For the last twenty-three years, Sigur Rós frontman Jón Þór Birgisson, better known as simply Jónsi, has traversed the deepest nearly every span of the human experience, from the glacial joy of Agaetis Byrjun to the isolated chill of Valtari to the dense grief of Kveikur to the bounding, pastoral joy of Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust. And that’s all without mentioning Sigur Rós’ more abstract works or the work of Jónsi & Alex, his ambient collaboration with his partner.

And while his first solo outing, Go, shared a lot of the acoustic, rambling mischievousness of his band’s Með suð while shying away from the amorphous, rolling ambiance of their earlier works, Shiver finds him indulging in his every instinct. He does not restrain himself from any of his tendencies toward atmosphere, preciousness, electronic weirdness, or joyful dance music. The result is an album that feels the most varied and comprehensive of anything he’s ever done.

While his solo debut had obvious similarities to what his main band had been working on around the same time (most specifically the riotous “Gobbledigook”), Shiver comes seven years after Sigur Rós’ last studio album, and separated by the better part of a decade, its similarities to his prior work are visible in much broader strokes. There are no obvious callbacks to anything he’s done before, either with his band or on his own, but there’s no chance anyone could mistake it as the work of anyone else.

Perhaps the biggest shift as that the sonic palette, which is almost entirely electronic, courtesy of Charli XCX collaborator A.G. Cook, who handles production duties here. But even the most skeptical of artificial instruments’ ability to create real emotion will have their fears laid to rest by this album. Jónsi is a heartfelt workman after all, and he and Cook use buzzing synths, mechanical drum machines, and glitching atmospheres to break the boundaries of instrument-based composition to create otherworldly soundscapes.

The extremes of the album are perhaps best seen by the juxtaposed tracks “Kórall” and “Salt Licorice.” “Kórall” is a dark chameleon, shifting between moods with intricate layers of synth arpeggios before crashing into a cacophony of digital drums. “Salt Licorice” on the other hand is an uptempo pop number that features Swedish dance music queen Robyn that is completely club ready—despite the pained lyrics.

The rest of the record sits somewhere between the dark experimentalism and bright pop of those two tracks. “Exhale” opens the album with a deep breath that swells into a life-affirming anthem. The title track follows, bursting with life as Jónsi’s voice soars above the orchestra-aided electronics. Cocteau Twins lead singer and Massive Attack collaborateur Elizabeth Fraser joins for “Cannibal,” a tender love song about devouring your lover whole (which might be the only indication on this album that Iron Maiden was his entry point into music). It’s also very strange to hear two singers known for using their voices more for tonality than vocabulary sing a song in English.

“Wildeye” shifts between a metallic dance rhythm and swelling atmospheric passages over an almost mournful melody. The ballad “Sumarið sem aldrei kom” opens with three minutes of Jónsi’s voice accompanied only by swelling pads and strings. A percussive line three minutes in teases another dance party, but instead the instruments pull back and are replaced by a lone piano. The single joyous “Swill” bursts with sampled orchestral hits and a collage of digital noise.

The final two tracks, “Grenade” and “Beautiful Boy” may hit the closest to Sigur Rós’ existing catalog. The first follows a grand piano pulse augmented by atmospheric swells and the most natural sounding percussion on the album, hitting pretty close to the more stripped down songs on Takk. The latter uses manipulated vocal tracks to build a billowing soundscape not unlike the atmopshere that rested beneath ( )’s post rock instrumentation. The titular lyrics even sound like they were recorded backwards and then reversed, a la Amnesiac era Radiohead.

And because it is Jónsi, it goes without saying that every second of this album—from the most subdued ambiance to the weirdest experimentation—is absolutely gorgeous. And for me, it carries a special sentiment: I was recently tasked with running sound for my sister’s wedding, and while setting up, I used this album to sound check. Admittedly, it took me a little longer than I expected, and this album was still playing by the time guests started arriving and I didn’t want to awkwardly stop it and put on something else. And so, this album ended up serving as the soundtrack for my sister’s wedding (along with Takk, which I played intentionally after the ceremony).