New music: Björk – The Comet Song (original) (raw)

When it was announced last year that Björk would provide a brand new song for a brand new Moomins film, we thought it sounded like the most perfect marriage of aural and visual sensibilities since Celine Dion stood wailing on the end of that big boat. In the UK, the Moomins (large, hippopotamus-like trolls with big snouts who inhabit Moominvalley, in case you'd forgotten) represent something simultaneously alien yet oddly lovable, much like Björk herself. The Comet Song – co-written with Icelandic poet, Sjón – summarises the film's plot, which involves our intrepid explorers trying to find out more about a giant comet that's on course to land right in their back garden. The chorus – if you can call it that – is brilliantly blunt: "Comet, oh dammit." Musically, it's all clanking percussion, creepy crawly basslines and that crystalline voice adding gravitas to lyrics such as "we need milk and cakes and a warm bed".

The Comet Song is released on iTunes today. All the funds generated by the track go to Unicef Pakistan children's charities.