Debut

About

You could say that Björk Guðmundsdóttir was born twice: First in Reykjavik in 1965—and again in the studio in 1993, thanks to her aptly titled solo <i>Debut</i>. By the early 1990s, Björk had been a staple of Iceland’s alternative-music scene for more than a decade, thanks to her work with several scrappy local bands, as well as her time with The Sugarcubes, the co-ed quintet that shot to international fame thanks to its 1988 hit “Birthday”—a song all but defined by Björk’s inimitable breathless vocals. But none of that earlier work prepared listeners for <i>Debut</i>—an album that belongs within another solar system entirely. It’s a strange and singular piece of work, one that seemed to emerge fully formed from Björk’s deep creative wellspring. Indeed, as a guide to the next few decades of Björk’s career, there could hardly be lyrics more fitting than those on <i>Debut</i>’s opening track, the galloping, frost-tipped hit “Human Behaviour”: “And there is no map/And a compass wouldn’t help at all.” Armed with years’ worth of song sketches—including a few compositions she’d started while still in her teens—Björk passed through several early collaborators on <i>Debut</i> before opting to work with British producer Nellee Hooper, who’d recently helped make hits for Sinéad O’Connor and Soul II Soul. The result is a dance-floor outlier threaded through with brightly syncopated beats and global-citizen flourishes. “Venus as a Boy” sways to an unhurried, almost tropical rhythm, while “Big Time Sensuality” finds its joyful backbone in rubber-band electro-funk. The lovestruck ballad “Come to Me,” meanwhile, shivers with woozy longing and ice-crystal orchestration. Still, even in the midst of <i>Debut</i>’s constant tonal shifts and switchbacks, certain anomalies stand alone: “Like Someone In Love,” for instance, is a stripped-down, fairly faithful cover of a standard first made popular by Bing Crosby in 1945. And the album’s closing track, “The Anchor Song,” is strung together with little more than mournful horns and plaintive vocals. But, in their own ways, each track here serves as a signpost of where Björk would go in the years ahead, illuminating a path forward for this unparalleled and forever unpredictable artistic force.

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

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