Monday 4 April 2022, 8pm
The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid is the debut release by ---__--__ composed of Mari Maurice (More Eaze) and Seth Graham. The release has also been arranged with commissioned instrumentation from Karen Ng, Nick Storring, Rob Mcgill, Meteronori, spoken word from Proxy.exe, and guest vocals from Recovery girl and Meteronori
The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid is the expression of Midwestern sadness, the entrapment of class and inexpressible discontent. The opener “When you're hot around the narcs” showcases shoegaze-like whisper vocals with simple classical arrangements weaving blips of free jazz sax; this track sets the mood for The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid: a near death experience from narcotics addiction (a common and personal story of Ohio).
There is clear vulnerability with phrases barely holding on to minimal arrangements. Mari's falsetto voice floats above breathing woodwinds, atonal classical expression with a consistent melancholy mood of crotale melody throughout The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid. A swirl of frustration and hopelessness lead by crooner opera, akin to Harmony Korine’s works and Tilt by Scott Walker, or Blemish by David Sylvian.
"Long time friends Elena Isolini and Bianca Scout align amidst the madness to deliver their new collaborative album for Them There - Our Hearts. Both dedicated and revered, multi-disciplined artists in their own right, the pair harness a spectrum of talents from their individual fields for this moving new album. Friends and contributors to Our Hearts include Mun Sing (Giant Swan), Cameron Molloy (Violence Grass Band) and Alex Mckenzie (Gentle Stranger).
Informed in-part by their contemporary dance and movement collective ‘Daughter Mary’, Our Hearts explores narrative led composition through slow motion, character-like vocalisations that render remote scenes of fabled icy landscapes. Through the mist of choral vocals, raw, choppy samples brush against guitar and piano loops to lull the listener. Conjuring elements of Collage Pop and gnarly Experimental Ambient, the kind that fans of Bianca Scout may already be familiar with from her previous collaborations with the likes of Klein and the Curl collective.
Recorded and produced in London over intermittent gatherings throughout the past four years, Our Hearts reflects two independent artists with a singular vision, sharing a voice to present a surreal but honest exchange of energy.
An expression of healing through a retrospective lens, “The endurance of this frame, is not the picture.”
Laurie Tompkins (b.1990) is a UK composer, performer and co-founder and co-director of the Slip label.
From scores for samples, instruments and voices he creates a grabbable music that dreams and confounds. Bodies, things, words, and sounds strain under duress, looping their way through scenes of grubby presence, not-quite riff, mouldy echo, and swollen bombast.
His spring 2022 discs for Entr’acte, 33-33 and Hyperdelia are a thick, unruly soup of keys and computer with pianist Eliza McCarthy; a desperate suite of consoling, tanked songs with takes from Jess Hickie-Kallenbach, Teresa Winter, Gwilly Edmondez and videos by Joel Wycherley; and some dilated rotten soul with Eliza and Ashley Paul.
Laurie helms Slip, which has released music by Yeah You, Mica Levi, Julia Reidy, Bass Clef, Object Collection, ilgendo, Chaines & Competition, Old releases of his own include ‘Ample Profanity' (2018), with cellist Oliver Coates; 'Heat, War, Sweat, Law' (2016); and 'Exorcise' (2021), as Yes Indeed with bassist Otto Willberg, justly hailed as “proper, mad scones” (Boomkat).
Performances: Café Oto, Aldeburgh Music, Spike Island, Harp Art Lab (Harplinge) and National Sawdust (New York). Commissions: House of Bedlam, Daylight Editions, LSO Soundhub Scheme, ddmmyy and 840 series. Radio: specials for NTS and Resonance FM and a session with Adam Bohman recorded at Maida Vale studios, broadcast on BBC Radio 3.
