Sigur Rós Announce Harvest Festival Sideshows

Those Icelandic masters of ethereal music, Sigur Ros are headlining Harvest Festival 2012, alongside the likes of Beck, Grizzly Bear and Ben Folds Five, for the festival’s three mid-November dates in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

Now the glacial quartet have announced two very special sideshows for two very lucky cities that are missing out on the Harvest Festival tour. South Australia and Western Australia will be the two states that get to experience the band’s stunning live show with the announcement that Sigur Rós will be playing Perth’s Belvoir Amphitheatre on November 13 and Adelaide’s Thebarton Theatre on November 15.

The two dates are squeezed in-between the Melbourne and Sydney legs of Harvest, which won’t be visiting either Adelaide or Perth, which means this may be WA and SA fans last chance to catch Sigur Ros for some time. Especially considering this is the band’s first visit down under in four years.

This is the group’s first visit to Australian soil since 2008, touring in support of their latest and seventh studio album, Valtari. Unfortunately, audiences won’t be seeing band member Kjartan Svensson – following reports that he’s retiring from touring commitments with the group for the time being.

Angelic singer Jónsi Þór Birgisson and bassist Georg Hólm first revealed that their multi-instrumentalist bandmate would not be joining the tour, but also squashed rumours that Sveinsson had quit the band, or that their future was in dispute. Birgisson telling media that Sveinsson’s decision to bypass their live show was because he was “tired of touring,’ adding he wants to “spend his time doing something else.”

Sveinsson’s position will be fulfilled by three new additions to the line-up, including Hólm’s younger brother Kjartan Dagur Hólm on guitar, along with a keyboardist and an oboe player.

In the meantime, fans can get themselves in the mood with the ‘The Valtari Mystery Film Experiment‘, a series of music videos which, according to the band’s website, gives several filmmakers “the same modest budget and asked them to create whatever comes into their head when they listen to songs from the band’s new album Valtari.”Adding that the idea behind the project is “to bypass the usual artistic approval process and allow people utmost creative freedom.”

We’ve already had Transformers star Shia LeBouf getting naked for the sake of art in one video (which we’ve included again for your pleasure/discomfort below), and the band plan’s to release clips right through to November 19th, which handily coincides with the ethereal musicians’ appearance at Harvest Festival 2012 and the newly announced sideshows.

SIGUR ROS SIDESHOWS // AUSTRALIAN TOUR 2012 DATES

Tickets for both shows go on sale on July 13 through the band’s wesbite.

Tuesday 13th November – Belvoir Amphitheatre, Perth WA

Thursday 15th November – Thebarton Theatre, Adelaide SA