Einar Örn Benediktsson (born 29 October 1962), often billed as Einar Örn, is an Icelandic popular music singer and trumpet player. He was a member of the Sugarcubes. He served as a member of the Reykjavík City Council between 2010 and 2014. With Björk and the Sugarcubes Einar has been described as the first punk in Iceland. He claims he became interested in punk rock after reading about Johnny Rotten vomiting on an aeroplane and listening to John Peel on his mother's car radio. Einar spent the summer of 1977 in London, where his father worked. Through this, he was able to make contacts enabling the Reykjavík arts festival to book The Clash in 1980. In the early 1980s, Einar was the lead singer of the short-lived punk group Purrkur Pillnikk. Following Purrkur Pillnikk's demise in 1983, Einar became a member of the anarcho-punk Kukl along with the already notable Icelandic singer Björk Guðmundsdóttir. During this period, whilst studying media at the Polytechnic of Central London (now the University of Westminster) he got in touch with several punk groups such as Flux of Pink Indians and the anarchist band Crass. This eventually led to the release of Kukl's two studio albums, 1984's The Eye and 1986's Holidays in Europe, on Crass' in-house label Crass Records. In June 1986, Smekkleysa SM or Bad Taste SM ltd was formed by a group of friends which included Einar, Björk, Sigtryggur, Einar Melax from Kukl, Bragi Ólafsson and Friðrik Erlingsson from Purrkur Pillnikk, Þór Eldon, Ólafur Engilberts and Sjón from the surrealist group Medúsa and lastly Ásmundur Jónsson from Gramm Records. Out of this group the Sugarcubes were formed, with Einar sharing vocal duties with Björk. While with the Sugarcubes, some critics scorned him for his bizarre spoken-word rants and discordant singing, which often overshadowed Björk's more popular vocalizations. Others, however, defended his contributions as an essential component of the group's free-spirited, chaotic ethos. Einar remained with the Sugarcubes until the band's breakup in 1992. In 2006, Einar reunited with the Sugarcubes for a one-off performance at the Laugardalshöll arena in Reykjavík. Post-Sugarcubes After the breakup of the Sugarcubes, Einar wrote a newspaper column "Close Encounter" ("about daily life in Reykjavík"), promoted records for the Sugarcubes' former Icelandic label, Bad Taste (Smekkleysa), which he had co-founded, and worked as a bartender. Music went on the backburner: "I was discovering other things, like family life.