Björk
Vulnicura

She did it. Sure, it took her a good ten years, but in the end, despite many having written her off, seeing her as a victim of experimentation for its own sake (and indeed after "Biophilia", which still contained more than one good track, it was difficult to contradict such an assertion), Björk managed to compose the album that many expected from her. Not for nothing, already from its release, which happened prematurely due to an illegal leak of the entire project, many have compared it to two cornerstones of the Icelandic's discography, those "Homogenic" and "Vespertine" which until now remained unmatched by her and not only, and for once, such a comparison doesn't seem to have been thrown there randomly.

"Vulnicura" (a title born from the combination of the two Latin words "vulnus", wound, and "cura") indeed contains several passages that hark back to the aforementioned albums, but it would be wrong to label it as a work looking to the past: while not presenting itself accompanied by revolutionary concepts (or pseudo-ones) and not proposing particular innovations in terms of sound (especially regarding the beats, here curated by Arca, always articulated and complex and "suspended", a bit like in "Vespertine") this new studio effort by Guðmundsdóttir presents a series of characteristics that distinctly set it apart from her predecessors. Starting from the lyrics, the entire work presents itself in a much darker guise than in the past and in a solemn intertwining of beats and strings, the listener is powerfully transported into what is effectively the life lived by its author immediately before the composition of the album (specifically the end of the marriage with Matthew Barney); never had Björk written lyrics so intimate and personal, or at least so biographical as now, and benefiting from it is her voice, which, in clear recovery compared to the weariness that was evident from "Biophilia", seems to have regained not only the power but also the expressiveness of better times, almost as if she had suddenly rejuvenated.

Another fundamental element of the work is the intensive presence of strings, curated by Björk herself, as well as an almost total abandonment of the traditional song structure, which in "Vulnicura" is completely absent, so much so that, if we exclude the first two pieces, "Stonemilker" and "Lion Song", there is no trace of clearly distinct verses, choruses, and bridges: more than pop, in fact, the Icelandic sprite seems to have been inspired by lyrical arias, building dynamic and ever-changing tracks that take all the time necessary to unfold and evolve without necessarily wanting to be memorized and appreciated right away, and just take a look at the duration of the individual tracks (seven out of nine last from six to ten minutes) to realize it.

In the end, this results in an album that's anything but easy and immediate (but when has the Icelandic ever made works that didn't require more than one listen to be fully understood?) and which likely won't be liked by many precisely for its refusal of the traditional song form. For those who instead wish to listen to it with due patience, waiting for them is Björk's best album since "Medúlla" and the most intense since "Vespertine".