With rock-revolutionary poets: Vodka Songs, with Valur Gunnarsson (see myspace.com/valurgunnarsson)
Domestic Christmas songs, most likely in 2003
búkolla (A fantasy on the mythical cow, Búkolla, who ate chemically altered plastic bags and turned into a winged superhero, battling trolls and creatures of the dark.) það er öldungis ófært 2 (This was supposed to be a take on Jesse Fuller´s You´re no good, but due to the holidays, the conclusion ended up quite milder.) You will have to excuse the poor quality, this was made with domestic equipment
Gjammur Gjallandi
A rap song for an unexecuted campaign for mental and economic sobriety, lyrics by Héðinn Unnsteinsson. Gjammur Gjallandi is difficult to translate, but is something akin to Beckoning Barker. Probably from 2001-2002 gjammur gjallandi
gímaldin: Christmas CD 1999
This christmas cd was written largely from the view of the Icelandic menial laborer, his views and interests about society. From the dim view of Einkavæðsla, where the narrator predicts the rightwing leadership will privatize the streetcars and it will end up in a disaster, to the narrator feeling a bond with the derelict cats left in garbage bins, to the description of the working day of the laborer in Svarthvítur van Gogh and Göcke – where the laborer shirks his job and stays at home watching cable tv, although still feeling the need to complain about his job, – the actual showing up at work in Vinnusöngur, and the laborer fantasizing about how excellent it would be to have 1 or 2 millions in the bank to think about while grinding licorice into his coffee, and finally reaching a logical conclusion in one of Dylan´s sharpest social commentaries.
2var (Ann Lee Remix) (This was a mildly popular eurothrash song in 1998-99. gímaldin, however, liked it enough to make an Icelandic version of it)
ann lee (This was supposed to be a eurothrash song in the style of Ann Lee (who is not Chinese nor from Lousiana, by the way), but turned out somewhat totally different)
anreitt (This a midi version of some piano piece which bears some resemblance to it)
Kasino (Kasino-remix) (Samúel Samúelsson is credited for this song, which featured on the autonomed CD by a band of the same name. Páll Óskar sang all the other songs, this was the only instrumental)
Einkavæðsla (An early demo of a song that would later pop up on Herdeildin´s Áður óútgefið efni)
le homme (This was quite a long time in the making. After being just a guitar riff for many years, gímaldin had the idea to put a Steven Seagal monologue from the movie, On Deadly Grounds to the music – but then the monologue needed to be translated into French, for obvious reasons. The multi-lingual Turk who was supposed to furnish the translation thought it was too crazy an idea and never completed the task, or even started for that matter. gímaldin then put Icelandic lyrics to the song many years later, though it kept its french title for obvious reasons)
ruslakisa (This is probably originally a Swedish or French folk song, musicologues feel free to correct if needed – the Icelanders sing it around christmas, the poem deals with a hare escaping a hunter, and finding itself on the doorstep of Mr Santa Claus, pleading for his mercy. gímaldin´s version is about derelict cats saved from garbage bins)
Trönuber (This is the first version of a song that would appear on Herdeildin´s Skipið siglir, in a salsa version)
W-einkatilbeiðsla (Einkavæðsla in a different key)
In 1991-1992 I played guitar for this rural progressive funk band. We competed in the annual Music Contest as held by the Fjölbrautaskólinn á Akranes, and were rewarded some studio hours. At the time Axel Einarsson operated a studio on Leifsgata and we recorded two tunes.
valen (The bassist, Sigurdór Guðmundsson, and primo drummer, Óskar Viekkó, composed the song and the lovely Swede, Alexandra, came up with the melody and lyrics)
Sindbad the cowboy (I wrote most of the parts for this one as well as the lyrics, the arrangement was done by the band)
PS: In the recordings the primo drummer was replaced by the legendary Jón Mýrdal who breathed heavily during the session.
Pingback: Hello world! « gímaldin.com