how the Cubes were formed

The Sugarcubes came about because of the domesticity imposed by Björk’s motherhood. After they were married, Björk and Thor moved into a house, and an avant-garde crowd of poets, painters, and musicians would come around. Six of them created Bad Taste Ltd., dedicated to publishing each other’s work. For a joke they also formed the Sugarcubes. When one of their songs, ’Birthday,’ caused a stir in England, they rerecorded it in English. Suddenly they had a career.

It was a hobby really. We’d all get drunk at weekends and write these weirdo pop songs and then when we had enough we could go on holiday as The Sugarcubes. It was just a group of friends travelling all over the world and thinking, ’this is crazy’. Nobody expected to last even as long as it did.

Folks might say something went wrong with the Sugarcubes. Not so ! We had worked together as a unit since we were 14, 15 years old - we’d done all these different things together and always stuck by each other no matter what. We set up a pirate
radio station - we broke into Radio One for the 200-year birthday of Reykjavik and made all these announcements and played songs that we considered more realistic. So we’ve been arrested, been thrown in jail together.

Pulse ! #7, 1995