Icelandic Music I like: Guðrið Hansdóttir and Low Roar

Although neither Guðrið or Ryan of Low Roar are native Icelanders, they both reside in Reykjavík and make beautiful music that is well worth mentioning.

The first time I saw Low Roar was last summer when he surprisingly played at a memorial concert for Siggi Ármann, a talented Icelandic musician who passed away in May 2010 long before his time. Siggi Ármann was more than just a name to me since his sister is one of my closest friends and his family has always been really good to me. The evening was a beautiful tribute and Ryan’s music fit perfectly.

Next time I saw Low Roar was at the Iceland Airwaves off venue program at the Downtown hostel and ever since he’s kind of been everywhere. His self titled album is good as a whole but I especially like his song – Friends Make Garbage, Good Friends Take It Out which I filmed during his Airwaves show.

Like Low Roar, I discovered Guðrið Hansdóttir by accident one night at Harpa during Airwaves. I was waiting for a band I wanted to see and there she was playing a set. Her set turned out to be one of the highlights of the night. She is from the Faroe Islands and sings both in English and Faroese. Faroese, by the way, is very similar to Icelandic but for some reason a lot of pretty normal words for them mean something dirty for us. The song that really got me hooked was Cloth Mother which you can see her perform here during SXSW last year.

Both Low Roar and Guðrið have played at the Live in the Lobby series at the Downtown hostel since Airwaves and you can see their full sets over at Live in the Lobby blog.

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