Family Tree
Family Treeexplores Björk's artistic progression in part by sifting through older material and experiments with musical tangents. Just a month removed from the release of herGreatest Hitscollection, which was compiled entirely from fans' votes, this multi-disc set highlights the artist's selections. In addition, the box contains five 3-inch discs of rare and previously unreleased material. Two of them focus on her fascination with classical arrangements and include songs she performed live with the Brodsky Quartet in 2000. Two more are given over to her earliest work, including a fewSugarcubestracks, as well as "Sídasta Eg," a song Björk composed on her flute when she was 15. The last of the five minidiscs,Beats, contains her first post-Sugarcubes club-oriented experiments with808 State's Graham Massey and Mark Bell that eventually yielded her startlingDebut. While it feels scatterbrained at times,Family Treesuccessfully strips down Björk's creative output into a fascinating history lesson, providing a glimpse at the forces behind Björk's ornate, iconoclastic style.--Matthew Cooke