Gunnarsson left the band after Ágætis byrjun and was replaced by Orri Páll Dýrason. Two tracks were released from the album as singles: " Svefn-g-englar" and " Ný batterí". It reached number 1 on the Icelandic album chart, number 17 in Norway, and number 52 on the United Kingdom Albums Chart. Keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson joined the band in 1998 and a year later Ágætis byrjun was released. Only one track, "Leit af lífi", was new to the album. Von brigði was released in 1998 and features remixes of tracks from Von. It failed to chart, selling 313 copies in its first year of release, but was certified platinum in 2005 by Iceland's record industry association. Sigur Rós released their debut album, Von, in 1997 with Smekkleysa Records. Sigur Rós was formed in 1994 in Reykjavík, Iceland, by singer and guitarist Jón Þór Birgisson, bassist Georg Hólm and drummer Ágúst Ævar Gunnarsson. The discography of Sigur Rós, an Icelandic post-rock group, consists of seven studio albums, three remix album, five extended plays, one soundtrack album, sixteen singles, twenty-three music videos and two video albums. Nearly every song on the album is a highlight.Sigur Rós performing at the Roskilde Festival 2006, Denmark This is an album that is hard not to like, no matter what the listener's musical preferance is.
The real impact of the album comes when it is finished and the listener sits back, amazed, head full of thoughts and reaches for the repeat button. The best parts of the album, however are the parts that make the listener feel as if they are listening to the music of another world and completely absorb the listener into the song. The different moods make it an enjoyable experience for the listener and make the album seem more like a musical journey than a collection of songs. Some are desperate, full of vocal wails ("Ný batterÃ*"), some mix all of these moods ("Hjartað Hamast") and others are somewhere in between all of these. There are beautiful songs that seem to just float around the listener ("Svefn G Englar"), others are pretty and lightweight and make the listener smile ("Ãgætis Byrjun"). There are many different moods throughout the album, more than the other two full length Sigur Ros albums ("Von" and "( )"). Most of the music is very thick, with lots of different parts to discover with each listen. A song like "Hjartað Hamast (Bamm Bamm Bamm)" mixes many different styles but is very dense. Some of the tracks mix musical ideas extremely well, but for some there might be too much in the song at once. The bass work is mainly just background stuff but on a couple of songs it takes a lead role and works extremely well. The drumming on the album is sometimes interesting, sometimes just there in the background, driving the music along.
"Ný batterÃ*" is full of many different brass instruments, played in a panicking, desperate way. There are other different instruments in the music now as well. The music is now very strings heavy and is often based around piano parts with vocals simply adding another instrument to the music rather than being the complete central focus of it. The addition of a keyboard player changed Sigur Ros' sound very much for this record. On this record, Jonsi sings in "hopelandish", a term coined to describe the mix of icelandic and gibberish that is contained in the vocals of this album. For some listeners, this may be a disspointment, but for most, it's an improvement. There are no more experimental 10 minute long noise tracks.
"Von", however, is an excellent debut album and this record builds on it's success. Many people seem to think that Sigur Ros came out of nowhere with this spectacular album. It's easy for Sigur Ros' debut album, "Von" to be overshadowed by the highly rated second album, "Ãgætis Byrjun".
It's strage how Iceland is such a tiny country, yet the quality of it's music (Iceland's most famous artists are Sigur Ros and Bjork) often exceeds the quality of music from many entire continents. Sigur Ros create some of the most unique music around these days with a unique way of putting together ideas and a unique vocal style.
The year 2000 was the year that Sigur Ros became famous in the US, not long after they had released "Ãgætis Byrjun". The band had made some changes, namely the recruitment of keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson, making Sigur Ros a group of four. Sigur Ros released "Ãgætis Byrjun" two years after the release of their debut album, "Von".