ARTICLES
Benoît Pioulard's Précis
Label: Dynamophone
Label: Hidden Shoal

ALBUMS
Aemae
A Lily
Arc Lab
Blotnik Brothers
Gui Boratto
Cagesan
Jeremy Caulfield
Loren Dent
Do Make Say Think
Eats Tapes
Enduser
Domink Eulberg
Explosions in the Sky
Michael Fahres
The Field
Frivolous
Maximilian Hecker
Hug
Hush Arbors
Jan-M. Iversen
Espen Jørgensen
Kattoo
O.Lamm
Bruce Levingston
Tobias Lilja
Lusine
Marcia Blaine School
The Missing Ensemble
Nebulo
Ölvis
Charlemagne Palestine
Palomar
Pornopop
The Postmarks
Propergol Y Colargol
The Retail Sectors
R/R Coseboom
Sankt Otten
Scratch Massive
Slow Dancing Society
Stars of the Lid
subtractiveLAD
Sunosis
Aoki Takamasa
Amon Tobin
Tokyo Mask
Kate Wax
Wes Willenbring
Windmill

COMPILATIONS/MIXES
Chaos.Lovers
Cryosphere
Hub: 2004-2005
Rufs
Satoshi Tomiie

3" /7" /10"/12"/EPs
Agnes
AM/PM
Arctic Sunrise
Audion
Characterize 1
Dartriix
Death is Nothing To Fear
Don't Be A Stranger
Einóma
Fusiphorm
Heartthrob
Human Nature
Infant Cycle / Antmanuv
Lilienweiss
Luci
Mauve
Paco Osuna
Ben Parris
Carola Pisaturo
Portable
Sutekh
System
Aoki Takamasa
Cortney Tidwell
Andy Vaz

Ölvis: Bravado
Resonant

It's telling that Orlygur Thor Orlygsson's ‘Ölvis' moniker is actually pronounced ‘Elvis,' given that the Icelander sings in a husky croon that only tangentially recalls the Memphis icon. But there's little in common otherwise, as Orlygsson favours an epic ballad style so smothered in reverb and haze it takes on an hallucinatory character—an entrancing, orchestral mutation of lounge, early rock'n'roll, and shoegaze, if you will; “Space Mission,” for one, could be a prototypical Roy Orbison lament updated for the 23 rd century. Bravado offers fourteen instrumental and vocal variations on the theme, with Orlygsson murmuring in his native tongue on about half the tracks and fashioning dramatic instrumental settings elsewhere. Of the latter, organ flourishes and waves of hazy ripples drone throughout “War Chant” while “Merge with the Infinite” caps the disc like a shimmering soundtrack for a shuttle's slow-motion sojourn to Mars.

With the material on Orlygsson's third album often founded upon two wavering chords (e.g., “Song For Love”), the songs themselves are relatively simple in compositional structure but achieve impact through their multi-layered construction. While the ‘Ölvis' persona is dominant, the album's substantially bolstered by the contributions of Sigur Rós drummer Orri Dýrason and bassist Georg Holm, and Apparat Organ Quintet's Arnar Geir Ómarsson and Amina's Maria Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir who add percussion and violin respectively.

April 2007