- published: 05 Mar 2016
- views: 3429
Ske is an Icelandic band whose origins can be traced back to 1992, when a band called Skárren ekkert was founded by Eiríkur Þorleifsson, Frank Hall and Guðmundur Steingrímsson, and joined by Hrannar Ingimarsson in 1998.
In 1999, they wrote the music for NPK, a dance performance by the Icelandic Dance Company. The following year Eiríkur, Frank and Guðmundur, along with Guðmundur Hafsteinsson, wrote and performed music for Shakespeare's A Midsummers Night Dream at the Icelandic National Theatre's (Þjóðleikhúsið) 50th anniversary performance. Hrannar was away in New York with Icelandic rap-band Quarashi, with whom he'd worked extensively as engineer/mixer and guitarist since 1996.
In 2002 the album Life, Death, Happiness and Stuff was ready, with additional performances from Kjartan Guðnason on drums, Una Sveinbjarnardóttir on violin and vocalists Jón Oddur Guðmundsson, Juri Hashimoto, Julie Couadou and Daníel Ágúst Haraldsson. The album was a cult hit, the songs Julietta 2 and Stuff were picked up by ad-agencies for national television campaigns for The National Bank of Iceland and Icelandair. The album was also nominated as Album of the Year and 'Julietta 2' was nominated for Song of the Year and won.