The Sugarcubes
Life's Too Good

THE REVIEW

Sometimes the land you live in permeates your soul, making you one with it.
An innate flow, a continuous osmotic process that roots itself, shaping you day after day.
In the music of the Sugarcubes, there is all of Iceland, its colors, its moods, an ancestral,
cathartic relationship that interconnects the symbolic and the corporeal dimensions.
The music, the words, the geysers, Björk's enchanting voice, and the northern lights in a whirlwind of rare beauty,
find their natural transposition in "Life's Too Good."
Sugarcubes formed in Reykjavík on June 8, 1986, with Björk Guðmundsdóttir (vocals),
her husband Þór Eldon (guitar), Bragi Ólafsson (bass), Sigtryggur Baldursson (drums),
Einar Örn Benediktsson (vocals, trumpet), Friðrik Erlingson (keyboards), who was replaced the following year
by Einar Melax, and later by Margrét Örnólfsdóttir.
"Life's Too Good" debuted on the London label One Little Indian Records in the summer of 1988,
after a single EP ("Einn Mol'á Mann") released two years earlier, and what emerges from its grooves is pure emotion.
The vocal arrangements between Björk and Benediktsson and the sharp, fiery guitars, running free, twisting
on a massive bass framework, create a perfect and original formula,
music that sounds delightfully informal, polyhedral, beyond the conceptions of its time.
The media impact of this talented band from distant Reykjavík
did not go unnoticed by the famous talent scout, DJ, and journalist John Peel, and the music magazine Melody Maker
which ranked the album second in their annual "End Of Year Critic Lists,"
preceded only by none other than "Surfer Rosa" by the Pixies.
The singles "Coldsweat," "Deus," "Motorcrash," and "Birthday" received absolute acclaim from the specialized critics
despite the renowned conservatism prevalent in the industry magazines of the time.
A special mention goes to "Birthday," born two years earlier in its original language version, "Ammæli,"
it is an ecstatic orgy, a hypnotic ballad supported by the ethereal, impressive vocals
of the enchanting Björk and the overwhelming instrumental anarchy that sets the pace
of the track through an oxymoron "dissonance-consonance."
"Thread worms on a string, keeps spiders in her pocket, collects fly-wings in a jar..."
Grotesque and surreal, the lyrics also perfectly align with the musical parts,
strangeness is customary as in Carroll's tales.
"Deus" is no less, four minutes and ten (the album's longest track) of love, of passion.
It is a slow march through a solemn atmosphere marked by Ólafsson's bass, robust and essential as ever,
riding Björk's voice, accompanying her until the end of the track
which fades into an inspired, spine-chilling riff by Eldon.
The intriguing "Mama" with its mystical aftertaste, the finely crafted pop-funk of "Blue Eyed Pop,"
the typical post-punk spleen in "Sick For Toys," the orchestral and bizarre "F***ing In Rhythm & Sorrow,"
seal a work that, thirty years after its release, remains radiant and eternal.
In April 1988, the Sugarcubes gave the world "Life's Too Good."
Iceland is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, but not only.