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Iceland Airwaves festival day three – Thunderpussy bring the boogie, King the glorious sonics

A gloriously old fashioned dose of early 70s hard rock provided one of the highlights of the festival so far



“Welcome to Iceland,” Jóhannesson says, standing before us with the First Lady, Eliza Reid, in the grand drawing room of their house, which just happens to be white. He starts talking about the “Icelandic music scenery”, and how much Airwaves has done for the local economy. He even reads out some quotes from the world’s press, about how it’s “the hippest long weekend on the annual music-festival calendar” (courtesy of David Fricke of Rolling Stone, who is here), and how this year’s one “starts in a toilet”, a reference by yours truly to John Lydon’s inaugural address on day one at the converted public convenience that is the Icelandic Museum of Punk. He proposes a toast to “music, cooperation, and having fun” and tells us to either “clap or rattle our jewellery”. You can’t imagine Theresa May opening the Great Escape with a John Lennon gag.



From the president to King. When I wrote about these three Los Angelenos back in 2012, they seemed mired, in the best possible way, in the 70s celestial soul of Minnie Riperton and her Rotary Connection. Tonight, they appear to have moved on a decade, the sound coming from Paris Strother’s panoply of keyboards and computers evoking the shimmering R&B of super-producers Jam and Lewis. It’s a very mid-80s electronic soul sound, with none of the murk or rhythmic idiosyncrasy of today’s avant-R&B. The actual songwriting could do with a bit of oomphing up – that’s an Icelandic phrase – but the sweetness of their female attitude, their dovetailing harmonies and the actual sonics are glorious.


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