Jónsi

Jón "Jónsi" Þór Birgisson (born April 23, 1975) is a guitar player and lead singer of the Icelandic post-rock band Sigur Rós. His trademark is the bowed guitar, that is, playing his electric guitar with a cello bow through distortion and reverb to get that ethereal and trademark sound. Other guitarists that have used a bow on the guitar, but not with the reverb are Eddie Phillips and Jimmy Page. He sings mainly in falsetto.

Musical history

In 1995, Jónsi fronted a band called 'Bee Spiders', under the alias 'Jonny B' (a hidden reference to 'Jón Birgisson'). He wore sunglasses onstage throughout the whole concert. Bee Spiders received the 'most interesting band' award in 1995 in a contest for unknown bands called 'Musiktilraunir' (Music Experimentations). The band played long rock songs and was compared to the Smashing Pumpkins. Jónsi also fronted a grunge rock band called 'stoned' around 1992-1993. He sometimes uses the alias Frakkur to release his solo material.

Trivia

• Jónsi was born blind in his right eye. He once remarked, "If I saw in stereo I'd go mad." (needs citation)
• The name Sigur Rós is actually the name of Jónsi's little sister, except her name is Sigurrós. It was also the name of his late grandmother (a fairly well known if eccentric figure in her native Skagaströnd at the time), whom the little one was presumably named after. Jónsi's sister was born at the same time as the band formed. Sigur translates to "Victory" and Rós to "Rose," but the phrase "Sigur Rós" is not intelligible in Icelandic as it is in English. That is to say, "Sigur Rós" does not mean "Victory Rose" (like a rose one would receive for a victory), and is actually not grammatical in Icelandic. (needs citation)
• Jónsi is gay[1].

Languages

Jónsi's first language is Icelandic. He also speaks English, though with a thick Icelandic accent. Jónsi and the other members of Sigur Rós speak in an official interview[2]. According to the official Sigur Rós web site [3]:

On the first three Sigur Rós albums (Von, Von Brigði, Ágætis Byrjun), Jónsi sang most songs in Icelandic but two of them ("Von" and "Olsen Olsen") were sung in 'Hopelandic'. All of the vocals on ( ) are in Hopelandic. Hopelandic (Vonlenska in Icelandic) is the 'invented language' in which Jónsi sings before lyrics are written to the vocals. It's of course not an actual language by definition (no vocabulary, grammar, etc.), it's rather a form of gibberish vocals that fits to the music and acts as another instrument. Jónsi likens it with what singers sometimes do when they've decided on the melody, but haven't written the lyrics yet. Many languages were considered to be used on ( ), including English, but they decided on Hopelandic. Hopelandic (Vonlenska) got its name from first song which Jónsi sang it on, "Hope" (Von).