Imagine being told that your homeland, some 10,000 square kilometres of land, no longer belonged to you. That it had been purchased by a rich American, intent on stripping away all natural resources to provide rubber for his car plant. Drinking and smoking become forbidden, even inside your own home, the way of life of your so-called benefactor forced upon you. Your food is nasty and American, cheap hamburgers providing little sustenance and leaving you feeling bloated and ill. This was the plight of the Brazilian workers who in the 1930's, found themselves working for Henry Ford in Fordlândia, areas of plantation land bought for his company, and the subject of the latest album from Jóhann Jóhannsson. This album is the second instalment in a proposed trilogy by the Icelandic composer, based on technology and American brand names. His previous album ‘IBM 1401, A User's Manual' was a wonderful suite of music, which questioned whether computers had the ability to inspire melody. After discovering in his fathers attic old reel-to-reel recordings of the IBM 1401 mainframe, he utilized these fragments to construct (with the aid of a sixty piece orchestra) a rich collection of sounds and songs, from the technically avant-garde to beautiful sweeping strings and melody. He does much the same here, though the end result sounds more organic. The titular opening track is a repeated string refrain, reminiscent of the fourth track from Sigur Ros's wonderful (), which sets the tone well for the rest of the album.As with his debut album "Englabörn", nothing is hurried, the songs allowed to sprawl and take shape. ‘Melodia (I)' chimes with a waltz-time of woodwind, whilst ‘The Rocket Builder' is full of bass-driven thumps as the rubber plants fall to the ground around the plantation. ‘Aerial View' takes up soaring above the trees, whilst the chilling ‘Melodia (III)' is haunting and unsettling, starting with a muted piano in a clearing, the orchestra darting out of the forest in stabs and whispers. The crowning glory though is ‘The Great God Pan is Dead', a lament to the damage of Fordlandia, a mourning choir expressing the aching sadness for what is lost.Almost as good is ‘Guidelines For a Space Propulsion Device', patterns and loops of organ and percussion drifting round the swell of the orchestra, taking us into the epic ending that is ‘How we Left Fordlandia'. Over the course of 15 minutes the music is dramatic and touching, ebbing and dying at the end with no clear conclusion. This is his greatest album so far, which given his previous output is really saying something. I for one look forward to the conclusion of this trilogy and to see what will inspire his muse next. 84% Jóhann Jóhannsson on MySpace