Several weeks ago Björk and Rosalía announced they’d recorded a song together to protest Icelandic fish farming. After a few weeks of delays, that song, “Oral,” has been released today.

Speaking to Rolling Stone, Björk decried the release of industrially farmed “Frankenstein fish” into Iceland’s water. These fish are more likely to carry pesticides and organic waste with them, and they threaten the country’s natural salmon population, which has declined by three quarters since 1970.

The article reveals that Björk wrote and recorded “Oral” in the ’90s but did not release it at the time because it felt too poppy and mainstream to fit on avant-pop masterpieces like 1997’s Homogenic and 2001’s Vespertine. When she became aware of this fish farming situation, she decided to dig up the song and invited Rosalía to freshen it up.

In the interview, Björk explained how funds from the sales of “Oral” will be used:

Since this is all in the west fjords, the east fjords have not been attacked yet. But there’s one fjord there called Seyðisfjörður. There are these two venture capitalists who want to start [a fish farm] there and the majority of the people who live by this fjord don’t want it and have been protesting in the streets and started a legal case.

We would like the profit from the song to go to help these people win this court case. It will take two or three years, and when they win it, we can use that as an exemplary case to other fjords and hopefully the world.

She added the following statement in a social media post Monday:

i am so happy to announce the release of “oral” a single with @rosalia, tomorrow 21st of november

the profits will all go to stop open net pen fish farming in iceland.

this is a 25 year old song of mine i wrote and programmed inspired by a dancehall beat (the grandmother of reggaeton)

rosalia´s experiments with the genre and her incredible voice made her an obvious guest for the song.

i feel blessed she said yes and she and her team are giving their work and all the profits to this battle.

i think somehow there is an elegant resonance between the fact that both of our voices are the same age on the recording.

i would like to thank @segabodega for co-producing this with me and rosalia.

we have a team of people from the biggest environmental groups in iceland with lawyers that will take on other open net pen fish farming cases, I would like to thank them all for all their hard voluntary work.

industrial salmon farming in open net pens is horrid for the environment. the farmed salmon goes through immense suffering, and it causes severe harm for our planet. this is an extraordinarily cruel way to make food. the fight against the open net pen industry is a part of the fight for the future of the planet.

one of the most severe environmental challenge for the north this century is the acidity of the ocean. in the space of 5 years, norwegian open sea fish farming of companies MOWI and SalMar have already damaged big areas in our fjords , both marine life , animals and plants , which will attribute to that .

we can still reverse this. our legal cases on bio-diversity, cruelty to animals and more could become exemplary cases around the world.

warmthness

björk

Watch director Carlota Guerrero’s “Oral” video below. Björk has set up a donation page here.