Bjork Debut CD

Personnel: Bjork (vocals, keyboards); Jon Mallison (guitar); Corki Hale (harp); Oliver Lake (alto saxophone); Gary Barnacle, Mike Mower (horns); Marius De Vries, Paul Waller, Martin Virgo (keyboards, programming); Garry Hughes (keyboards, Hammond organ, programming); Luis Jardim (bass, drums, percussion); Bruce Smith, Nellee Hooper (drums, percussion); Talvin Singh (tabla); Jhelisa Anderson (background vocals).
Engineers include: Jim Abbiss, Nellee Hooper, Howie Bernstein.
Personnel: Björk (keyboards); Björk (vocals); Jon Mallison (guitar); Corky Hale (harp); Gary Barnacle, Mike Mower, Oliver Lake (brass); Nellee Hooper, Luis Jardim, Bruce Smith (drums, percussion); Talvin Singh (tabla); Jhelisa Anderson (background vocals); Garry Hughes, Marius de Vries, Martin Virgo, Paul Waller (keyboards, programming).
Recording information: Beats Studio, Bombay, India; Livingston; Matrix; Milk Bar Toilets; Olympic; Summa Studio, Los Angeles, CA; Swanyard; TownHouse; Wild Bunch; Workhouse.
Director: Talvin Singh.
Photographer: Jean Baptiste Mondino.
Arrangers: Björk; Sureh Sathe; Oliver Lake.
Freed from the Sugarcubes' confines, Björk takes her voice and creativity to new heights on Debut, her first work after the group's breakup. With producer Nellee Hooper's help, she moves in an elegantly playful, dance-inspired direction, crafting highly individual, emotional electronic pop songs like the shivery, idealistic "One Day" and the bittersweet "Violently Happy." Despite the album's swift stylistic shifts, each of Debut's tracks are distinctively Björk. "Human Behaviour"'s dramatic percussion provides a perfect showcase for her wide-ranging voice; "Aeroplane" casts her as a yearning lover against a lush, exotica-inspired backdrop; and the spare, poignant "Anchor Song" uses just her voice and a brass section to capture the loneliness of the sea. Though Debut is just as arty as anything she recorded with the Sugarcubes, the album's club-oriented tracks provide an exciting contrast to the rest of the album's delicate atmosphere. Björk's playful energy ignites the dance-pop-like "Big Time Sensuality" and turns the genre on its head with "There's More to Life Than This." Recorded live at the Milk Bar Toilets, it captures the dancefloor's sweaty, claustrophobic groove, but her impish voice gives it an almost alien feel. But the album's romantic moments may be its most striking; "Venus as a Boy" fairly swoons with twinkly vibes and lush strings, and Björk's vocals and lyrics -- "His wicked sense of humor/Suggests exciting sex" -- are sweet and just the slightest bit naughty. With harpist Corky Hale, she completely reinvents "Like Someone in Love," making it one of her own ballads. Possibly her prettiest work, Björk's horizons expanded on her other releases, but the album still sounds fresh, which is even more impressive considering electronic music's whiplash-speed innovations. Debut not only announced Björk's remarkable talent; it suggested she had even more to offer. ~ Heather Phares
With DEBUT, the Icelandic thrush Bjork Godmundsdottir (late of the Sugarcubes) brings her knowing innocence and quirky voice to bear on an engaging program of renegade pop tunes. The unusual instrumental textures on songs such as "Human Behavior," fleshed out with timpani, small percussion instruments, vibraphones and harps, suggests a post-modern version of Phil Spector.
As a singer, Bjork's swooping octave leaps and guttural cries betray the elemental contradictions in her music. She projects the girlish innocence and barely constrained sensuality of a wise child, old beyond her years (the techno-reggae romanticism of "Venus As A Boy," the bouncy house changes of "Big Time Sensuality" and "Violently Happy"), and sometimes she sounds like she's trying to rediscover how such doe-eyed love might actually feel, as if for the first time (the mysterious groove of "One Day" and the jazzy standard "Like Someone In Love," with its spare harp accompQ (12/99, p.76) - Included in Q Magazine's "90 Best Albums Of The 1990s."
Q (1/94, p.85) - Included in Q's list of `The 50 Best Albums Of 1993' - "...an album of tantalising contrasts....manages to be bubbly, exhilarating, brazenly dance-oriented and satisfying all at once..."
Q (7/93, p.85) - 4 Stars - Excellent - "...Bjork Godmundsdottir's voice was undoubtedly the jewel in The Sugarcubes' crown and in the relatively sparse setting of this solo debut she reclaims all her old wit and joissance....a surprising, playful collection..."
Melody Maker (1/1/94, p.76) - Ranked #6 in Melody Maker's list of the `Albums Of The Year' for 1993 - "...a fantastic DEBUT..."
Musician (7/93, p.90) - "...what makes her singing memorable isn't the odd assortment of growls, moans and chirps she relies upon, but the emotions those sounds convey..."
NME (Magazine) (12/25/93, p.66) - Ranked #1 in New Musical Express' list of the `Top 50 LPs Of 1993' - "...DEBUT is a musical treasure chest of organic techno beats, twinkly jazz serenades and otherworldly nursery rhymes, disregarding categories and [displaying] a bewitching faith in pop's ability to challenge..."
NME (Magazine) (7/3/93, p.35) - 9 - Excellent Plus - "...an album that believes music can be magical and special...."