OCTOBER 2004 - ICELAND AIRWAVES

Iceland Airwaves in Reykjavic is one of the coolest festivals in the world.
for two reasons: their bookings are super sharp + Reykjavic is a fantastic party city.

This is a diary of Iceland Airwaves 2004 in pics & vids, of a group of 5 x partyheads aged 24-30, from Copenhagen.

nota for web surfers: you are on the personal website of Tom & Jojo Algren Fleurquin.

We stayed in a top modern 4-star hotel (I think called "Nordica" ?)
- hand luggage: a bottle of scotch & aspirine.

personal note: I always thought it was for sissie-snobs to say "scotch" instead of "whiskey"
- but i got served far too much bourbon bullshit (fuck jack daniels)
so now I say scotch (because bourbon is piss).

First concert: To Rococo Rot - wow - cult legends from Germany.

Later on Day One came Dagur's band (Dagur is an old Icelandic friend we know from when he lived in Copenhagen).

The music is supernice dreamy stuff and they play on plenty of cool weirdo instruments
- but the real thing is we all fell in love with the girl in blue.

This guy is electronica hotshot but cant remember his name. That was also Day One.

With our big luxury hotel room on the 7th floor, we had to host an afterparty.

Jojo and her old friend Rasmus made an interview with a funny local guy called Erpur, they invited him over and he told us fun stories about Reykjavic,
the old families & the clans of Iceland, the background of Iceland Airwaves and Iceland Air etc... He is a hip-hop singer.

NOTA NOTA: We had NEVER imagined that any hotel staff could ever tell anyone that they were making too much noise at 6am so politely.

After Day One, we lost track of days - from now on the chronology is messed up.

fun Reykjavic detail: this is the humble office of the prime minister.

customized jeeps with big wheels are all over the place - wow.

Band of Brides is a band of punk rock brides.

This wacko dude is a Icelandic legend performing with his son.
This concert took place in the cellar of a hotel in a fancy loungy bar, the amosphere was tight.

we were superdrunk and in a good mood so this concert below (in vids only) was fantastic experience in a tiny bar
_ some kind of slow drum'n'bass with traditional Nordic chants. Plus everybody looked amazing (see 2 x videos).
weirdo nordic chants
genuine style on the dancefloor

here some good looking party people in the night:

we dont know this hip-hop band but the crowd was going CRAZY.

There was plenty of fashionable nu-rock with attitude, and Airwaves is cool because their bookings a very sharp.
so for people who take lifesyle magazines seriously, this is a fantasic primary source for new trends.

Are these The Kills ? The Thrills? The Pills ? The Stills ?
no it's not the Kills because they are a duo and one is a chick, (but the Kills played as well).

we think they were from Canada - and everybody was alking how hot they were.

we took the obligafuckingtory trip to Icelandic Nature.

geyser:

grundfoss or Danfoos or something like that:
my wife - aaah
waiting for a geyser sprout:
the photographer of the group - in a sexy posture:
we also visited Dagur and his new kiddie babygirl

Erpur, the hiphop guy we met on day one, told us about the annual congress of this religious cult who worship the ancient Nordic Mythologic Gods (Odin, Thor etc...). Because his dad is one of the High Priests. We thought this would be a nice "cultural experience / culturally correct".
the people were very nice - but their food was unbelievable bad.

this was a little religious ceremony. Erpur daddy stands far left.

KID KOALA plays BJÖRK track
(nota: Kid Koala performs the greatest scratch-show in the world)

cheap burgers & cheap beer you can find at VITABAR

CIRCUS
Circus is the coolest bar in town. check this video - later during that song we did the crowd surfing thing (the bar is 40 sq.m. or less).

when circus closed, we asked this girl if she would invite us (all of us, we were around 15) to afterparty in her flat.
She said yes.
Has this ever happened in your city?

we got home to be the first in line at the breakfast in our beloved Nordicus hotel. a memorable brakfast
- we even found a cosy corner to have it and we laughed with joy non stop.

The festival always ends with Gus Gus - my review is three letters long: WOW
- this guy is a monster on the stage. and the crowd was going WILD.

(one of the pics below links to a vid)

on the way to the airport / this happened:

Of course the fact that a festival with superhot bookings takes place all over a city in regular venues & bars is a monster hit
- it all feels like a giant stupid pub-crawl with people selecting top quality live music on top.
(we have almost the same in Copenhagen: DISTORTION)

Reykjavic rocks - thank you Airwaves. We be back next year.