Visir 2000-01 By Dr. Gunni Sent to BEP by Petur Iceland peturiceland@HOTMAIL.COM "I'm The Nerd Nr. 1" It is the year of 2000 and although dommsday won't happen then we live on very dramatic times. Dr. Gunni met the musician of the last century, Bjork Gudmundsdottir, and they spoke about music, work alcoholics, VIP groups, and what it is to be an Icelander but didn't spend time on discussion environmental issues like power stations. Bjork is special for many reasons and unique on Icelandic scale. There is no Icelander who has been involved in so many interviews. However, this is her first interview for a long period of time. I found out that I was spending 90% of my time in a hotel room somewhere, given interviews and in that way being involved in all the business. Perhaps 5% of my time went into spending time with people I love and 5% into composing music. Therefore this was perhaps not what I wanted to spend my time on. This was beginning to be a little bit boring. But this was exciting for a short period of time. This was like going to the moon. I was taking a breath to other kind of oxygen. The last one, two years after I moved to Iceland - I have spent my time on building something up. Now I have computer at my home in Iceland and I have never composed so much of music. I composed the music to the film which is 50 minutes. Usually my records are 40 minutes. The cinema music was also totally different project, 70 people in an orchestra and I had to make this fit to the film. Besides all this, then I have now 20 demos for my new record. Of them about 7 songs are very good songs. I have been composing a lot and listen to music and I have been a lot alone at home. I hadn't been at home here in Iceland for 15 years, just lived in a suitcase. It is unbelieveable how funny it is to just sit alone at home with my computer and CD players and try to find out whether I can actually spend my time on this. Reporter: So you have finished to compose the music for the film Dancer in the Dark by Lars von Trier? Yes, I finished that work about year ago. Reporter: And you act too, how was that? It was terrible. Reporet: Why? Was it very different than when you were an actress in the short TV film "Broken glasses" and acted as co-actress against Bjössi Basta? Laugh, Laugh. When you are an teenager then you are ready to try all kinds of projects. But now I knew this was nothing for me. I had decided to compose the music and should in fact have stopped there. But Lars talked me into acting also in the film. He said that the person who composed all the music should be the main actor because the songs would then come out of the person who composed the songs. It took him one year to persuade me into being the main actress in this film. Then I decided to do it but it wasn't nice. Puff, you need to have a certain character to be an actor. Actors are that kind of people who can have four nerve break down each day if it is requested and in front of everybody. This is not what I have talent for. I don't think that people know how much it is "into the body and mind" to compose music. You are perhaps with your two friends in a room for many months and then some songs come out of it. That is very introverted. The same can be said about being on the stage. Although it is on 5000 volume then I manage easily to have feelings for each song. "It is an art form to know how to grow older" In the international music industry then Bjork is not any longer the newest of all the newest rather an exciting old woman. Many people think that musicians become worse when they get older but Bjork will probably always follow all the new technological changes in the music industry for many years to come. But can you always find something new? Is Bjork still hearing something she hasn't heard before? Yes, from time to time she admits. Of course you have to listen to 50 CD to find perhaps two new songs. I find the new generation which is now growing up very exciting. This new people are not taken the everyday life too seriously and are big virtualities on computers. Mainly kids in Germany, the next generation after Aphex Twin. He is of course the king and some kind of father figure and the kids who grew up with him are now coming forward with something totally crazy. Reporter: Is then this new casual rock and pop totally dead for you? Yes, I become depressed and angry when I watch MTV. I become furious. Reporter: Like Westlife singing Seasons in the sun which is number one in the charts now? Yes, I just want to kill myself by walking across high traffic road, laugh-laugh. But, I always believe in pop music and I also believe in what the nerds and the musicians have created. Both have tendency to become introverted. I remember when I was making Debut then was fed up with going to a record shop and always coming out with one another record by Miles Davies. It was becoming very boring. But if you can't find something intellectual in the record shops you have to create something. Reporter: Do you something find out that you have become stagnant? No, it is rather that I get the feeling that the time is running out. That I won't have time to do everything I want to do. It is so strange with myself that I haven't analysed myself until the last one year, when I finally had time to think about all this. That is because, one month I'm busy working on texts, the next one hanging out in computer shops with some nerds and the next month I'm busy going out to watch harp concert. When I'm into the harp concert I might be stagnant in the other hobbies (making text, going to computer shops etc). Reporter: When I was 20 years old I regarded 35 years people as burnt out. Do you never get the feeling for example when you meet the young nerds. Some kind of feeling like: there come the "old woman" feeling? It is so special with myself that I have always looked forward to become old. When I was a kind my mother said I was in an terrible age. It is simply problems and mistakes between twenty and fourty, people running around asking themselves: who love I and who do I don't love, what should be my occupation and that kind of stupid. But my grandmother had analysed this. My heros were people who did the best things when it was fifty or sixty. And I'm of course the main nerd. As a kid, I was listening to Messiaen and that kind of people. But of course it is an "art" to know how to get older. Up to thirty years old you can use everything you were given, you just follow the mainstream. After thirty you are on your own and you can just use what you have created, your self discipline and what you have learnt from the life. But the problem is that it is perhaps just one against million that you will make it. And it is an frightening thought and therefore much more exciting when you manage to do it. Reporter: So in the Encyclopaedia at the year of 2030 you will be called classic musician and then there will be a small text about your music in the following text? No, above all not classic composer, I don't like the definition of classical. It has just happen in the latter part ofthis century that this is so separated, the pop music and the classic. About one hundred years ago, this wasn't like that. You were then with people who could be listen to by everybody. Reporter: The definition perhaps came forward at the same time as the definition of teenager came forward? Mayby. It is a great stagnantion in the pop music but I belive it is even greater in the classic. I really like to work with thorgerdi Ingolfsdottur as an example. She sometimes compose songs which whip out all types of categories. That is really what this is all about. The music is just beautiful. Full stop. Not into some kind of box. I don't know how to relax Reporter: If you wouldn't have any music talents what would you then be working on now? I would be nerd with a radio program and an messenger for an independent record shop. As a kid I also dreamt about being music teacher and establish my own music school. Reporter: Is it too late? No, no, this is one of things I will do around 40 years old. Once I tried to be a music teacher because I was asked by a woman called Bergljot. She invited me to teach a few lessons. That was very entertaining, especially when kids are between four and six years old. To show them it is not just a few select people who can compose songs. This is all so much elite, some composers who are looked upon. Everybody can compose songs. Reporter: Talking about kids, your friend Didda has had her second child with some Puerto Rican from Cuba, your friend Magga Stina will soon have her second child. Because of all this, don't you want to become pregnant again? Yes, I could always have 20 children, that is not the problem. It is just mainly the time, I don't have too much time. My son is of course 13 years old and like that. Reporter: He will then confirm his christening around Easter this year? No, he will not do that, he took his own decision concerning that matter. Reporter: It's good he has taken that decision. What about men in your life, are you not dating somebody? No, the last two years I have been in so much munk mood and taken "the be alone packet". I have spent the last five years in given perhaps around 20 interviews each day. I think that in 1993 I had two days off and one day off in 1994, Christmas and week-ends were there included. But I'm not saying that this has been boring, but then the need for taken part in something very big and be involved in something very strong. Now I'm just learning to sit in a chair and dig into myself. It is of course very anti social to sit in a chair and I'm not very much with the communication nose on. But this has given me so much. The music I composed for the film is for example definitely the best music I have ever composed. Reporter: Is it film music or just songs? It is songs. I decided to go that way. But it is a very long songs, each song takes about 8-9 minutes. This is a musical. To compare this with something - athough it can't be done-then there is a little bit West Side Story in this. Then I'm not talking about the music style. We really had to make a totally new stile. The main role is a introverted girl and the whole story happens in her imagination. All the beats were made by knocking on things which were next to my says Björk and knock with a spoon to an ashtray and to an cup to make her case stronger. Just sounds like this. So the music in this film had to be with no style. There is a small Sound of Music sentimentality in this film. This introverted girl is a little bit sentimental. Reporter: Are you then leaving this munk mood now and the year of 2000 will be just finding someone? I don't know, I'm just excited. I have put down some roots already, but it has taken a long time. It is a big challenge not to feel bored at home. It is so easy run out and have some influence, go to a party in New York or something. You need to know when you are lazy and when not. Sometimes it is the most bravest to go to New York and let the whole body system have a shock, then something comes out of it. But sometimes I don't won't to do anything so I go to New York and then compose no songs. My most bravest thing I have done over the last two years was to be at home. It is a frightening thinking but what came out of it was very big. Reporter: I guess you sometimes not compose nor listen to music but then you should relax? I can't relax and Bjork laugh. No, I can't relax. My friends often say: It would be a nice change for you to relax and I have tried that but I'm simply not that type of person. I simply don't like to relax. Reporter: You are then some kind of work alcoholic? The word work alcoholic is a word that lazy people came forward with. The phrase: she is always doing something is more national. My whole family is like that. My family for example go to a summer house but spend the whole time making and digging some ditch/trench--it is always action there. Reporter: From where does the craft to make something come from? This is some kind of mind and I personally don't want to explain it. I just feel too young to explain it. Perhaps I can explain it over coniac glass when I will be 70 years old. Many people have tried to explain this need for making something, Picasso said for example that this was just jealousy to the holy God, to be flirting with something which don't concern them. I think this is chemistry in myself, I'm just born with this in my body. I can not go and work like the usual worker do everyday and not be in a casual marriage like everybody else. I would be in suicide thoughts after one week. I was just created like this. I need to have some to express myself for this because otherwise I become like volcano. This need to compose music is as strong for me as the need to eat and sleep. You just have to look positive at this natural creatation. I feel shy if people give me a praise Reporter: What about Christmas. Don't you relax at Christmas? Christmas? They are always the same; family-people who I love most of all in the world, my grandmothers and grandfathers and my friends. Reporter: What did you get as Christmas gift? I got a lot of books. Nobody dare to buy CD's for me because I'm so difficult. Reporter: What did you give? I'm so much Trainspotter and listened definitely to 5000 CD's this year, then I set the best songs to a disc which I gave friends and relatives. Then I'm a big fan for educational programs and went to London and emptied the shelves of BBC videos to give. It is videos like "A trip to the cells", NASA programs and the whole David Attenborough. Reporter: Again to your music career. Have you regrets something in your whole music career? It is my opinion that you shouldn't isolate yourself to one special music. When I was 14-15 years old then all the teenagers were listened to Crass (british anarkist punk music band). Then I met Crash and they were so much puritanist that they had closed to the whole world. It matter most what you see in your teenage years so I promised to myself that I would never been like that. I always stick to what I'm doing each time but I always test everything at the same time. Nobody should went into that position to be an isolated perfectionist and give shit to everybody else and don't dare to take any risk. Although you could end up being regarded as total jerk then I think it is worth taking the risk. I perhaps do five mistakes but one good thing perhaps comes out of it. I have done five hundred mistakes but I always knew when I was doing them that I was on the way to do something else. The only way to learn and not to become stagnant is to be always ready not to make you a jerk. Reporter: Do you have humor for yourself? Yes, completely. Reporter: And you don't become sad if you get bad critic? No, not at all. I find the bad critic more exciting. I have difficulties in reading good critics and when people come and praise me then I feel embarassed. If people give me bad critics and throw some statements at me then I can always take part in that discussion. Reporter: Do you then defend yourself? No. I find it fantastic. Something for me to do, I think, something which I can fix, although I sometimes don't agree to what these people have been saying. But if people praise me then I go into a big defend position and almost hide myself under the table. Reporter: How do you then cope with all the rumour that you are the most famous, most richest Icelander and all that crap? I don't hear much about that. After I moved home to Iceland, I was expecting things like that but nobody says this straight to my face. I have a strong family and friends and I think they get more of this into their ears. They then spend their time in defending myself. Reporter: How do you like when people snob for you? I don't like it at all, because I'm an old punk. Sometimes people want to give me something free and I can not take it. If I would like, you know, :living it large", then I would simply be in some celebrities parties, 24 hours in limosin cars. I find it terrible boring. But I attend these parties two times each year and meet the whole crew. These celebrities are a special species of animal and it is a curios anthropology study to be a fly on the wall in these parties. You can easily do this here in Iceland too, it is full of snob over here too. Reporter: Has the snob around your person sometimes made you mad? Yes, 100 times. But I just don't take part in it. It is as bad to criticize it too much like participating to much in it. People who says: "the Hello magazine is disgusting and so on" is as bad as the people who is in the Hello Magazine. This people are as much addicted to this magazine. It is the most easiest way to stick to what you like most of all. It is fascinating how much has to be done New year has arrived and a new century some say. It is therefore appropriate to discuss the future. Björk sang three songs which she had composed together with 90 young people in the Voices of Europe choir on 31st Dec and this group is going to sing in all the cultural cities of Europe later this summer. This is my second hand job says Björk. My main job is to finish my new record. Reporter: Your solo record nr. 4? Yes, I have finished about half of it now. The soundtrack with the film will be released and I will make some videos with some of the songs which can be found in the film. This film will be shown in Cannes in May and I will go there to take part in the media part, that is doing interviews and so on. I have already began to prepare myself mentally for that. The other part of me will take part in all the media attention because of this film and the another part of me will be in Iceland to finish my next record. It is very exciting project for me because the music on the new record is something brand new which I have never done before. Very different from the film music and much more different than Homogenic. I have promised Derek, the owner of One Little Indian that I'm ready to finish the record in September and then he will decide when it will be released. Reporter: What kind of music can be heard on the new record? I can't allowed myself to discuss what kind of music will be on this new record. If I will say something then I would go home to my computer and end up doing nothing because I have just been talking about what I'm doing on the new album. But I can only confess that this new record is totally different from the sound world on Homogenic. Reporter: How do you like Reykjavík now compared with when you moved away from Iceland? When I left Iceland nothing really exciting was happening here and therefore I find it fantastic to come back. As an example then I never went to a theatre in the old days, because that was like a menu for something very boring, but now I attend theatres very often. Now there are also many excellent record shops in Reykjavík and there is much going on in the centre of Reykjavík. There is a good connection with what is going on abroad but at the same time then the athmosphere is more Icelandic. As I have more contact with foreign countries then there is more going on and the question arise: what is it to be an Icelander? comes closer to my mind. I have never understand the phobia that somebody doesn't won't to mix with other cultures. Reporter: One heavy question in the end, what is it to be an Icelander at the beginning of the year of 2000? I find it most interesting concerning that question that this question hasn't been answered. We can now say that Sigurros is something very special Icelandic, they are very special. But before they came forward it was hard to explain why they are so Icelandic, do you understand what I mean? It is very fascinating how much has to be done and how sudden the answer to this question can be. I feel myself very Icelandic and Sigurros are very Icelandic but at the same time then this is very different music. Another music band which is totally different from us can come forward but at the same time this music band can be very Icelandic and that is very exciting. About 20 men can watch the waterfall Gullfoss and found out 20 songs from this waterfall.