LISTEN: Evan Greer – ‘Surveillance Capitalism’

A rallying cry against the un-nerving nature of Spotify’s increasingly pervasive developments in user-monitoring technologies, Boston-based indie-punk artist Evan Greer has shared her latest single ‘Surveillance Capitalism’. Taken from her new album Spotify is Surveillance, released via Don Giovanni Records and queer-run independent label Get Better Records, the track also marks the launch of Greer’s StopSpotifySurveillance.org campaign with digital rights platform Fight for the Future.

The campaign calls on Spotify to drop reported plans to use artificial intelligence and voice recognition software to spy on listeners’ conversations, conducting emotional surveillance and manipulation to target music and advertising. Greer, who is also a journalist & a pro-active voice for trans rights and equality, will be donating all the profits from her single to the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers (UMAW) to support their #JusticeAtSpotify campaign.

“We all want to be seen / but behind the screen / there’s a nightmare dressed up as a dream,” Greer sings, a sentiment that will resonate deeper with listeners who have endured a year of increased screen-time due to the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic’s on-going lockdowns. The idea that Spotify could be spying on and profiting from people’s privacy via new technologies is abhorrent to Greer, and she wants listeners to push back against the platform’s plans too.

“The fact that Spotify filed a patent for this type of emotional surveillance and manipulation is beyond chilling,” she explains. “It’s not enough for them to say that they have no plans to use this technology right now, they should publicly commit to never conducting this type of surveillance on music listeners. Surveillance capitalism as a business model is fundamentally incompatible with basic human rights and democracy, regardless of whether it’s being employed by Facebook, Amazon, or Spotify.

The song and video highlight the fact that the Internet has the potential to profoundly transform our society for the better, abolishing false scarcity and enabling universal access to human knowledge and creativity, while ensuring marginalized and independent artists and creators are fairly compensated for our labour. But if we allow a small handful of companies to dominate the web and the music industry with a parasitic business model based on surveillance and exploitation, we’re headed for the opposite: a dystopian future where algorithms decide what we see and hear based on profit, rather than artistry.”

Listen to ‘Surveillance Capitalism’ below.

Follow Evan Greer on bandcamp, Spotify, Twitter & Instagram

Photo Credit: Kayana Szymczak

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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VIDEO PREMIERE: Maud – ‘Nobody’

A shadowy electro-pop gem that champions personal growth and self-autonomy, Norwegian producer & songwriter Maud has shared her a new video to accompany her latest single ‘Nobody’. Directed by Danish video artist Signe Dige (Chinah), the visuals combine acidic colours with surreal photo-negative-style close ups to reflect the track’s themes of emotional resilience and finding your inner strength.

“Signe and I had one short phone call before we started working together and the rest of our communication was through WhatsApp,” Maud explains about the video. “The threshold for collaborating with people digitally is so low right now, and I love how I can just find inspiring artists in other countries through Instagram and instantly be able to connect with them.”

“The idea behind the video was to portray the intimate and sincere self-love described in ‘Nobody’ by combining playful close-ups of me in a dark visual landscape,” Maud continues. “I shot some videos on my phone in my apartment in Kristiansand, sent it to Signe in Denmark and then she edited it together with some crazy good animations that she made. The result is dreamy and organic, but also a raw and dramatic video which fits my single perfectly.”

Watch the video for ‘Nobody’ below.

Follow Maud on Spotify, Instagram, Twitter & Facebook

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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Track Of The Day: Milly Blue – ‘Dancer Teleports into Thames Mud’

A tender, sparse soundscape inspired by the lost relics of ancient shipwrecks resting at the bottom of the river Thames, Mancunian vocalist, songwriter & composer Milly Blue has shared her debut solo single ‘Dancer Teleports into Thames Mud (Kisses Fragmented Self with Tongues)’. Originally written to provide a soundtrack for London-based photographer Holly Birtles’ exhibition ‘Up to your Neck in Mud’ at xxijrahii gallery in Deptford, the track is a beguiling offering that softly spotlights Milly’s intuitive song-writing talent.

Although this is her first solo offering, Milly has been collaborating with an eclectic range of musicians since her teenage years. She provided vocals for Basement Jaxx, toured and collaborated with Andrew Hung (Fuck Buttons), and has performed alongside Beck, Kae Tempest and the Guillemots. Now, she’s applying her multi-talented approach to her own music and is preparing to release her new album, elephant, Baby, later this year. Latest single ‘Dancer Teleports into Thames Mud’ will be featured on the record.

Full of Milly’s lush vocal layers, the track soothes and unsettles in the same breath. “Holly approached me to compose a piece to accompany the end of her exhibition,” Milly explains about ‘Dancer Teleports into Thames Mud’. “Her images were abstract and disjointed, exploring the sheer number of shipwrecks in the Thames and the objects, animals and even towns that have been lost into mud, both along that river and on the coast of the North Sea.

With the track, I wanted to make something haunting and bare. Something that could be ancient and lost. The layers intermittently jar and tesselate and there is a real sense of melancholy in the music. But in a comforting sense. Like loving spirits, visiting you from the mud. Holly, after hearing the track, created a beautiful video to accompany it. I’m really happy and excited about the results.”

Watch the video for ‘Dancer Teleports into Thames Mud’ below.

Follow Milly Blue on bandcamp, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram & Facebook

Photo Credit: Andre Russell

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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FIVE FAVOURITES: Francis Of Delirium

Creators of swirling, grunge-infused guitar tunes, Luxembourg-based duo Francis Of Delirium write songs about the ever-evolving nature of human emotion. Together, songwriter & guitarist Jana Bahrich and her collaborator Chris Hewett have released two EPs via Dalliance Records, with their most recent offering, Wading, continuing Jana’s narratives of personal resilience and enlightenment.

We think one of the best ways to get to know a band is by asking what music inspired them to write in the first place. We caught up with Jana to ask her about her “Five Favourites” – five albums that have inspired the band’s song-writing techniques. Check out her choices below and scroll down to listen to Francis Of Delirium’s latest single ‘I Think I’m Losing’ at the end of this post.

1. Arca – KiCk i
I found Arca through the newest Euphoria episode. There’s this one scene where they use Arca’s music and it’s this crazy gunshot type beat and it sounds so smoke and it is probably the coolest thing I’ve ever heard. I spent weeks trying to figure out where I could hear it in full but it turns out it’s not released. In the process though, I became obsessed with her album KiCk i. I’m trying to get better at electronic production and I like to use Kick i as my north star, less as a template to copy but more as the realization that anything is possible. She’s so creative in everything that she does which I find very inspiring, plus her songs just do something to my body that makes it feel like it’s exploding. I love you Arca.

2. Sufjan Stevens – All Delighted People
Hoping this will pass as an “album” even though it’s an EP! This is my favourite Sufjan project, easily. I feel like in this era Sufjan Stevens was making music for kids who were in the school brass band and so I felt very seen. I love the way he uses horns and trombones in All Delighted PeOple and the song-writing is still so strong, he also just gives you so much time to settle into each song which I love. The first Sufjan Stevens song I ever heard was ‘Casmir Pulaski Day’, my friends showed it to me. I went home that day and then learned it on the banjo. I spent a lot of my teens consuming solely his music. Then I realized his music was in Little Miss Sunshine which was my favourite movie then, so it felt like Sufjan was the man for me.

3. Half Waif – The Caretaker
Half Waif has such a wonderful ear for melody and uses vocal harmonies so wonderfully. Even on the first track, you’re almost immediately hit with those harmonies and they’re so beautiful and her delivery is heart-breaking and pulls at your chest. I couldn’t tell you how she’s influenced my song-writing but she must have because I’ve probably listened to The Caretaker everyday since it came out. Similarly to Arca, I often reference Nandi’s production choices, she has an incredible ability to make electronic sounds feel so tactile and warm and human, I just love everything she does. I first found Half Waif through her Tiny Desk which is also incredible, I say it a lot but I just love when artists give you their whole voice and body in a performance, it becomes so easy to connect with them through that.

4. Car Seat Headrest – Twin Fantasy
I don’t know how much I can express how much I love this album. When it comes to rock music and I look at someone like Car Seat Headrest, it’s just a reminder that you can and should keep making music on your own and you should make whatever it is you want to make. Especially since Chris and I record our own music, I found it really helpful to look to other artists that were making music on their own and read articles from them to try and figure out how to do it on their own. Then lyrically and performance wise the album is perfect to me, I find a kind of peace whenever I listen to Twin Fantasy. There’s always something unexpected in a Car Seat Headrest song when you listen to it the first time and I really value that, I feel like you are walking along some dark long winding road whenever you jump into a Car Seat Headrest record.

5. Heart – Dreamboat Annie
A lot of my favourite songs and albums I’ve actively disliked before I love them. For some reason, I couldn’t get into ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ when I was young and then I turned 14 and it was the greatest song I’d ever heard. I have a specific memory of this one rock station in Vancouver that would always play Heart all the time whenever my dad and I would drive to Taekwondo, and I thought it was some of the worst music I’d ever heard. After maybe 5 car rides, I was obsessed with Heart. If my dad and I go on a drive anywhere now, we definitely scream and sing along to ‘Crazy On You’, that song is so good, and they’re both so talented it’s crazy. They give everything to all the songs they play and that is something I try to do with every performance of our songs.

Thanks to Jana for sharing her favourites with us!

Follow Francis Of Delirium on bandcamp, Spotify, Facebook, Twitter & Instagram

Photo Credit: Lynn Theisen

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