
Show Notes
Gabríel Ólafs is an Icelandic pianist, composer, and producer whose work blends classical tradition with fantasy and a strikingly modern sense of atmosphere. Born in Reykjavík in 1998, he began playing piano at the age of five, receiving both classical and jazz training before emerging as a recording artist while still a teenager.
His debut album, Absent Minded, was released in 2019, and his subsequent work has expanded steadily in scope—from the solo intimacy of Piano Works to the folk-inspired Lullabies for Piano and Cello, which grew out of a 1906 Icelandic songbook he discovered in an antique shop.
He is also the co-founder of the Reykjavík Orkestra, and has quickly become one of the most distinctive young voices in contemporary instrumental music. Most recently, with Polar, he has moved further into speculative, atmospheric composition, drawing in part on the dreamlike emotional language of video games.
Gabriel Ólafs: Website Releases Archive Spotify Apple Music YouTube Instagram
Polar: Listen on Spotify Listen on Apple Music Buy CD (Decca Classics) Buy from Decca Records US YouTube Playlist
Polar: Traveler's Log: Listen on Spotify
Polar: Building A World: Watch on YouTube
The Waves: Listen on Spotify
Forza Horizon 6: Official Site Xbox
Other Gabriel Ólafs Releases / Labels: Oli Records Decca Classics Releases Archive
Jóhann Jóhannsson / IBM 1401: Listen on Spotify Watch on YouTube
Nils Frahm: Website Spotify
Gabriel's Perfect Console: World of Warcraft The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered God of War Death Stranding Baldur's Gate 3
Other Games Discussed The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Diablo IV Metal Gear Solid 2 Become a My Perfect Console supporter and receive a range of benefits at www.patreon.com/myperfectconsole Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
More from My Perfect Console with Simon Parkin
Yesterday came the news that EA plans to close BioWare, the Edmonton studio behind Baldur’s Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect and Dragon Age. I thought it was a good moment to revisit my conversation with Dr Greg Zeschuk, one of BioWare’s co-founders. We talk about the games that shaped him, and the long, remarkable journey of a studio that defined computer and console role-playing games for millions of people. Here’s my conversation with Greg Zeschuk.
Daryl Baxter is a British writer and podcaster from Lincoln whose work has ranged across games, technology, and the history of the medium. He has written for outlets including WIRED, TechRadar, Den of Geek, and the Radio Times, and now publishes Springboard, a free newsletter about gaming, technology, and mental health that deliberately avoids chasing SEO or relying on AI. Growing up with series including Sonic, Metal Gear and, especially, Tomb Raider, he eventually turned that fascination into his first book, The Making of Tomb Raider, published in 2021 and based on extensive interviews with the original Core Design team.
Will de Renzy-Martin is a British actor and voice performer whose career has increasingly become intertwined with video games. As a child, he was fascinated by storytelling and by watching his older brothers play Ocarina of Time, but initially followed a rather different path, reading Computing at Imperial College London. Before long, however, he changed direction, training as an actor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he discovered voiceover shortly before graduating in 2017.
My guest today is an Irish writer, producer, and multimedia creator whose work spans journalism, video games, language, and digital culture. Born in Vietnam, she was adopted at three days old by a primary school teacher from County Kerry, and brought to Ireland at six weeks of age. Irish became one of her spoken languages, and it would go on to shape both her education and her career: she later studied Irish and Journalism at Dublin City University, building a body of work that moves across reporting, video games, and digital culture.
Paolo Pedercini is an Italian game designer, artist, educator, and activist whose work has spent more than two decades challenging assumptions about what video games are for, and what they are allowed to say. In 2003, he founded Molleindustria as a project dedicated to the "reappropriation of video games and the radicalisation of popular culture."