Music and video: Reuben Wu.
12 February 2015
11 February 2015
"Wolves" to be released on 7" vinyl
The vinyl is limited to 500 copies and has the catalog code TWI 1165. The B-side of the single features a driving analog remix of "Wolves" by Greek synthpop duo Marsheaux.
According to Helen: "The song reflects the sea of change that is people power. Where there is power, there is resistance".
"Wolves" is an electro ballad produced by Jonny Scott (The Kills, Strike the Colours).
Source
10 February 2015
Marnie salutes the Peruvian fans
Helen Marnie will perform at Blue Festival (Lima, Peru) on 30 April 2015.
07 February 2015
23 January 2015
Sunday Mail interview (2008)
The Beat Goes Tron
Ladytron singer Mira Aroyo quit science to hit the stage with Helen Marnie, Daniel Hunt and Reuben Wu - and reveals here why it was the best move she ever made.
Why is the album called Velocifero?
It means carrier of speed. It was the title of a track which didn't make it on the album but we liked the name so much we kept it. Scooters and pushbikes also go by the name. We Googled it and found it was also the title of a 19th-century Italian opera. We just liked it because of the speed of velocity.
What's the inspiration behind it?
To do something more diverse and better. That's all really, otherwise it's just the same inspiration for all the things we do. We want to make songs we enjoy and like playing and hopefully other people will enjoy them. We've been going for eight years and I don't think we would have if we weren't pushing forward. I'm happy with the album. I guess it's natural to think it's your favourite because it's the last one you have done.
What was it like recording in Paris?
We went straight from touring in America to recording. One of the studios we were in was underneath a big theatre where they record people like Charles Aznavour. Duran Duran recorded Rio there. It was funny doing it with people who were not English-speaking. Funny but nice.
You are originally from Bulgaria. Do you get back home much?
We've played there twice. I have to go quite often because my grandma and uncle are there. It was pretty amazing to play there because I think people appreciated it.
Do you get nervous playing at home?
My home town now is London. It's where my friends are. It's always stressful because you have to make sure everyone is OK. It's like it's your party and you never get to enjoy it much because you are pouring drinks and stuff.
How did the band meet?
Through friends. Helen was at university in Liverpool, where Danny and Reuben are from. They were on the music scene. They were DJing and we met through mutual friends.
Your fellow vocalist, Helen, is from Scotland. Do you visit here much?
I love coming to Scotland. We've played at Oran Mor in Glasgow a few times and it's one of our favourite venues in the UK. Because Helen is from Glasgow, she goes there all the time. She has a flat there as well.
You were a geneticist. How did you get into music?
We've all been very passionate about music and I was a DJ before but I never thought it would be a career. We all had jobs when we started Ladytron then little by little we ditched them. I was a geneticist doing a PhD and realising lab work wasn't for me. We were doing Ladytron at the same time and I was enjoying it more. It was easier and more fun.
Is there anyone you'd like to work with?
We are really interested in during more film soundtrack stuff. Stay at home, less touring, more soundtracks. The director who did the video for our single "Ghosts" is a big Ladytron fan and he has some scripts that he is hoping to start on next year. He has asked us to work on the music.
Any favourite films?
I'm obsessed by films so there are lots of favourites but I really like Watership Down, David Lynch films and lots of horror films.
What's your favourite way to spend a Sunday?
In summer, I like to go to a nice park, cycle around or have a picnic on a boat or a barge. Right now, that would be nice.
Source
Ladytron singer Mira Aroyo quit science to hit the stage with Helen Marnie, Daniel Hunt and Reuben Wu - and reveals here why it was the best move she ever made.
It means carrier of speed. It was the title of a track which didn't make it on the album but we liked the name so much we kept it. Scooters and pushbikes also go by the name. We Googled it and found it was also the title of a 19th-century Italian opera. We just liked it because of the speed of velocity.
What's the inspiration behind it?
To do something more diverse and better. That's all really, otherwise it's just the same inspiration for all the things we do. We want to make songs we enjoy and like playing and hopefully other people will enjoy them. We've been going for eight years and I don't think we would have if we weren't pushing forward. I'm happy with the album. I guess it's natural to think it's your favourite because it's the last one you have done.
What was it like recording in Paris?
We went straight from touring in America to recording. One of the studios we were in was underneath a big theatre where they record people like Charles Aznavour. Duran Duran recorded Rio there. It was funny doing it with people who were not English-speaking. Funny but nice.
You are originally from Bulgaria. Do you get back home much?
We've played there twice. I have to go quite often because my grandma and uncle are there. It was pretty amazing to play there because I think people appreciated it.
Do you get nervous playing at home?
My home town now is London. It's where my friends are. It's always stressful because you have to make sure everyone is OK. It's like it's your party and you never get to enjoy it much because you are pouring drinks and stuff.
How did the band meet?
Through friends. Helen was at university in Liverpool, where Danny and Reuben are from. They were on the music scene. They were DJing and we met through mutual friends.
Your fellow vocalist, Helen, is from Scotland. Do you visit here much?
I love coming to Scotland. We've played at Oran Mor in Glasgow a few times and it's one of our favourite venues in the UK. Because Helen is from Glasgow, she goes there all the time. She has a flat there as well.
We've all been very passionate about music and I was a DJ before but I never thought it would be a career. We all had jobs when we started Ladytron then little by little we ditched them. I was a geneticist doing a PhD and realising lab work wasn't for me. We were doing Ladytron at the same time and I was enjoying it more. It was easier and more fun.
Is there anyone you'd like to work with?
We are really interested in during more film soundtrack stuff. Stay at home, less touring, more soundtracks. The director who did the video for our single "Ghosts" is a big Ladytron fan and he has some scripts that he is hoping to start on next year. He has asked us to work on the music.
Any favourite films?
I'm obsessed by films so there are lots of favourites but I really like Watership Down, David Lynch films and lots of horror films.
What's your favourite way to spend a Sunday?
In summer, I like to go to a nice park, cycle around or have a picnic on a boat or a barge. Right now, that would be nice.
Source
20 January 2015
Excerpt from a new track by Reuben Wu
Reuben Wu posted on SoundCloud an excerpt from a new track for SiteSeer.
19 January 2015
17 January 2015
MTV Iggy interview (2015)
ICON: Ladytron's Helen Marnie Steps Out on Her Own
In late December, Helen Marnie, one-quarter of Ladytron and, as of recently, a solo artist recording under her last name, played her first solo gig in Glasgow. We met there in a pub to discuss her upcoming album and the fate of her famous band. "I think it went OK", she says modestly, then thinks for a moment. "Except no one told me my keyboard wasn't working for the entire show". The gig — a "not pretentious" benefit for TYCI, the Glasgow-based feminist collective founded by Chvrches' Lauren Mayberry — offered Marnie the chance to get a low-pressure solo show under her belt (and to iron out any kinks like malfunctioning keyboards) before the beginning of a year that will see her play overseas and release her second solo album. It was also a chance to reconnect with the community of her home city of Glasgow, where she returned, after 12 years living in London, two years ago.
With song titles like "High Road" (the name of '90s Scottish soap opera) and allusions to the sea, the influence of her return home is stamped over her first solo album, the warm and emotionally resonant Crystal World, released in 2013. "I think because it was my first solo album, things like my childhood and my influences were going to creep into it", she says. "Crystal World is very reflective and about looking back and reminiscing about things, so Scotland played a big part. It was recorded in Iceland, but Iceland didn't creep into it at all because the music and lyrics were already written".
Marnie went to Reykjavik to record at the studio of Barði Jóhannsson of Bang Gang and Starwalker. She brought on Johansson to co-produce with Ladytron bandmate Daniel Hunt so that the album would not be just a Ladytron project. Now she is working with Jonny Scott, known for his work with The Kills and Olympic Swimmers, who she describes as a "synth geek and quite pop-oriented".
For her next album, which will be out later this year, she plans to write and record with Scott. "I think it will probably go more electronic sounding than the previous one. I think Crystal World had a softer edge. It was electronic but had a folk tinge to it. The next one might be a bit weirder".
As a teaser, Marnie released the Scott-produced "Wolves", a track calling out the establishment and urging people to raise their voices, in September 2014 — pointedly right before the referendum. The chorus goes: "Raise all your voices / Gimme all your hands, take the chances / Don't be fooled, wolves in disguises / All your hands! All your hands! / Hail for better days!"
"I wrote the lyrics at the beginning of 2014 when there was so much information about [the referendum] being thrown at us". She says. "The referendum was part of my life for so long that it was natural that it fed into it. At the time, I realized what I was writing about, and I wanted it to be quite anthemic".
The solo work and return to Glasgow have had some worrying that Ladytron is no more, but that's not the case. In fact, in what will be an exceptionally busy year for Marnie, she expects the band to get started on a sixth album in the second half of this year.
Reflecting on Ladytron's place in and influence on the electronic music scene, she says: "A lot of the electronic music that's coming out now is more pop than Ladytron. I think that we were always more underground than the stuff you would hear in the mainstream. Then, it wasn't like it is now where there's so much electronic music, and a lot of people didn't know where to put us and how to label us".
As for the more immediate future, she has solo gigs lined up in Peru and Mexico this month. It seems natural for her to play in Latin America, which has always been good to Ladytron in comparison to the UK where they "never really took hold". When asked for career highlights, as well as a show in a Brian Eno-produced festival at the Sydney Opera House, she fondly remembers a gig in Mexico City where she could barely hear her own voice over the crowd. The response in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, and North America has far surpassed that of Ladytron's home country where the band "never really got much radio play".
While the new album is still in the planning stages, one thing she's certain of is that she won't be repeating her last experience of funding it via Pledge Music — an experience she describes as "a lot of hard work" and "quite stressful". She also credits the crowdsourced method as a factor in the subdued reaction it received, although, the reviews it did get were highly positive. "The day the album was available, it went to the pledgers, so I felt that it didn't get much press because [by the time the media heard it] it was old news; it was already out there", she tells us. Neither will she be returning to Reykjavik to record. She says she is quite happy back in her hometown, a "good city" where "the people are good".
"When I make another album I am really looking forward to just staying in Glasgow and making it here", she declares. After more that 10 years in the business, it seems fair that Marnie gets to do it her own way.
Source
In late December, Helen Marnie, one-quarter of Ladytron and, as of recently, a solo artist recording under her last name, played her first solo gig in Glasgow. We met there in a pub to discuss her upcoming album and the fate of her famous band. "I think it went OK", she says modestly, then thinks for a moment. "Except no one told me my keyboard wasn't working for the entire show". The gig — a "not pretentious" benefit for TYCI, the Glasgow-based feminist collective founded by Chvrches' Lauren Mayberry — offered Marnie the chance to get a low-pressure solo show under her belt (and to iron out any kinks like malfunctioning keyboards) before the beginning of a year that will see her play overseas and release her second solo album. It was also a chance to reconnect with the community of her home city of Glasgow, where she returned, after 12 years living in London, two years ago. With song titles like "High Road" (the name of '90s Scottish soap opera) and allusions to the sea, the influence of her return home is stamped over her first solo album, the warm and emotionally resonant Crystal World, released in 2013. "I think because it was my first solo album, things like my childhood and my influences were going to creep into it", she says. "Crystal World is very reflective and about looking back and reminiscing about things, so Scotland played a big part. It was recorded in Iceland, but Iceland didn't creep into it at all because the music and lyrics were already written".
Marnie went to Reykjavik to record at the studio of Barði Jóhannsson of Bang Gang and Starwalker. She brought on Johansson to co-produce with Ladytron bandmate Daniel Hunt so that the album would not be just a Ladytron project. Now she is working with Jonny Scott, known for his work with The Kills and Olympic Swimmers, who she describes as a "synth geek and quite pop-oriented".
For her next album, which will be out later this year, she plans to write and record with Scott. "I think it will probably go more electronic sounding than the previous one. I think Crystal World had a softer edge. It was electronic but had a folk tinge to it. The next one might be a bit weirder".
As a teaser, Marnie released the Scott-produced "Wolves", a track calling out the establishment and urging people to raise their voices, in September 2014 — pointedly right before the referendum. The chorus goes: "Raise all your voices / Gimme all your hands, take the chances / Don't be fooled, wolves in disguises / All your hands! All your hands! / Hail for better days!""I wrote the lyrics at the beginning of 2014 when there was so much information about [the referendum] being thrown at us". She says. "The referendum was part of my life for so long that it was natural that it fed into it. At the time, I realized what I was writing about, and I wanted it to be quite anthemic".
The solo work and return to Glasgow have had some worrying that Ladytron is no more, but that's not the case. In fact, in what will be an exceptionally busy year for Marnie, she expects the band to get started on a sixth album in the second half of this year.
Reflecting on Ladytron's place in and influence on the electronic music scene, she says: "A lot of the electronic music that's coming out now is more pop than Ladytron. I think that we were always more underground than the stuff you would hear in the mainstream. Then, it wasn't like it is now where there's so much electronic music, and a lot of people didn't know where to put us and how to label us".
As for the more immediate future, she has solo gigs lined up in Peru and Mexico this month. It seems natural for her to play in Latin America, which has always been good to Ladytron in comparison to the UK where they "never really took hold". When asked for career highlights, as well as a show in a Brian Eno-produced festival at the Sydney Opera House, she fondly remembers a gig in Mexico City where she could barely hear her own voice over the crowd. The response in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, and North America has far surpassed that of Ladytron's home country where the band "never really got much radio play".
While the new album is still in the planning stages, one thing she's certain of is that she won't be repeating her last experience of funding it via Pledge Music — an experience she describes as "a lot of hard work" and "quite stressful". She also credits the crowdsourced method as a factor in the subdued reaction it received, although, the reviews it did get were highly positive. "The day the album was available, it went to the pledgers, so I felt that it didn't get much press because [by the time the media heard it] it was old news; it was already out there", she tells us. Neither will she be returning to Reykjavik to record. She says she is quite happy back in her hometown, a "good city" where "the people are good". "When I make another album I am really looking forward to just staying in Glasgow and making it here", she declares. After more that 10 years in the business, it seems fair that Marnie gets to do it her own way.
Source
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