Nothing lost in translation in Ásgeir’s new album
Ásgeir Trausti Einarsson speaks in a barely-there whisper. "Right now, I’m pretty fried," says the Icelandic folk singer-songwriter about the effects of success. "We’ve been touring one and a half years. I’m from a tiny village where everyone knows everyone else. To visit all these huge cities — well, it takes a lot of getting used to."
Einarsson sits in the corner of a fashionable Dublin restaurant, gazing into space. He isn’t unfriendly, just distant in that Nordic way. "When I left home, to attend school in Reykjavik, it freaked me out that everybody was a stranger," he says. "For the first three years, I would walk back to my accommodation at lunch hour and play guitar in my room — simply so I didn’t have to talk to anyone. I must have walked three hours a day." He smiles. "And now I find myself going on stage in New York and London, in front of all these strangers. Our first concert abroad was in Seattle. It was like an out-of-body experience."
