Björk

Björk (born 21 November 1965 as Björk Guðmundsdóttir) is an Icelandic singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer. She initially was the singer of anarcho-punk group Kukl and later became known as the lead singer of the alternative rock band the Sugarcubes, whose 1987 single "Birthday" was a hit on US and UK indie stations and a favorite among music critics. Björk began her career as a solo artist in 1993. Her first album, Debut, was rooted in electronic dance music, house, jazz, and trip-hop, and is widely credited as one of the first albums to introduce electronic dance music into mainstream pop. Now in the third decade of her solo career, Björk has developed an eclectic musical style that incorporates aspects of dance, rock, jazz, electronic, classical, and avant-garde music.... (read more at wikipedia)

Links To Peel
Peel was a fan of Bjork's band The Sugercubes' early work including their single "Birthday", which topped the 1987 Festive Fifty. When the Sugarcubes were invited BBC Studios, Peel was offended by Bjork's behaviour after he shook her hands. On his show on 08 June 1988, Peel mentioned the event:


 * "The Sugarcubes, actually who were in the building, some of them anyway a week ago or so. And the two blokes were aimable, but Bjork seemed rather those things, just came over, shook hands and went and stood at the far corner of a rather large room staring moodily at the wall, which I thought was, well, I didn't expect her to say yo! homeboy and pinch me on the bum, but at the same time, it seemed a bit kind of calculated broody or brooding."

When the Sugarcubes released their second album, Peel was disappointed with it's material and never played any of their tracks on his show. After the Sugarcubes split in the early 90's and Bjork pursued a solo career, he once again was not impressed with her material.

In 1995 when writing for the Guardian (later reprinted in Olivetti Chronicles) after seeing her perform at the Reading festival, he described her success as:


 * "The global success of Bjork has been built on her exotic background, the projection of herself as plain weird and a singing style so mannered as to make Kate Bush sound pedestrian by comparison."

After presenting Top Of The Pops in 1995, which was a camouflage for his appearance on This Is Your Life, Peel described the difficulties in introducing Bjork on Top Of The Pops on his 23 December 1995 (BFBS) show:


 * "I had to do my introduction to Bjork three times, and on each occasion standing facing her about four, five feet away from her, and I had to spin through 180 degrees, which isn't easy for me to do when I'm not holding a microphone and trying to remember my amusing ad-libs. Of course, I'd written a really hostile review of her performance at the Reading Festival, and was thinking, is she a Guardian reader or not? Happily, it seems that she wasn't, 'cos she'd certainly have slapped me if she'd read the review which was very bitchy indeed, I'm pleased to say. But she came on, did her number and things, which was fairly dreadful I felt."

Festive Fifty Entries

 * 2011 Festive Fifty: 'Crystalline (Omar Souleyman Version) #16

Other Shows Played
1995
 * 14 December 1995 (TOTP): It's Oh So Quiet #08