I don’t believe that I’ve ever had an instance where my occupation had direct correlation to music…until now.

Draumalandið (or Dreamland, in English) is a film that is based on the Andri Snær Magnason best-selling book Draumalandið – sjálfshjálparbók handa hræddri þjóð (Dreamland: A Self-Help Manual for a Frightened Nation in English). Who is this “frightened nation” you might ask – Iceland. The book is a critique against the Icelandic government’s plan to build the largest dam in Europe to provide cheap energy for aluminum smelters in Iceland fjords. The complaint by Magnason is that to get the predicted 30 TWh/year of energy would require the damming of Iceland’s most known waterfalls such as Dettifoss, which is Europe’s most powerful waterfall, and Gullfoss, which together with Thingvellir and Geyser makes up the golden circle.

The book has since been made into a documentary with composer/producer Valgeir Sigurðsson (Björk, Nico Muhly, Coco Rosie) providing the orchestrations for the soundtrack. Mostly the tracks are instrumental with Sigurðsson composing small string ensembles that pluck and swell with what I assume are scenes from the film. You can listen to the entire film score here.

What does this have to do with me? Well, I work for a subcontractor construction company that provides and installs aluminum paneling and our main supplier is Alcoa (also the makers of Reynolds Wrap) who owns the aluminum smelter that is 75Km east of Reyðarfjörðu,  a small town of 1200 inhabitants. This smelter is the reason for all the controversy.

I feel dirty.