Documenting Every Step of the Way

Ok, so it was like yesterday or something that I made a post about Bjork’s news update on the gigography. Now, Lima seems to be getting their own Bjork fix this week with a TV special on Plus TV’s musical show “Nadie Nos Escucha” (which translates to “Nobody Listens to Us”) – Now, Somos (El Comercio’s own magazine suplement) shows a shot of Bjork’s face from a Corbis photo. xD

The cover reads;

Bjork
The beauty freakie fairy from the north comes to Peru.

Now, I will probably be documenting all that I catch from Bjork in the media in here… since it was not very often I heard or read about her in everyday’s life. So I will be exercising my translating skills with this…

Bjork
Polar Star
‘Miracles. Bjork, one of the most original and still working in the music scene of today, comes to Lima’

+ The most important Icenlandic performer in history comes to our country to perform in a one and only concert, this November 13th in El Vertice del Museo de la Nacion, on her world tour to promote her latest album, VOLTA. While they announce that tickets are almost gone, the Limeño fans count the days for such an unexpected visit.

>Tour 2007. Edited on May this year, Volta made it to the #9 spot on the Billboard 200, her best spot to date. Her current tour mixes instruments, dances, and African outfits with electronic music of edge.

The Icelandic singer has always played the seer of what pop music will sound tomorrow. Unlike many avant-garde musicians, Bjork’s not motivated by misanthropic airs nor elitist: she’s sold without shame over 15 million albums; she’s got a similar number of fans around the world and has achieved, throughout her decade and a half of solo career, a prestige colleagues her age would love to reach, even for a while. With her, the word timeless finds meaning: Bjork doesn’t seem to belong to any period. Sometimes, which is the weirdest, she doesn’t even seem from this world.

And we’re not talking about her recurrent fantasies, put together splendidly on videos of the French Michel Gondry, where she experiments various transformations from girl to bear, insect or robot. We’re not even talking about her eccentric personality, which lead her to use the swan dress in the Oscar 2001 Gala. There’s that something very earthy in her albums coming, most likely, from her indescribable voice, capable to go from a soft lullaby to a powerful holler in a split of a second. Bjork’s tone is unique and distinctive; her range can also be impressive, but it’s her original phrasing which gets us. It doesn’t seem from here nor there, and no one really knows. Yet, there lies the mystery.

Soy Tu Fan

Her full name is Bjork Gudmundsdottir but with the precise sense of shortening things, they’d rather call her “China” (Chinese Gal). “I love my China,” says 24-year-old Barbara Garcia Ramos, moderator at the Bjork Peru forums, that gathers local fans of the singer. They confess everything in there: from their unrequited love to the dreams they assure to have, sometimes, with her. They’re young. Most of them between 6 and 10 years of age when the muse began her solo career. The so-called “Bjorkholic” for the chronic musical addiction. Also for the kind of beverages that enlightens their meetings.

“Her voice is something that you listen to, and you get goosebumps”, Rolando Anton admits, the webmaster of the Bjork Peru site.

There’s 150 members subscribed in their forum, and few more in the site of Bjork en Lima, opened for the upcoming performance of the singer in our country.

“There’s people from Ecuador and Bolivia that have written to say they’re coming over here to see her”. Like all of them in the group, Rolando bought his ticket on the first day. Others, like Eduardo Palomino, have to make wonders to be able to pay for a ticket, pricier than the average. “I do anything to see her.”

According to Lalo Ponce from Phantom Music Group, one of the people responsible for the event, this visit was possible only for Bjork’s desire to visit the country. “Our offer was way below from what she usually gets per gig”, says without revealing the actual sum. Bjork will perform in Lima, in el Vertice del Museo de la Nacion, as part of her Volta world tour. She’s supposed to take a few days for pleasure touring. The show includes new versions of old classics with new arrangements, female choir, and the famous Reactable, a new electronic instrument created by a Spanish university that can be listen to in the album and is central to the show. All in all, just to not repeat herself.