic, as they point out more than once. As we today only have one further date according to the program we have plenty of time to enjoy the fantastic view from here and to talk with the people from the Nordic house as well as from the G! festival. Some of us go to the city for sightseeing purposes, some use the time for working and I use the free time to visit the author whose book I am translating right now because we have to talk about some things.
In the evening at 18:30 our next date begins. We meet in the restaurant Katrina Christiansen which belongs to the hotel Hafnia for the Meet & Greet where we meet many of the officials for the first time, among them for example the moderator of the FMA, Rólant Waag Dam. And some journalists arrived only today as well.
After the meal we all head to the Reinsaríið, where a pre-FMA concert takes place. This isn’t a concert especially for us, it is open for everybody to attend and the room is well filled. The first band playing is SISSAL. The young artist is nominated as female singer of the year in this year’s FMA. She just released an album and because of this we only get to hear songs from this album, like the calm “Drifting”. Like so many Faroese musicians she is introducing each song with some information about origin and meaning of it. For example when she was attending a festival that became victim to a storm and when she drove past the festival area the next day, everything laid in ruins. Only a lonely chair was still standing and appeared to watch the scenery. She immediately felt the need to write a song about this situation and so “A Lonely Chair With A View” was born. But my favourite is the dark and a bit dull “Secrets”. Sissal has a fantastic voice, but I think her stage acting could be a bit better. She appears, especially at the beginning, a bit shy. But all in all she’s presenting very quiet, pleasant, handmade pop music, which deserves to be heard.
The next artist is introduced to us as “the cultic voice of the islands from Gøta“. I have never heard of LYON. During the first piece he is accompanying himself on the piano and I think: This voice sounds a bit strange somehow. The next song is “Juliet”, yet unreleased, and here Lyon Hansen accompanies himself on guitar. And here I fall for him. What a voice! Yes, in the beginning it sounds a bit strange. Or better: special. And exactly that is what makes his voice so attracting. He differs positively from other singers and that makes him memorable. And he as well is telling short stories between the songs. But with a decent sense of humour so the audience is laughing again and again. For example when he talks about a holiday trip to Cornwall and while all his friends wanted to take a swim he felt much more comfortable to be on the beach together with his guitar. From the last album, the self-titled debut, he plays “Sister” for us, before we get to hear many new songs. Among them an a cappella song about death (and he also masters the a cappella), a slightly psychedelic song about an ape that was shot into space and a piece named “Scenes From Dreams II”. It is really a pity that LYON was only allowed to sing so few songs, I would have loved to listen to him much longer.
Fróði Bjarnason Joensen, who’s releasing his songs under the moniker FRODI BJARNASON is the next one. He opens with “Scandinavia”, a song he released half a year ago. The likable young man is – like the others before him – introducing nearly all of his songs. They often have very short names, like “Winter” or “Diary”. Besides that you notice something typical Faroese here: some of the musicians who were playing with SISSAL can be seen again. Many Faroese musicians play in different bands that may very well play different musical styles. With “Where My Home Is”, a beautiful singer/songwriter song Fróði’s gig ends. All in all I really liked this gentle pop rock with singer/songwriter tendencies. Also, Fróði’s voice is really nice. To him I would as well have liked to listen longer to.
As the last band of the evening plays DANNY & THE VEETOS. The name is not unknown to me, but I never really looked into their music. Officially the band contains 8 members but today only 4 of them are on stage. They offer us a world premiere as they will only play songs from the new, soon to be released album and which have never been played live before. From the band’s name I would have expected something wilder, to be honest. Singer Danny Baldursson lives his music and is moving every second; during one of the songs he and the trumpet player hit an extra drum with drumsticks that glow in the dark, which is a nice show effect. But that doesn’t change the fact that in the end DANNY & THE VEETOS just play more or less ordinary pop music that only becomes a bit special thanks to the trumpet. The band is nice, and nice to see – but it’s not knocking someone’s socks off.
And then another typical Faroese thing happens. Today is International Women's Day. It was celebrated massively in Tórshavn, there was a demonstration in the afternoon and now there’s a concert where only female artists will play. The concert (as well as a photo exhibition) is taking place in Perlan, right next door to Reinsaríið, so we only have to get out of one door and slip into the next. The typical Faroese thing: people are flexible and think practical. The women celebrating themselves just wait with their concert until the one in Reinsaríið is done. Because everybody there knows that, people do not hesitate, and nearly the whole audience and nearly all musicians head over to the next club and celebrate the female artists on a late night concert. And while the musicians on the first concerts pampered us with English announcements, the women don’t care about that and do the announcements solely in Faroese. A bit bad for my colleagues who don’t speak Faroese but luckily I understand nearly everything.
First on stage is GRETA SVABO BECH whom we already saw two days ago. A Faroese friend of mine said that Greta always looks a bit as if she was just nearly run over by a car – in a very artistic way. And that’s really kind of true. On stage she always looks a bit puzzled, as she’s sitting there in socks (also typical Faroese – many Faroese musicians don’t wear shoes on stage), every now and then pushing the wrong button and ruining her own announcements (I think “whoops, sorry!” where her most common words). But musicwise she is just fantastic. She starts with “Invisible”, a song she worked on together with the project THE BLOODY BEETROOTS of the Italian electro producer Sir Bob Cornelius Rifo. After that we hear the “Brexit-Song” and “Circles”, both of them have been presented to us in Listastovan as well. As last song she plays her current single “All My Bones”, which I really like. And just as it starts being fun, Greta is done with her gig. A pity.
FRUM is different than other Faroese musicians we experienced until now. Jenný Augustudóttir Kragesteen, the woman behind the project FRUM, sees herself as a holistic artist who not only creates music, but also music videos that are art projects in themselves and most of the time contain artful dancing. I have already seen her on last year’s G! festival where I liked her pretty much. Today she’s sitting in total darkness, is nearly invisible and the only optical attraction is the same video sequence from her video to the song “Let it”. That is a bit disappointing because she has done so many videos which would have been worth showing. She as well - I think – is playing some new songs before she’s playing “Beat” as her last song (there’s a video to this song on YouTube, too). She is also talking a lot between the songs – although she thinks at the same time that she is talking too much (No, you’re not.). Many of her songs she sings while kneeling, working at the synthesizer. She has many fans in the audience and three of them don’t refuse to dance to her songs although the room is literally packed with people.
The last artist is the one with the biggest fan base – measured by the volume level. JASMIN is a very young artist who on the Faroes first attracts attention by her look. And then with her voice. Wow. I was very curious to see her because I kind of liked those of her songs I listened to beforehand. Or, more precisely, I like Jasmin’s voice. She has an enormous souly-bluesy voice for such a young woman that pulls nearly everybody under her spell. Unfortunately you cannot say the same about her songs. They’re not bad, but in the end, they’re just pretty ordinary electronic pop with a souly touch and the lyrics are typical teenager girl lyrics. Only her incredible voice is changing everything. I am pretty sure that when she is a bit older and writes a bit more grown-up songs she can become really big. Live she’s celebrated already now. She has a big fan base; every single announcement is cheered and screamed to. Today she plays among others “Remember”, one of her best known songs (while she at the same time resigns to play “Baby Blue”) and as closure she plays “Any Other Night”, a brand new song she wrote just two weeks ago. The audience goes crazy over her gig so she has to play an encore, which is “I Can Move”.
In the meantime it is well after 01:00, the day was long and many of us head back to the hotel. Tomorrow will be a tight program as well.
