Archives

Art Pop

For Each Song I Create a New Character

by Ben Richel


During my childhood in Savoie, France, most of my free time was devoted to one activity: imagination. I imagine grandiose destinies but also standard and common stories: From fishermen in the Philippines to Western rockstars, from 19th-century wars to post-collapse scenarios, from my Star Wars spin-offs to projecting myself on stage later… I could imagine revolutionary flying machines, and the same day imagine the realistic routine of the today’s French middle class (I am myself in the middle, like Malcolm!)

For me, everything is interesting.

My life has been built by imagining and connecting lives. It was obvious that one day I would invent characters, partly because expressing my whole personality cannot be done by simply embodying a predefined, cliché role given by society.

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‘10 Years of Travel’ – The Long Journey Home

by Andy Coombs of Soft Cotton County

Soft Cotton County


Music was once ‘the most important, unimportant thing we had,’ said music critic and presenter Robert Elms. This sums up my relationship with writing in general and music in particular. I want to keep it unique and avoid the fillers and the B-sides. One great song would make me happy. In an ocean of mediocrity, sea levels are rising, but starfish are still found in the depths.

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Scene from an Art Heist

by Nick Stevens a.k.a. The Eighty Six Seas

Nick Stevens a.k.a. The Eighty Six Seas


The most vivid artwork I’ve ever seen was a series of blank frames.

The first time I walked into the Dutch Room at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, I was gobsmacked. This room was the site of the most notorious art heist in history, where thirty-three years ago, two thieves disguised as police officers broke into the museum and stole half a billion dollars worth of masterpieces by Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Degas. I’ve never witnessed such a visceral display of the absence of art.

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Room 167 – A Space In Time

by Manuel of Raven and Phan

How Many Times by Raven and Phan


Raven and Phan, also known as Utku and Manuel (me), is a duo from Vienna, Austria. Utku is originally from Istanbul, Turkey, and has lived in various countries in Europe and America. Our music is influenced by cultural, musical, melodic, and rhythmic elements, which is why we like to refer to our music as “A sonic odyssey from the Bosporus to the Alps.”

We met in 2014 when I was searching for a guitar player for my project. A mutual friend, Ilkhan, introduced us, and we began playing together. At the time, they were founding a recording label, which I was also indirectly a part of. We spent our summer days chilling on Utku’s balcony, listening to inspiring music such as Caribou’s track “Sun,” Chet Faker, Nicolas Jaar, and Jamie XX. Our goal was to create music that reflected our unique perspectives and shared influences.

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Soaked in Secrets

by R L Armstrong

Soaked in Secrets by R L Armstrong
The day is November 9, 2019, and I live in Calgary Alberta, Canada. I grew up in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, the same town as Justin Bieber. Belieber it or not I actually babysat him once and played music with him a few times before he became the hugely famous, hated, loved, etc etc .etc .superstar kid-adult that he is now. That being said the youth culture that I grew up in that town a few years before he was not at all like what you would think a town that Justin Bieber partly grew up in would be…

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Classic Pop Reborn For A Hip Hop Is Pop World

by Cosmos T’err

Classic Pop Reborn For A Hip Hop Is Pop World by Cosmos T'err
For most of a decade, Carlotta loitered, half-finished, in the fringes of my songbook. Old-fashioned with modern sensibilities, her presence was staunch, her gaze penetrating, yet musically, her identity remained vague.

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Healing Sounds

by K.P. Ransom

Ohmwrecker: Music was our Salvation

Ohmwrecker was formed out of complete chaos and desperation.

After recording 20+ albums by myself as Six Car Collision for 18 years, I moved from Boston to Vancouver Island, British Columbia, and was unable to write and play music for about 4 years. I was just blocked… completely stuck and unable to write or say what it is I needed to say. For the first time since I’d started writing and performing, I was completely helpless.

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