After a sneak peak from a Roskilde Festival affiliated blog that revealed the signing of Norwegian hardcore metal band Kvelertak, northern Europe’s largest music festival has kicked off the planning for its 2013 incarnation with a four-pack of Nordic music acts.

 

Roskilde officially announced today that joining Kvelertak will be Icelandic post-rock stalwarts Sigur Rós, Danish rockers turned international superstars Volbeat, and the Swedish psychedelic rock outfit Goat. 

 

Led by the distinctive voice of frontman Jónsi Birgisson, Sigur Rós are perhaps one of the most unlikely successes in the modern music business. With lyrics that are sung alternately in Icelandic or the constructed language of ‘Hopelandic’ (with one single forray into English), the band’s distinctive ambient sound puts them “in an air-void space, only accessed by astronauts and abstract painters”, to use the festival’s description. The unusual superstars will bring their visual-heavy live show back to Roskilde for the first time since 2006.

 

Joining them will be hometown heroes Volbeat, whose brand of stadium-friendly hard rock has brought them success far beyond Denmark’s borders. Now chummy with metal superstars Metallica, Volbeat will bring a sound that Roskilde says is “packed as tight as straw bale with equal parts power and hit potential”. The Danes will be releasing a new album in the spring − perfectly timed to whet the appetite of their home audience ahead of the festival.

 

The Swedes in Goat will bring their trippy, psychedelic act to Roskilde, providing a sound that is “cooked in equal parts bong water, Swedish wild strawberries and African extracts”. Their 2012 album World Music earned significant praise from high-brow music critics. 

 

Rounding up the Nordic package will be the previously-announced Norwegian hardcore metal act Kvelertak, a band that put on a 2011 concert deemed to be one of the year’s best by The Copenhagen Post. 

 

Get yourself prepared for the 2013 Roskilde Festival will the videos below.