Electronic Sound Magazine Issue 92 Back Issue

Even at their most obviously pop moments – and there have been plenty of those over the last two decades, many of them truly glorious – there’s always been something a bit weird and unsettling about Röyksopp. If you’ve seen them play live, for instance, you’ll know they have a fondness for oddball outfits. So when we decided to put the Norwegian duo on the cover of Electronic Sound, we suspected they wouldn’t be posing for pictures in their trackies and trainers. As you’ve probably already worked out, we weren’t disappointed. Svein Berge and Torbjørn Brundtland talk about what they call their “quirkiness” in our fascinating interview with them. Some of it they put down to growing up in the remote city of Tromsø, a place 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle which they describe as “a David Lynch landscape”. The sun never sets in June and it never rises in December. That must have an effect on your wiring, right? Röyksopp are on a roll right now. And then some. Having released a new album in April – their first for eight years – they’re bringing out another one this month. The two records, ‘Profound Mysteries’ and ‘Profound Mysteries II’, find Berge and Brundtland as mercurial as ever, moving seamlessly through a range of electronic styles ably assisted by guests such as Alison Goldfrapp and Pixx. The group have also commissioned some amazing graphics to accompany the music, turning ‘Profound Mysteries’ into a wider art project. The 20 tracks on the albums are each accompanied by a short film, most of them pretty bizarre and some of them pretty subversive too, making those pop moments the duo are so good at crafting all the more unnerving.