The whole of Iceland waits anxiously for the 6th of October, when the ten-year anniversary of the infamous banking crash will take place. But five days prior to the crash a screaming prophecy of the upcoming events was published on the blog krapp.blogspot.com – and had in fact been recorded at the legendary artist hangout Populus Tremula in Akureyri. If you never made it to a concert there, we‘re sorry to say it‘s too late – but trust us, it was almost certainly awesome. Particularly the final concert, when a man approaching sixty, walking with a cane, belted out Tom Waits before the break and Nick Cave after the break – with a short detour to Swedish legend Cornelis Vreesvijk.

But back to the song in question. This was in those ancient times people downloaded mp3 links from the internet – and that is the only way to listen to this song (the link still works), unless of course you’re the owner of that single cassette tape that was recorded of the album. Here you can find the mp3 in question.

The work in question is the short (a total of 8 minutes) punk album Burt með borgarastéttina by the band of the same name, but the name translates simply as “Down With the Bourgeois.” The band was composed of four young men from Akureyri in the north of Iceland, the singer Hrafnkell, AKA Melli, guitarist Villi Stebba, baseplayer Þorgils, AKA Nolem, and drummer Gunnar Jóhannesson.

This is hard core punk – and even if you can’t always hear what singer Melli screams at the microphone we now all know what he meant – and hear well when he says “all the same hypocritical bastards.”

And since you’ve started listening already you should of course finish all the eight minutes, which includes four more songs (the sixth song is long lost), with titles such as (in a rough translation): Randomwriting, Puked out Café Karólína (the name refers to possibly the most legendary café in Akureyrian history), The Truth About Ocean Dayson and There‘s a Long Road to Dagvarðareyri.

Further information can be found in the following blog – not to mention pictures of selected band members.

Text: Ásgeir H Ingólfsson