Introducing Interview: Meduse MagiQ

Meduse MagiQ is an innovative arts collective and music label based in Amsterdam. It serves as a community focused on sound that supports locals bands and artists to explore music through collaboration, art, performance and exhibition.

We spoke to its founders to find out more…

Welcome to Get In Her Ears!  Can you tell us a bit about Meduse MagiQ and how it all started?
Meduse MagiQ is a sound and art collective driven by our love for music. We are a record label, a radio station and a recording studio that are located in the centre of Amsterdam in a building with a theatre, a venue and a vegetarian restaurant called ‘Plantage Dok’. We share our headquarters with 50 creatives consisting of artists, ngo’s, food waste collectives, tattoo artists and experimental composers. We started the Meduse MagiQ collective a couple of years ago when we decided it was time for a community that was about sound and only sound. We wanted to support our local bands, artists and our creative network and bring back the focus to art and music. I can see at Meduse MagiQ you are focused on giving musicians their own voice and space to explore music through collaboration, art, performance and exhibition.

What have you been most proud of so far at Meduse MagiQ?
We are dreamers. The most proud we are of daring to dream and the materialization of those dreams. All projects, collaboration and tours came from an open and curious mind. Blue Crime driving 9500km trough Canada, Spill Gold going trough Switzerland and filming in the snowy mountains, making new records in China, the Moon Festival, our research in the Sahara desert and our summer festival in a small french Village in the south are all examples and started with a simple conversation in our studio. We never say no to the possibility of a sonic adventure.

So you’re both in bands – Blue Crime and Spill Gold – can you tell me about about them?
Our bands and musical collectives are a creative group of people where everyone is equally important, whatever it is that they do in the band. We go for unity. Spill Gold is a psychedelic three-piece that unwinds vivid, spiralling stories with their eerie yet persistent songs and brings listeners into a trance-like state. They saw the sirens– and just like that, as they were sitting in the rain, daydreaming on a foggy mountain trip with Japhy Ryder, witnessed the rising of an unusual new moon. A revelation that would not be contained, an unrelenting vision that demanded to be shared. Blue Crime’s stars have a gloomy shine, inspired by myths and dreams and parallel universes. Earth felt too low; space is the place. They started out as a glowworm in a dark atom shelter, and emerged as eerie moonpop, growing grittier in time. Call it moonpsych, noisefolk, call it earthquakes with guitars and vocal eclipses. Or just feel it, and call it nothing at all. Be it love or hate, dark or light… Blue Crime shows no mercy for the sober and cold-hearted.

What are your thoughts about female representation in the music industry? 
We love females in the music industry. We love guys in the music industry too. We love genderless. It is true that at the moment the balance between men and women is rather disturbed, like in many parts of society and the world. This is why we like to support women creators and we choose to program them. We don’t think it is important to explicitly focus on gender. A musician is a musician,  whether they are man, woman, both or none. We do think it is important to bring back balance. We should all support each other and create equal chances and conditions. It’s everyone’s job to protect diversity in the music industry. The more diversity there is the more interesting it gets. Music is about free expression and that means that every musician is free to be whatever they are. We think it’s important to focus on the artists’ music instead of their appearance or gender.

If someone wanted to get involved with Meduse MagiQ, would they be able to? If so, how?
Yes they would. Come visit our headquarters. Everyone is welcome to write us if they want to get involved in any way. Mail or letter, sonically or images, feel free to connect. You can find all information on www.medusemagiq.com

Finally, as we’re a new music focused site, are there any new/upcoming bands or artists you’d suggest we check out?
Ada Gadass is our newest project. It consists of a continuous sound wave inspired by the Desert. Spill Gold just has an EP out on our label, called Mercury that they will tour in Canada and Blue Crime is off to China to record ‘Xinshi’, their new art project with a Chinese poet and tour. Soon we’ll start our new program called ‘Melting Universe’ which consists of 5 dialogues between female experimental composers such as Jessica Moss and Baby Alien Collective.

Huge thanks to Meduse MagiQ for answering our questions! 

Spill Gold play MOTH Club on May 27th – tix here

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INTERVIEW: Queen Zee

“I could do a Morrissey…” threatens Queen Zee, as we sit outside of Hackney’s Sebright Arms chatting before the band’s headline gig at the venue that evening (April 26th). Zee’s referring to The Smiths’ front-man’s recent controversial interview in which he makes more of his weird and divisive statements for seemingly no reason. I know it’s an idle threat, but Zee’s dry wit puts me at ease. I begin by asking Zee about what they’re expecting from the show that evening.

“The great thing with Queen Zee gigs is that you never really know what’s going to happen. Sometimes we turn up and it’s absolute mayhem, and sometimes we turn up and people are ballroom dancing. You can’t predict it, and that’s what I love about it”

It’s this unpredictability that drew me to the band in the first place. I saw them support Marmozets on their 2017 UK tour at The Garage, and I was blown away by their ability to get the crowd stirred up in to a mosh pit with their songs ‘Boy’ and ‘Fly The Pink Flag’. Their combination of punk anthems and activist attitude has laid the foundations for a community of fans to unite and celebrate in style – and safety – when they attend Queen Zee gigs. I ask Zee whether fans approach them after shows about this.

“We do have some fans who prefer to message us after the gig on Twitter which is always nice, but I make a point when I’m on stage of saying ‘come and say hello’, because I love sharing and I see Queen Zee as a collective, not just as an extension of my ego or as my project. I like people getting involved. People have been customising their clothes and getting tattoos…”

I tell Zee that I saw that a fan had posted a picture of the “sass or die” tattoo that they’d had inked in honour of the band on Queen Zee’s social media accounts. But for every loyal fan, there seems to be a troll. I ask about the trolling Zee experienced on the band’s posts about International Transgender Day Of Visibility (31st March). I ask if shouting back – which Zee always does – takes its toll, or do posts like the one about the tattoo make things easier to deal with?

“Cis people will see these things online and be really shocked by that, but one of the main things for trans people is that you go through things like that every day anyway, it’s just not always online. I actually love people trolling, it’s my favourite thing. I know that I have offended them, and that my existence offends them – and I think that’s brilliant. I don’t want those people to like me, I don’t want them to come to our shows if they’re that bigoted.

Going back to the tattoo though, I absolutely love that. I think it’s bizarre that people would do that. It blows my mind. We played this huge punk show in Liverpool last year, where all the DIY punks get together as a collective and play to about 300 people. We played that and my guitar broke, so we just had to play cover songs, and after that the fan came up to me and showed me the “sass or die” tattoo – and that was the way we ended 2017: it was absolutely amazing. I loved it”.

I broach the subject of mental health too, as this is also an issue Zee speaks openly about online. I ask if they have any advice for other bands who find themselves feeling mentally drained whilst on tour.

“The big thing for me was that I was originally really anti-meds. But actually, just starting on meds has totally changed my life and I feel so much better for it. I don’t want to be ‘pro-meds’ – whatever your stance is, it’s your stance and that’s totally fine – but I would advise people to come to their own decisions, and don’t close your mind off to it. Especially if it’s something that could potentially help you.

General advice and stuff for bands is to eat well, sleep well, and look after each other. It’s dead simple. When we first started touring it was like ‘Yeah! We’re on tour, let’s go out every night!’ and you end up being destroyed by day ten. You get physically ill too.

The thing that made me really ill whilst touring though was that the band consumes your life, so it takes away your social life and even though you’re with your best friends in a band, you don’t see your family, or your other friends, or your partner. And on top of that you’re constantly tired, so it all adds up. I would advise keeping in contact with friends as much as you can. Get your friends to come to shows in the different cities that you’re touring, which is what I’ve done on this tour. A bit of life outside of the band whilst you’re all on tour is great, and it will stop you killing each other.

Our band is formed of five of the most annoying individuals ever. Our bassist is obsessed with meme songs, so on the way here we were listening to Toto – just Toto. It’s funny to start with, you’re like ‘you’ve played ‘Africa’ a few times, okay’ and then he played another Toto song, and another one, and another. He played them for the entire journey – which was an hour. He’s lucky to still be alive. So yeah, no Toto songs on tour…

After establishing a strong “No Toto” rule, I ask if Zee can remember the first time they crowd-surfed or got involved in a mosh pit at a gig, as both of these things always occur at Queen Zee shows.

“The first time I crowd-surfed was as Queen Zee. I never had the guts as a little queer kid to get down to the front and do it. I can’t remember the first time I moshed really, but I was always in to punk and thrash bands so I definitely moshed at those gigs. It was very macho though, so I didn’t feel very welcome in to any of that and there was never really any girls in the pit. So it’s great now when we play shows that I see a mix of girls and guys in the mosh.”

I highlight what a great achievement that is, to have created the safe space that Zee felt was initially lacking at gigs.

“That’s what it’s all about. People know at our gigs that we won’t tolerate any nonsense either. We stopped a show in Nottingham on this tour because our bassist Frankie’s Mum got punched in the face. It was the last song of the set, so I was like ‘if you want to move about, this is your chance to do it!’ and this guy thought it was a great idea to just to swing round in to me, hitting Frankie’s Mum in the face in the process.”

I point out that of all the people that could’ve happened to, what are the chances it would be the Bassist’s Mum…

“I know! I was like ‘you need to leave, now’. Luckily she was okay, she actually loved it! Mosh pits are weird though. We had a gig in Birmingham the other day, and the crowd for the support bands were quite young, maybe seventeen year olds? So they were really kicking off, and I thought I’d jump in because you know, it’s only kids – but I just got beaten up! I’m too old. I’m twenty-four this year, and I came out of that mosh bruised and feeling like a fifty year old”.

I ask Zee what new music they’ve been listening too, as GIHEs are always interested in new music recommendations from our favourite bands.

“There’s so many on this tour that we’ve played with. A band from Cardiff called CHROMA are amazing. We shared a stage with them at Reading & Leeds last year and then we’ve played with them on this tour, and they always blow me away. Their songs have a really cool Death From Above type vibes to them. There’s a band from Nottingham called Babe Punch who play Riot Grrrl-esque punk stuff, and they do a really good cover of ABBA’s ‘SOS’. Salt Bath are another Cardiff band who play really cool queer punk stuff. They’re my big three”.

Now it’s time to talk about plans for the summer. I ask what festivals Queen Zee will be playing at, and if there are any festivals Zee would like to attend just as a fan.

“I hate music…”

It takes me a moment to work out whether Zee’s joking or not…

“No seriously, when we play a gig or we’re watching support bands I’m like “Ah music is great, I love it!” but when I’m at home I never listen to music. I’m chilling the fuck out and watching Netflix, I’m not going to any festivals as a fan! After seeing the inner-workings of festivals as well, it changes your perspective on things. It’s always so stressful trying to get from point A to point B in a field, which you think would be simple but it’s the most difficult thing.

But, having said that, we’re playing quite a few festivals in May. We’re playing The Great Escape, Sound City, Live At Leeds, Neighbourhood and there’s more on the horizon too. We’ve got some time off on June & July to do some more recording though.

To make the idea of Festivals more bearable, I ask Zee what their dream Festival line-up would be.

“Dream headliner would be Me, with a support of Me and just before that it would be Me. Doing slightly different stuff though, maybe even a ‘Toto’ covers set? I dunno, I’d probably give the headline slot to someone who really deserves it.

I have really bad music taste, I love classic rock like Twisted Sister. I’m obsessed with them, and I know I shouldn’t be, and I know it’s bad. Everyone else in the band has really cool music taste like Pixies and Neutral Milk Hotel and I’m like ‘okay, does anyone like Scorpions?’ I’d like to see The B52s, I don’t even know if they’re still going?’

I mention that Cindy Wilson of the B52s is doing her own solo stuff now, so that might have to wait.

“I’d resurrect ABBA! To be honest, it’d probably just be loads of little bands in a sweat-box venue. Oh wait – I’ve got my dream headliner – Judas Priest…I’m obsessed with them.”

Little did we know at this point that the next day ABBA would announce they’re releasing new music. It’s as if Zee has a sixth sense. To end our chat, I ask Zee what three words they’d used to describe Queen Zee – aside from “sass or die”…

“Tortured Scissor Sisters…”

Fingers crossed that’s what Zee calls the band’s debut album.

Catch Queen Zee at The Great Escape at The Hope & Ruin (10:45pm -Thursday 17th May)

Photo Credit: Jon Mo

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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Interview: The Anchoress

Catherine Davies AKA The Anchoress has recently stepped off a UK tour with childhood heroes Manic Street Preachers, for which she joined them on stage for the classic hit ‘Little Baby Nothing’ as well as ‘Dylan & Caitlin’ (which features on their latest album). And, as if this wasn’t impressive enough, she then headed straight to Croatia to perform with Simple Minds.

The Welsh songstress took some time out of her gruelling schedule, however, to talk to Get In Her Ears about touring life and her creative process…

Hi Catherine, welcome to Get In Her Ears! If you could use one word to describe your journey since becoming The Anchoress and now what would it be?
Uphill.

Collaborating with the Manic Street Preachers on their latest album plus duetting on ‘Little Baby Nothing’ with them must have been an exciting project as a life long Manics fan. As you are both heavily inspired by literature and poetry, was it a meeting of the minds?
Absolutely. I’ve been a fan of the Manics since I was 12, so they’ve hugely influenced my cultural education in terms of literature and film, as well as the general course of my life (being the first in my family to attend university and going on to study to PhD level as a result of their “education”). We had such a shared vocabulary, culturally speaking, that it felt like a very natural collaboration.

Is literature and poetry a passion you keep separate from your role as a musician, or do you allow the two passions to combine?
I’m sure that studying poetry for such a long time has informed my use of metre and rhyme when I’m writing songs. I tend to always collect quotes and snippets from books or films when I’m making an album too as I find that helps me focus and coalesce the themes and preoccupations. When I come to think of it, making a record isn’t all that dissimilar from writing a PhD – lots of self-imposed isolation, research and reading!

Manic Street Preachers have the nicest fanbase in rock. Have they welcomed you into the fold?
I can honestly say that I’ve had the warmest welcome from the fanbase. The internet can sometimes be a cruel and nasty place, but I’ve had nothing but a positive reaction to the duet and to the shows (since I first supported them back in 2016 at the Eden Project). The fans are an absolute credit to the band and their ethos.

Which other artists or bands inspire you?
I love a lot of “art rock” – Roxy Music, Bowie, Eno, but I’m also a big fan of Nine Inch Nails and Deftones, as well as being reasonably obsessed with the Beatles, Kate Bush, and Prince. Amazing pop music is something I come back to a lot as well: ABBA, The Carpenters and ELO. I’m also still hugely moved by a lot of classical music I grew up dancing to. I think what consistently inspires me though is great songs, whatever genre or style they may fit into. My most recent obsessively listened to albums have been Father John Misty, Sharon Van Etten, and The Twilight Sad.

You mention in your biography on your website that in creating your artistic persona you are not afraid of giving into madness which may lie within that solitude. Which part of that creative process appeals to you and do you feel it opens the way to more creativity?
I enjoy the immersive process of making a record, and the contrast of that to the touring life of constant travel and movement. It’s nice sometimes to be still and not leave the house for while… I’m naturally quite a solitary person which has always informed the life choices I’ve made – studying for so long, being a solo artist (not being in a band). But that’s not to say that some of the richest life experiences I’ve had haven’t come from collaborating and working with others. That’s the holy grail – to balance the solitude with the conversation.

Your sound is pretty fierce and powerful. Do you intentionally like to pack a punch in your songwriting?
I don’t really think about external pressures to be or sound a certain way when I’m writing or in the studio. I think my default mode in life is certainly to be a little angry at all times about something or other (there’s lots to be mad about…) and that probably permeates the songs I write and my production.

The music industry is a very fast paced world, do you feel that there’s a pressure to jump from project to project in a short time frame?
Economically speaking, there’s pressure to juggle many things. Most musicians are self-employed and freelance which creates a certain pressure to say “yes” to work when it’s offered and assume that there is always a fallow period coming. Creatively, I don’t think that’s always best for an artist – you need time to let things percolate and the way I produce records is very much about having the time and space to immerse and procrastinate on the small details.

Are you looking to head in a different creative direction with album number two?
Naturally, the sound of the next album has evolved, and the theme of the new record is quite distinct from the first. Gear wise, I’ve used a lot of vintage synths on the second album and played/written more on the guitar, but at the core of everything is still the piano (as with the first album).

Have you got any tours planned for the rest of 2018? If so where will you be stopping off?
I will be playing at Robert Smith’s Meltdown at the Royal Festival Hall on June 19th – that will be the first Anchoress show of the year, where we may even debut some new material from the next album. The rest of the summer I’m insanely busy touring with Simple Minds all over Europe and the UK.

Huge thanks to Catherine for answering our questions!

Nicky Lee-Delisle
@Nicky___Lee

Photo Credit: Annick Wolfers

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Eurovision 2018 Preview

You’re probably wondering why Get In Her Ears would indulge me in allowing an article extolling the Eurovision Contest’s virtues. But, whether you watch the contest in a detached ironic fashion, or if you avoid it like the plague, I’m here to tell you why Europe’s favourite TV show is, in 2018, more important than ever.

It’s nicknamed ‘gay Xmas’ – and that still matters.
Massive parts of Europe still either outlaw LGBTQ behaviour, or repress it with violence, whilst politicians condemn gay people and restrict their freedom. Eurovision is family entertainment – like most people, I watched it as a kid – and has also developed a substantial gay following. Giving visibility across all of Europe and making statements of solidarity and universality (if occasionally a little broad and insipid) still matters.

It’s internationalist.
Whether you voted leave or remain in the European Union referendum, it’s hard to ignore the feeling that the UK is drifting towards a position further away from Europe. Eurovision allows different countries, from cultures as diverse as Portugal, Finland, Turkey and Russia to come together. It’s like an Olympics of singing. And when you bear in mind that relations between Turkey and Armenia, Greece and Cyprus, and Russia and the UK, are frosty at best, seeing people from those nations in one place kind of makes you optimistic.

It puts outsiders in the mainstream.
Conchita Wurst, Lordi, Verka Serduchka, Terry Wogan… Eurovision has brought us a world of different characters – and not always what you would expect from their country of origin. As someone who enjoys predominantly ‘alternative’ music, Eurovision has always seemed to be open to the weird and eccentric, and when you look at the history of the competition, they often seem to be some of its most successful entries.

It can still surprise you.
The grand dame might have been going since 1956, yet she still has the capacity to throw up surprises. Just because you think that Georgian ballad is a bit boring doesn’t mean it won’t get 12 points from Latvia and, with such an open field, the winner is notoriously hard to predict. No-one gave Ukraine or Portugal a chance in the 2016 or 2017 contests and they took the prize, possibly because they gave surprisingly honest and real performances in a contest high on glitz and showbiz. What might surprise you most this year? A lot of the songs are actually quite good!

It’s a reality show, but it doesn’t take itself too seriously.
One thing that reality shows do, constantly, is talk up the ‘journey’ its contestants have been on, with a lot of the crucial aspects hyped up or stretched out for the purposes of giving the show added drama. Not in Eurovision. It zips along at a frantic pace (fitting in 25 performances plus results in 3 or so hours) and is usually happy to poke fun at itself. In a time when even baking is given the full drama of television, Eurovision is self-aware and celebratory.

And some of this year’s best entries include… 

Australia: It’s a bit Ellie Goulding, but the anthemic nature of ‘We Got Love’ might mean Jessica Mauboy brings home Oz’s first win. (Yes, I know Australia isn’t in Europe).

Cyprus: An old-school tacky Europop with indecipherable lyrics, ‘Fuego’ has become the bookies’ favourite largely due to the charming choreography (with an array of hair flicks) courtesy of Eleni Foureira. In a wide open race, it might just light up the contest.

Estonia: If Elina Nechayeva’s soprano voice doesn’t get you, the SFX dress in the performance of ‘La Forza’ just might.

France: This year’s most political entry, the lyrics of ‘Mercy’ were inspired by the true story of a baby born to refugees on a boat in the Mediterranean. Madame Monsieur are the latest in a strand of French pop that acts as a cultural commentary, in the vein of Christine & The Queens.

John McGovern
@etinsuburbiaego

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