Sigur Rós: Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust

By removing

a key element of their sound and not allowing themselves their usual

cooked-to-perfection studio time, the members of Iceland's most majestic, respected,

and popular band has issued itself a serious challenge. On album number five,

Sigur Rós has basically ditched the bowed electric guitar sound that helped

define them for years. The songs have quieted considerably, and scratchy

surfaces have arisen that weren't there before. That news might give

diehards—a surprisingly large group for a non-English speaking band

specializing in lofty orchestral rock—reason for worry, but it shouldn't.

Sigur Ros make perfect music—they're just doing it a little differently

on Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust (translation: "with a buzz in our

ears we play endlessly").

Sigur Rós gave

devotees further reason to worry with the early release of album opener

"Gobbledigook," the least Sigur Rós -like track of its career: It's unusually reliant

on acoustic guitar, it chugs along instead of floating, and it sounds hurried

instead of carefully measured. (It also sounds remarkably like latter-day

Radiohead, but with organic hum and strum replacing insistent electro-clicks.)

An album full of these might've been too jarring, but it segues quickly into a

sun-bursting-through-the-clouds epic, "Inní Mér Syngur Vitleysingur," to set

things right. "Vid Spilum Endalaust" is similarly joyous, with horns and

strings providing the foundation that Jonsi Birgisson's guitar usually does. "Med

Sud í Eyrum" will have fans of the sadder, more contemplative third album (

) in thrall with

its hypnotically downcast rhythm and vocal melody.

Those

sides—the sunburst and raincloud sides—meet in the massive "Ára Bátur,"

which begins with simple piano and voice, content to luxuriate in Birgisson's

beautiful voice for five minutes before bringing in the London Sinfonietta and

London Oratory Boy's Choir to add a massive emotional swell. At its peak, it

hews a little too close to a Hollywood soundtrack—expect Julia Roberts to

come rushing through the door—but it's tempered by the band's affection

for left turns. Plus, it offers a peak for the album's final songs to come down

from: There's intimate and gorgeous (the acoustic-and-voice "Illgresi" and the

orchestra-and-voice "Fljótavík"), a bit of instrumental palate cleanser

("Straumnes"), and finally the band's first track sung in English, "All

Alright," whose strings, muted horns, and slurred vocals retain plenty of

mystery despite the lack of language barrier. It's a gorgeous descent for an

inimitable group that knows better than most how to deliver its highs high and

its lows low.