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Metacritic	87/100
Review scores
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AllMusic
The Austin Chronicle
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
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NME	7/10
Pitchfork Media	9.4/10
Q
Rolling Stone
Spin	8/10
The Village Voice	B

Ágætis byrjun (Icelandic pronunciation: [ˈaːucaitɪs ˈpɪrjʏn] OW-gy-tiss BI-ar-yun, A good beginning) is the second album by Icelandic post-rock band Sigur Rós, released on 12 June 1999. Ágætis byrjun was recorded between the summer of 1998 and the spring of 1999 with producer Ken Thomas and became the band's breakthrough album, both critically and commercially. Ágætis byrjun represented a substantial departure from the band's previous album Von, with that album's Cocteau Twins-esque dream pop and extended ambient soundscapes replaced by Jónsi Birgisson's now signature cello-bowed guitarwork and lush orchestration, using a double string octet amongst other orchestral elements.

The album's title came from a friend hearing the first song they had written for the album, which would become the title track. After hearing the song, he said it was "a good beginning"; the name stuck. The name has also been translated as "An alright start."

Sigur Rós won an Iceland Music Award and the 2001 Shortlist Music Prize for this album.

Smekkleysa/ Bad Taste claims that the album has sold 10,000 copies to date in Iceland which earned the band platinum status.

The ten songs on the album include some self-reference: the introduction contains backmasked parts from the title track, and the last song, "Avalon", consists of a different take of an instrumental passage from "Starálfur" slowed to around a quarter of its original speed. The strings in "Starálfur" are palindromic; they are the same forwards and backwards.

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