Takk...

1	Takk... 1:57
2	Glósóli 6:15
3	Hoppípolla 4:28
4	Meo Blódnasir 2:17
5	Sé Lest 8:40
6	Saeglopur 7:38
7	Milanó 10:25
8	Gong 5:33
9	Andvari 6:40
10	Svo Hljótt 7:24
11	Heysátan 4:09

Barnes & Noble

After the somber dirges of their untitled third album, Sigur Rós return to what they do best on Takk... As on 1999's brilliant Ágćtis Byrjun, the Icelandic troupe create spacious, crescendo-filled art-rock symphonies that are overwhelmingly beautiful. Takk... is the Icelandic band's brightest, most upbeat album, with Jónsi Birgisson's angelic voice soaring into the stratosphere (multi-tracked, he sounds like a boys' choir), and with tinkling chimes and trebly piano and keyboards taking newly prominent roles among the band's trademark kettle drums, bowed guitars, and cinematic strings. Many tracks expand and contract over the course of six or more minutes, and while they're usually structured around several crashing epiphanies, they get there in different ways. The euphoric, triumphant "Hoppipolla" quickly rises on a music box–like keyboard figure, pounding drums, and eerie voices -- then pauses before ascending further on orchestral strings, horns, and impossibly pretty vocals. "Sé lest" begins with a hypnotic, circular pattern, first played on what sounds like a vibraphone and later picked up by piano and chimes, which then cede to an oom-pah-pah horn fanfare before fading into a creaky electronic coda. Sigur Rós are masters of music that swoons and is swoon-inducing. Steve Klinge

All Music Guide

A strange thing happens before the two-minute mark in "Saeglopur." All the twinkling and cooing erupts, at what might seem like eight minutes earlier than normal, into a cathartic blast of tautly constructed group noise -- or, as those who prefer songs and motion over moods and atmospheres might say, "The good part comes." "Saeglopur" is emblematic of Sigur Rós' fourth album, released nearly three years (!) after ( ). Nothing resembles a drone, and no part of it could be described as funereal. Even so, Takk... is still very much a Sigur Rós album, due in large part to the ever-present otherworldly vocals, but also because the only real changes are the activeness of some arrangements -- arrangements that deploy a familiar combination of bass, drums, piano, vocals, lots of strings, and some horns -- and some of the colors that are used. Despite opening with what sounds like a happy walk through a snow bank, the album is just as suited for a sunlit spring morning as ( ) was suited for a winter trudge across a foggy moor, so in that sense, it isn't a repeat and is more tactile than illusory, but it's not likely to win over anyone who suddenly felt an index finger push against the back of his throat while hearing "Svefn-G-Englar" for the first time. And it's not as if the band is suddenly writing three-minute pop songs, either. Half of the album's tracks are longer than six minutes, with extended cresting, sudden bursts of action, and a couple particularly fragile moments that seem to be on the brink of melting away. One thing to consider when wondering whether or not this band has changed in any way: they've gone from providing the background music to death announcements to "Sé Lest," a fluttering children's lullaby that is briefly crashed by an even more gleeful oom-pah-pah brass band. Andy Kellman