Iceland's Stilluppsteypa began its life as a guitar-bass-drum trio. Their earliest long player, 95's "Car Dirty With Jam on a Busy Street" LP on Germany's Very Good Records sees them sounding like a more restrained, garage rock-influenced Boredoms, playing a spastic music full of shrieks, tribal drums, surf guitar riffs, tape collage, and a penchant for the absurd.

After a handful of scarce 7" releases, and under the apparent influence of Bruce Gilbert they decided to abandon the guitars completely and head for an amorphous sound zone that bears little resemblance to their previous output. A bit of pulse electronics recalls the most non-techno moments of Pan sonic, and a bit of surreal sound collage brings to mind the post-industrial abstractions of Nurse With Wound or Hafler Trio. But mostly they do whatever they please.

Vocal contributions from Melt Banana's Yasuko Onuki and Juntaro Yamamouchi from Gerogigegege, as well as mixes by Andrew McKenzie, Ryoji Ikeda and Matt Wand of Stockhausen & Walkman, plus the fact that they have a CD out on the Mille Plateaux side label Ritornell provide no precise clues as to what they might sound like.

Stilluppsteypa: When I was Eight Years Old [mp3]