And no, I'm not getting paid to do this.

Since we agreed, originally, to branch out into freaky music and movies as well as books, I thought I might as well get the ball rolling a bit, eh? Also I'm really excited to get you Freakybloggers into this band, which is why I'm taking the luxury of posting twice this month, instead of once, which is what I usually do for the sake of politeness.
I have already raved about these guys on my other blog ,so you might wanna check that post out first for more info on the band. Basically Sigur ros are an Icelandic quartet, a bunch of four skinny white dudes with impossible sounding names who one day decided that they would much prefer to hole up in a studio and make strange, wonderful sounds together rather than go to school, which is what they should have been doing.

They recorded their first album way back in the mid to late nineties, making a deal with the studio owners to paint the outside of the building in exchange for permission to use the equipment. For their second album, the members of Sigur ros glued and put together the CD casings on their own, resulting in most of the CDs being useless because of glue deposits on them.
But what makes them freaky, you ask?
They're freaky in a good way. The lead singer's voice is so high-pitched, ethereal and spine-tingling , that you would be graciously forgiven for thinking the voice came from a woman's throat, or the throat of someting that wasn't even human. They sing in a language that doesn't exist. Even their own countrypeople don't understand them, most of the time. According to keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson, the lyrics aren't important to them. They aren't interested in tagging each of their songs with a message or a story. They would, in fact, much prefer the listener to interpret and understand and "feel" the sounds in whatever way they feel.
And what a sound that is. In various reviews, the music of Sigur ros has been described as everything from "irrelevantly pretentious" to "the sound of God weeping tears of gold from heaven" .
They have been tagged with almost every musical genre imaginable ;post-rock, progressive rock, avantgarde, new-age, world music; when in reality the sheer size and scope and depth of their sound defies any attempt to categorize them. They are an acquired taste, like blue cheese or raisins (for me, anyway).
I raved about them constantly to one of my friends and whined about how difficult it was to find their stuff. But Annmarie came through spectacularly, and dropped by at my crib with a copy of Sigur ros' 2005 release, Takk...
I now take this opportunity to thank Annmarie, very publicly, on Blogger.

Takk is easily the band's most musically accessible record. Most of the songs remain under 10 minutes long (which is unusual for Sigur ros, but we don't mind) and have a definite structure. They tend to start out slow and soft and tinkly before exploding in a magnificent wall of sound that is predictable but still wondrous. Despite their huge, ethereal, apocalyptic soundscape, the songs aren't about God and Heaven and Hell and Judgement or angels and monsters, but simply about walking in the rain, or admiring the sunrise, or jumping in puddles, or holding hands with someone special, or smelling grass.
At some point, words fail to describe or do justice, when it comes to this band. In the same way that they defy being pigeonholed into a specific genre, they also defy the limitations of language to fully grasp what they have done to music as we know it.



Glosoli (from the album Takk.., also probably my favourite music video of all time).


Hoppipolla


Sigur ros live in Philadelphia (you gotta watch this, I'm telling you)



The trailer for their new (gorgeous) tour film, Heima.


Buy their albums here.
Stream their stuff here.
Download (free and legal, don't worry.) mp3s here.
Visit their official site.
Check out their MySpace.
Read other (better) reviews here.
Have a look at their Youtube channel.

The official site of their new tour film, Heima.

I think I've pretty much covered everything. Please please please do give them a try, in the spirit of Freakishness! And let me know what you think, regardless of whether you like them or not.

(International Mastermind also recommends!)




edit :International Mastermind, who is something like our Boss here (except that we don't get paid) is adamant that I add more freaky details about Sigur ros. But I'm a wee bit lazy to do that. Soo...if you are interested in learning more freakish trivia on this wonderful wonderful band please head on over to my humble blog and stuff yourselves with all manner of weird and wonderful gifts, talents, behavioural problems and disabilities that make this band true Freaks in their own freakish right! And if you still aren't even a little bit interested in trying their music out, well then I really cannot help you there.

American Gods

If Stephen King is the King Of Blatant Shameless Freakishness, then Neil Gaiman is the Emperor of Subtle Fine Freakishness.

Neil Gaiman doesn't do sharp teeth or gooey ickiness or wet warm blood. He does it in a way that's so subtle and refined and quiet that you forget it's supposed to be freaky. And then you remember. And then you get a wee bit scared.
Take this excerpt for example.

"The telephone in Shadow's apartment was still silent and dead. He thought about getting it connected, but could think of no-one he wanted to call. Late one night he picked it up and listened, and was convinced that he could hear a wind blowing and a distant conversation between a group of people talking in voices too low to properly make out. He said, 'Hello?' and 'Who's there?' but there was no reply, only a sudden silence and then the faraway sound of laughter, so faint he was not certain he was not imagining it."

Shadow, in question, is a convict. Days before his release from prison, he is told that his wife has died in a mysterious car crash. Numb with grief and confusion, he gets on a plane home, where he meets the enigmatic and decidedly odd Mr Wednesday, who claims to be a former god. Shadow, having nothing else left to live for,agrees to work for Mr Wednesday. So they embark on a strange journey across the United States, from New York to Las Vegas, from South Dakota to San Francsico, while a so-called "storm" breaks out, and a war of supernatural and divine proportions is poised to break out.
Shadow meets multititudes of the most remarkable people, all at one time who were gods, brought over from their native lands in the minds and hearts of the people who migrated to the New World.
While Shadow himself struggles with his true identity, and that of the "gods" around him, and his dead wife's corpse who keeps returning to him.
It may not sound like much, but the fact that I am blogging about this book before I have even finished it (just 200 pages to go!) gives you an idea of how good it is.
A great deal of research is necessary in reading American Gods. Neil Giaman features gods, deities and mythological figures from practically every known civilization; Norse, Native American, Bavarian, African, Asian, Arabic, Egyptian. Hindu gods, Chinese gods,Greek gods, Roman gods, even Jesus Christ is given a mention. The process of finding out the stories and details behind the myths and legends, and drawing parallels and lines and connections to the story, are just as fascinating as the book itself.
However if you are familiar with Norse and Scandinavian mythology, to a certain degree, the plot will be quite obvious to you. But Neil Giaman is a fabulous enough author to not let your knowledge of what should happen next spoil the read.
In any case, Bloody Awful Poetry highly recommends.

Edge by...Michael Cadnum

Ugh. This is definitely freakish. In the BAD way.

It starts out with Zachary, a high-school dropout living in a bad area. The first chapter is a blur-a brawl of crazed, drunken teens, that ends up blood spattered cloud of tear gas. Zachary finds himself stowing away a hard, steel gun.
Suddenly his life is falling apart, his father is in the hospital with a bullet in his spine, his girlfriend's mother is a bit too friendly with him, and all he has to hold on to is the revolver.
No one knows who shot his father.

It sounds much more exciting than it really is. The plot could have been great, but the author writes it in such a depressing way. I know that it is meant to have tear-jerking parts, but we are seeing this through Zachary's eyes. And Zachary sounds like he's on heavy meds.

Alas, as an avid reader I am compelled to read the rest of the book, even though it sucks. Oh well.


UPDATE: This is the first book that I have officially abandoned. Of course, I abandoned it to read three fantastic books that I have, stacked up and waiting for me. Midnighters 2: touching darkness, Midnighters 3: (forgot the name), and Specials. Got to love Westerfeld!

UPDATE:
Review of the whole midnighers trilogy in progress and coming ASAP! (which might be a while but still...

Dreamcatcher

Stephen King is the undisputed King Of The Freaks, in my humble opinion. Heck, it's even in his name! The King of things that go bump in the dark, that are born out of your nightmares, gooey and icky and full of teeth and eyes made out of the night, tapping on your window by moonlight, asking very nicely if you could please let them come in, just for a little while? They only want to play, and they're not really all that noisy.

Dreamcatcher, in my opinion, is one of Mr King's freakiest works. His wife, Tabitha King, in fact often refers to it as "the one with the shit-weasels".



Basically it is the story of four men who were once boys. And as young boys they did something noble and good, but one that would end up altering their lives beyond belief and comprehension. An alien invasion in the woods of Maine, unexplainable powers, and the one little boy with Down's Syndrome who links these four friends and everything that happens around them.
I won't go into the plot much. I bought the book knowing next to nothing about the story, and I think I enjoyed the little flashbacks and revelations much more that way. It is one of the joys of a Stephen King novel. Step into it, as clueless as possible, expecting nothing and everything, and just let that man, the storyteller, do his job. My only complaint is that the novel is just a tad too long. At least a hundred or so pages could be cut off, really.
But apart from that, this book was a godsend for me. I had flu and a throwy-uppy virus for about a week, and Dreamcatcher (along with warm orange juice) was my constant companion on those long, feverish, sweaty nights, when sleep was as far away as the chance of Jessica Simpson winning the Pulitzer Prize.
It goes deep into the depths of human psyche and awareness and psychology without you ever realizing it at first. It plumbs at your fears so tactfully and unobstrusively that you almost never realize what's going on. And not just fears of what's hiding in the shadows or what's going to pop out at you from behind those bushes. But also the fear of losing your grip on that line between reality and fantasy, and losing the people you love, and losing that carefree innocence of your childhood, and losing yourself in the overwhelming insanity of the world around you.

Stephen King may never be considered as particularly intelligent literary reading material, but you cannot deny the fact that the man makes his characters so very human that it's almost ridiculous. Their thought processes, their fears, their minds and hearts become part of you, that's how powerful it is.
All in all, Dreamcatcher is another extremely satisfactory King reading experience, with one of those ambiguous you-decide-what-the-ending-is finishing touches. Bloody Awful Poetry highly approves.

There is also a movie version of the book, starring the likes of Morgan Freeman and Thomas Jane. Apparently it is quite good, but all I'm saying is that, compared to the novel, the movie ending supremely sucks.

PRETTIES ~Scott Westerfield

Somebody has probably already posted on this book, but I love it so much! I just finished it, and I loved UGLIES (book 1 in the series) almost as much.
Westerfield has created a future world, where you are divided by how you look. When you are young (a.k.a. 'Littlie') you live with your parents in 'Middle pretty Town'. (Ignore the crappy city names!) When you are twelve, though, you are sent to 'Uglyville' (again with the stupid names,). There you are raised by computers, fed, clothed, and taught by a hole in the wall. You are also taught to think of yourself as a hideous creature who can't wait to turn 16.

Once you are 16 you are sent to an operation. An operation where they sand off your face, smash all your bones, and then make you look beautiful. Pretty. You look like everyone else in 'New Pretty Town', sweet, innocent, and vulnerable. And gorgeous.
In this new world, killing animals and trees was considered barbaric. You instead used metal.

All Tally ever wanted was to be a Pretty. She was always tricking the technology, to sneak into New Pretty Town to watch the partying and fun going on with the pretties. (Did I mention that that was all Pretties had to do? Have fun?) But then she is told what terrible things that the operation can do to you, and she changes her mind a bit about turning 'Pretty'.
I can't tell about Book 2, without giving away Book 1!

Go. Read. It.

two very different header options for IM's other blog!