NOTE: This document is not an exact transcription and can contain faults because of the difficulty in sometimes hearing what they said.
All spelling errors (if there is any) are probably done by me. The grammar errors that might be in the text is deliberatly left uncorrected by me to preserve the interview as exact as possible. Anything in [] is my comments. [CLIP] is placed in the text to point out where a cut is done in the interview. The words in ## are words I'm not really sure if they are the right ones. I hope that you can follow the text, even without seeing the body language and hear how the words are said. This transcription is written without permission.
B: I've got everything in my life I want these days.
I've been very very lucky.
[Intro with 'Venus As A Boy' and with stills of Björk. The interview
is done in a cafe nearby her home in London. Björk is having a glass
of wine and is wearing an orange long-haired jacket, which she later
takes off to reveal a red T-shirt.]
L: I must say I'm really sorry we couldn't do this interview
in some Scandinavian language because, you know, it's
crazy, here we're sitting from Scandinavian countries
and we don't understand eachothers languages. It's a
little bit weird, isn't it?
B: Ye, I guess I must say I'm guilty. Icelandic people
have got a bit of a attitude towards Scandinavian
languages because we were a Danish colony for many
hundred years so...it's a bit sort of...we're to proud
to speak.
L: Ye. You learn Danish in school, don't you?
B: Ye we do, but everybody get really good in talking
horrible Danish, it's...it's a bit of a pride thing
really, it's kind of hard to explain, it's...In Iceland
the vocabulury to say someone is like evil or wicked,
like a bitch or something, you got..."he's Danish".
And...it's just what happens when...because we just
got independent 1944 and... I mean, I was obviously
not born then...but it's gonna slowly, sort of like,
take's, you know, several generations to forget things
like that.
[CLIP]
L: How does it feel to do your 'debut' when you're 27
years and you actually made your first solo album 16
years ago.
B: Well, I desided to call it "Debut" just to put importance
on the fact it is the first time it's my music. I did
a record when I was 11 but...it was just one song written
by me, and all the arrangements and... Well I picked
the song myselfs and had something to say but, mostly
it was produced and arranged by other people, sort of
grownups and...so I wouldn't really consider that my
album, not really. Eventhough I sang on it because...
What's could always truly be my ambition and kind of
where my heart is, is making music and kind of like...
sort of...sounds, noices and surroundings that I find
exiting and intrests me. While being a singer is mostly
like...bit of a tool. To be able to do that and...
[Björk is interrupted by Lars' next question]
L: But you started out playing the drums, didn't you?
B: Ye. And I've arranged lot of things and co-produced
and stuff like that and...that's why I kind of call
my album "Debut" this one, because this is the first
time that you hear my noices and my sounds and my flavors.
[Birthday, Sugarcubes] From the beginning to the end of
the second chorus.
B: My mom and ten of her friends started a bit of a comune
when I was about three. And they where playing music...
24 hours [a day]. There were always be someone awake
who had a record on and...that's kind of...where I come
from and...
L: A real hippie-life.
B: Ye, but I was very lucky because then there was... My
grandparents which I stayed a lot with because my parents
were busy a lot of the time, they listen to jazz. And
then I was sent to music-school when I was five, and
them trying to convince me for ten years that modern
music wasn't worth anything and, noone was gonna outdo
Beethoven and stuff like that, and playing all this
music that have nothing to do with dayly life, it's
all based on history and it's was like dead. So, I
like, three very different point of views, and all three
different group thought that the music they were listing
to and the lifestyle they were #leeting/leet in?# was correct
and everything else was incorrect, which I thought was
a bit of a joke, but... The best thing when you're a
kid is that you... you're always watching. Everybody
think you just really stupid and they treat you when
you're in the room that you're not there really. And
talk their grownup-talk. But you're always being a bit
of a Richard Attenborough and you're, kind of like,
"examine the human species" and learning from their
mistakes, I guess. I kind of realized that musicstyle,
sort of, doesn't really matter, it's all a question of,
kind of like, attitude and spirit and... and emotion.
[Deus, Sugarcubes] From the beginning to "...taste the
forbidden fruit."
B: The good thing about Reykjavik is...it's got a mentality
of a little village and because we so recently became
modern, it's got all the superstitions and the mythology
of the Middle Ages. We lived in mudhouses till the
century, very poor. And still believe in major force
of nature, and nature is the most important thing - but
at the same time being very cosmopolitan, being a capital
in Europe, having BMW and mobile telephones. On top of
everything being obsessed by information and literature
and having all the books you want and...and having the
extremes, like nature and everybody knowing eachother,
the intimatecy of a village and the isolation. But still
having all...if you wanna like, cocktail...and like,
you know, modern lifestyle and television, and a car...
L: Modern discos?
...modern discos, drugs and rock'n'roll, you can have
that as well. And then basicly I hooked up with, I mean,
all the people that are in to the same things, obviously
in such a small place, they...[at] one point got to meet
eachother. And when I was 14 or 15, this group of people
had kind of started #a# label in Iceland, indie label.
Not printing #our# indie music though, but basicly everything
else, exept Michael Jackson, jazz, rock music, rap, reggae,
whatever, everything that's not...you know...commercial
pop. And then later we would start a label that put out
books and films, exhibitions.
[CLIP]
B: And we were very early thought of as being...trouble,
basicly. Sort of enfants terribles, or whatever you
call it, sort of...angry teenagers that refuse to grow
up and...I don't think we were angry, we were very happy
actually, very positive, and had a great time. Very quickly
all the critics in Iceland went like hated us, and call us
"bad taste". So we basicly desided to call our label
"Bad Taste". Just face the facts that that's what we
were, that's what we gonna be then.
[Regina, Sugarcubes] Beginning to end of second chorus.
B: We were hanging out a lot together and we disided to form
a silly band to play at party, which we would call the
"Sugarcubes", it was like the most silly name we could
think of, a bit like "Monkeys" or something. We were just
being a bit, sort of, opposite the serious band we were
in before. Kind of being a bit like...like get a fresh
of...fresh air and go like la la la la la la, getting a
bit sort of pop, ABBA, listening a lot to ABBA-records
and Boney M and kind of like "Yes, that's what it's all
about" "Fuck this sort of... you know, existentialism
and all those isms, and art, fuck that pretentiousness
like, let's be happy", you know. And of course, the most
silly thing we're ever done in our lifes, is the most,
ironicly, is the thing that's been taken most seriously
by media.
[CLIP]
B: We started handing out "Bad Taste"-awards and announcing
people. And everybody went really upset in Iceland. Like
the head of Icelandic tele[vision] was always...showed
arty-pretentious operas, they were really horrible, but
just because they were "art" nobody would criticize it,
you know.
[CLIP]
B: Bad Taste was the most important thing for us - Sugarcubes
wasn't. Sugarcubes was a way to travel around the world
to meet other people, and to get money to put in Bad Taste.
So most of the money we earned, we put in Bad Taste to
put out more books, more records... the whole thing. And...
L: And having fun?
B: And having fun, obviously! I mean, I don't have to say
that when you with your best friends, travelling around
America, getting free airflights, free hotels, free food,
free...drinks, and all you have to do is pretend you're
a rock band!
[Hit, Sugarcubes] From the beginning to the beginning of Einar's
part.
B: I've written songs since I was five and I could've put
out an album ages ago that only had my music on, that was
not the problem, but... The reson why I didn't put my own
album out earlier is because it just was against everything
I believed in. It was what I consider being very very
selfish, being very, sort of...narcissistic, if you want,
and...and I just didn't have the need to do it, because
I wanted to learn. And I wanted to...meet all this, have
this...intimate, over the top, obsessive, intimate music-
relationships with people. And the more different they
were to me, the better. If they were like the opposite
of me - that was brilliant! 'Cause that meant I could
show them all these things they never heard about and
they could show me all these things I never heard about.
And it would be so exiting and that's kind of what keeps
me alive and what turns me on.
[CLIP]
B: I'd be lying if I wouldn't admit that I realized in
alot of things I'm a bit, sort of, stupid and slow. And
it takes me about, kind of like, 10 years later than my
fellow girlfriends in, kind of like...finding out about
certain things, and...I would basicly say that, you know,
I'm a bit, sort of stupid and a bit sort of slow, you know,
and... I think it's lot to do with my...inability to...
take in and learn about things with my brain. I kind of
have to do it with my senses, is kind of all I got, really.
And when you do things like that it takes ages, you know.
And I, for example #like#, no way I can drive a car. I had
a car for one year and I think I crashed it, sort of...
twice a month. And it's just to clever for me, you know,
it's got no logic, traffic - just got no logic for me.
[Human behaviour, Björk] From the beginning to 1:45 into the
video.
L: Say something, please, about "Venus As A Boy". Did you
have someone particular in mind, a person like Brett Anderson
of Suede maybe?
B: Not really. It was actually my friend...who I wrote it
about...but then again... things aren't that simple, you
know, it's...not trying to pretend it's really deep or
something saying like that but...of cause it's about several
things...
[CLIP]
B: To tell you the truth, I don't understand anymore than
you do.
L: I think it's a very sexy song.
B: Ye? [Björk's got a big smile and the song starts in the
background.]
L: Yes. Definitly one of the most sexy on the album.
B: You should see the video, I'm frying an egg, so...
very sexy.
L: We will actually see the video right after this.
[Björk bursts into laughter and covers her mouth with her
hands.]
[Venus As A Boy, Björk] A bit into the song onto were she's
reflecting the light with the spatula
in front of her mouth. [It's 1:35
into the song.]
L: Would you like to play in India...with your new band?
B: In India?
L: Ye.
B: I love to. I not gonna be able to do that though, because
of finacial reasons I guess and again - time, there's no
time. I don't really wanna play...horrible place like Germany,
you know what I mean? Or Europe in a way, because that's
what I know already. I wouldn't mind playing, doing a tour
like India... Guatemala and Thailand. I would be right on
that if it be suggested to me, but...unforturnatly we have
to be practicaly and finacialy aware aswell. I mean, not
be too, must be too much Utopia, you know. And that's why
I play Europe and USA.
[Play Dead, Björk] The whole song, but with some picture-
interruptions of names of the people
involved in this program.