How to Raise a Rockstar (The Guardian, 2008)

Ed Marnie retired Scottish Enterprise development worker: father of Ladytron singer Helen Marnie

When Helen was a child we took her to see big shows like Evita, but she hated it. From that moment she was never mainstream in her attitudes to music or fashion. I once dropped her off to see Michael Jackson but usually it was obscure bands. She went to Glasgow to study but dropped out after a year and I thought: "Problem." But then she suddenly announced she was going to Liverpool to study pop music, and that's where they started the band. On stage she comes across as ultra-cool, and the critics use words like "stark" and "robotic" and "austere", but she's not like that - she's funny and down to earth.

It is weird being a pop star's parent. At one gig my pal and I were standing with our black Ladytron T-shirts on thinking we were cool and this kid looked at us and said, "You must be parents." I was once in a bar and this bloke said he was a big Ladytron fan and had a screensaver of Helen on his computer. I looked at him and said, "That's my daughter!"

Source

The new self-titled Ladytron album was uploaded on YouTube

Bido! Lito! interview (2019)

"Ladytron are, for me, the best of English pop music. They're the kind of band that really only appears in England, with this funny mixture of eccentric art-school dicking around and dressing up, with a full awareness of what's happening everywhere musically, which is kind of knitted together and woven into something quite new."

This is a quote from Brian Eno. Lifted from Wikipedia and unashamedly so. A quote like that stops you dead. Brian Eno knows his eggs and rarely proffers his compliments so starkly. For anyone familiar with the work of Marnie, Wu, Hunt and Ayoro then the excitement of a return is enraptured in such a comment. For those of you who are not: welcome. They've been away, you see, and now the time is upon us to behold a band that was conceived, then born in Liverpool and brought up around the world. There are places in Glasgow, São Paulo, Chicago, Bulgaria, Italy, London and Bebington that have nurtured and developed the four-piece to the point where the 'electronic pop' (their own simplified tag) of Ladytron is more than just a sound. It's an ology. A way of crafting distant and otherworldly artificial pop sounds that are actually none of the above. They are warm, defining and cultured. They are sweet, simple and dark. They are the sound you'd hear when crossing the International Dateline of space and time on a broken Korg.

We are on the cusp of the sixth Ladytron album, simply titled Ladytron. There's been a hiatus, brought on by life and the merits of living in the moment. There's babies (Mira), solo work (Helen), photography (Reuben) and production (Danny) that have all conspired to keep the creative flow of the band to a mere trickle over the last seven years. But all that has changed and a redefined, realigned and rebooted Ladytron are returning with an album of such heft and direction, it's hard to believe the gap was that long. Danny is stood outside a cafe in Glasgow. It's cold and he's tired. Rehearsing is a bitch. But now the dust has settled on getting everyone back in the same room, Bido Lito! can ask the opening question that he's probably sick of now: where the bloody hell have you been? He doesn't sigh. He almost enjoys the bounce.

"When we wrapped up the last record [Gravity The Seducer], late 2011, we just stopped. Mira had a baby and stuff. We didn't tour it as much as we'd have liked to as we couldn't play live any more. We were ready for a break and we anticipated three years or something like that. A brief pause, I guess."

It's such a good record. A remarkable 'comeback' if you will. There's a nod to new romantic on Tower Of Glass, there's a fraught, post-punk nursery rhyme Paper Highways, there's Michael Jackson pop electro-funk on Deadzone and the industrial seeping You've Changed. There's a lot of ideas fighting for attention here. He continues. "It [the new album] wasn't intentionally over-thought. It was a collection of our various ideas from the break that worked well together as a group. It was actually easy and therefore the most straightforward record to make. We had more material than we needed, but as we'd been working remotely, going in the studio was such a release. Remember we'd also been going back and forth to the UK and bouncing stuff around the four of us for a couple of years."

Ladytron have had the luxury of being able to creatively mutate over the various record deals down the years, so it seemed right to plough on and plan. "We weren't in a hurry," Danny continues. "We'd done six or seven world tours and it was very intensive for a long time. This break has allowed us to hit reset." This time he does sigh. Not a world-weary sigh, more a contemplative force of breath. "We had time to think about if we are going to do another Ladytron record, how do we go about it? We didn't just think about chronology, like when we did on the first five albums, this time we wanted to move things on and approach it in a different way. It's a Ladytron record in its purest form and there's the addition of everything we've learned since we got together."

The album backs that up furiously. There's an argument that the previous album, Gravity The Seducer, was not a typical Ladytron record. Their need to push the boundaries suggested it had been pushed too close to the edge, and the pop sensibilities had been overcooked. This eponymous sixth has more than steadied the ship, it has plotted a course that suggests that there's a future ahead. There've been hiccups along the way. Indeed, the time it has taken to produce Ladytron is not lost on the other band members, as Helen explains. "Seven years in the life of Ladytron compressed into a neat 13 songs. That was actually the hard part, pruning it down to a listenable amount of songs." Electronic music production as topiary? Did it work? Did you argue? "Yes! Personally, I'm really happy with the album. It's different to our previous efforts, but I think it needed to be. We needed to come back as a new, refreshed Ladytron and that is definitely expressed through this record. I'm not going to lie; having four members spread out across the globe is not always the easiest to negotiate. However, some things you just have to work around for the greater good."

Helen's comments are slightly at odds with Danny's, but only marginally as both views are born out of relief. This has been more difficult to arrange than both members are giving us, dear reader, credit for. But the globalisation of technology, infused with the desire to make this happen has brought to the fore the need for an act like Ladytron to flourish. As pop music blands itself through its own advancement, the acts that grow in the margins are becoming more and more essential, or necessary, depending on your passion for the anti-mediocre.

The new album draws on the societal sources that have plotted the course of the majority of Ladytron's oeuvre, especially since the first album. Ladytron have never been shy of exploring themes that are personal to their own world-view. But it's been the 'difficult' sixth album, so what were the main influences both musically and, more importantly, culturally?

Here's Helen Marnie: "Musically, we wanted to bring an energy to some of the tracks in order to create songs that were more danceable, or at least had more of an up tempo vibe. But at the same time we always want to create space and atmosphere with a record, and songs such as Run and Tomorrow Is Another Day do that well. It's hard not to be influenced by the politics of today, but saying that, most of the songs I've written are more influenced by personal events as well as being injected with a little imagination. One track is a dreamscape, exploring that feeling of trying to dodge death as we always do within a dream."

Danny's side of the story has a more concrete base of influence. "Experience and wisdom, really. We were writing in that vein on the last two, but now, I feel, we are closer to the subject matter, especially when you consider we are getting older and we have had more experiences. I'm satisfied with the lyrical content of this one more so than any of the others. We've grown up more and life has shown us things that it possibly hadn't before. I certainly wasn't dissatisfied with the previous ones, but this one has something about 'the moment' to it. A small proportion of listeners would get it from the off, but we've gone out of our way not to explain a lot of it."

Hold on, this is an interview! Explain it then. "No!" He laughs and mutters something about being out of sync with being interviewed. But the roller coaster has started its incline. "I'm not averse to going into detail, but I'd rather people listen and glean from it what they can. There are areas where you are over-emphasising and over-explaining when I'd rather the listener interprets it themselves and that's where the wisdom is. You need footnotes, something to reference in certain types of situations or certain songs. That's invaluable."

The new record hasn't quite got around to the full live experience. Only the two 'singles' – The Island and the utterly glorious bastardised pop of The Animals – made it into the set for the band's three shows in late November (Glasgow, Liverpool and London). It's worth noting that these were an overwhelming success as the quartet gingerly dipped their live toe back in the water. Glasgow was heaving, and a sold-out London Roundhouse proved the demand is still more than there. There were over eight hundred in Liverpool, the older songs being as enthusiastically received as some of the more 'classic' analogue tunes. Ladytron made sure all bases were covered, Helen gave it the full electro Dusty Springfield and Danny wigged out in true Will Sergeant style. The coloured visuals and dismembered hands dripped from the three screens and the synth bass dislodged confetti from the ceiling. The packed Liverpool Academy danced, listened, swayed and thrusted as a rejuvenated Ladytron powered through their strongest moments.

As the band exited the three screens came together to show a giant '¡No Pasarán!' They shall not pass. A comment based on Danny's life in the day-to-day political upheaval of modern day Brazil. With sweat dripping off the walls and the 30-something crowd baying for more, the lights came up and there was a palpable sense that there's more of this to come. Especially in the Merseyside soul of its creator.

"With the Liverpool show, we just wanted to see a load of people we haven't seen for a long time. But I do come back reasonably regularly. Liverpool produces so much unique stuff and has a better infrastructure in terms of labels and 'scenes' for want of a better word. There's a whole bunch of folk that didn't exist 20 years ago and I'm very proud of what's happening here."

With that he exhales, wishes me a good night and turns back towards the warmth of the cafe, the bosom of his band waiting to drink, laugh and row about the rehearsals. They needn't have. The gigs were a success and 2019 sees our heroes take on America, South America and back to Europe, cradling an album that has been more than worth the wait. Ladytron are here for your pleasure and they deserve that embrace so much now more than ever. Welcome back. Don't leave it so long next time.

Source

The new self-titled Ladytron album was released today!

Today the long awaited self-titled Ladytron album was released on PledgeMusic.



Track listing:
01. Until the Fire
02. The Island
03. Tower of Glass
04. Far From Home
05. Paper Highways
06. The Animals
07. Run
08. Deadzone
09. Figurine
10. You've Changed
11. Horrorscope
12. The Mountain
13. Tomorrow Is Another Day

Music Radar interview (2019)

Classic album: Daniel Hunt on Ladytron's Velocifero

The fourth album from this eclectic electropop foursome saw them moving in all kinds of new directions

After they dropped the career-saving Witching Hour back in 2005, Ladytron took a three-year break before their fourth album follow up, Velocifero.

Holing away in the luscious surrounds of a luxury studio in Paris, the quartet, made up of vocalists Helen Marnie and Mira Aroyo and synth/production whizzes Daniel Hunt and Reuben Wu, got busy putting their hearts and souls into some new music. They wanted to build on their previous good work, and hone their increasingly experimental and mature song-writing skills.

Having cast off the trendy and limiting 'electroclash' tag, they continued to explore further into what reviewers at the time would uniformly describe as a much icier and bleaker sound. Blending goth, techno, glam, indie, and new wave, with haunting lyrics and dense production, Velocifero would ever so slightly eclipse Witching Hour as the band's crowning achievement.

"We wanted to consolidate what we had achieved with the first three albums," says Daniel Hunt. "In particular, the third, Witching Hour, which was a huge leap. The longer a group works together, the further you get into your own universe. Outside influences become less and less important."

The resulting album was filled with contrasts. With dark and light. Shadow and sunshine. At one moment you have the post-punk glory of I'm Not Scared, and then the soaring bass rumble of The Lovers. Tracks like the Bulgarian kids TV show theme update Kletva catch you off guard and Predict the Day strips everything back to showcase their most minimal arrangement to date.

"We learned on the previous record to push things further," says Hunt. "To test the extremes of how far we could go with a track, even if the end result isn't ultimately used. We had this basic philosophy of always hearing an idea out, regardless of whether your instincts tell you it is going to work or not."

Ladytron are back in the studio again and promise their first album in seven years in February. The new single, The Animals, is out now and features a remix by Erasure's Vince Clarke. For now, though, join Daniel Hunt as he takes you through Velocifero track by track.

Black Cat

"This album is cut from similar cloth to [2005's] Witching Hour, but it is harder, much denser, darker in general, which is unsurprising after you've just come back from two years straight on the road. Plus, we were making it during the financial crisis.

"I love this track, though. And starting shows with it was so exciting. This is one of the ones where Mira raps in her native Bulgarian. By this track she had really perfected it.

"She prefers to sing in English, though, and this was the last time she did a vocal like that. Maybe in the future there'll be more."

Ghosts

"This one has something special, it still gets me. It was the first tune we had ready for the album, and had been played with a little on the Witching Hour tour in soundchecks, but never performed.

"This has an improbably long held organ chord at the beginning - I can't remember what we were even thinking with that.

"I guess Ghosts is a little different to what we'd done before. When writing it, it always reminded me of ['60s psych rockers] Sharon Tandy with the Fleur De Lys, but then the end result doesn't sound too similar…

"I'd also like it on the historical record that this came out years before any of that 'sorry, not sorry' business."

I'm Not Scared

"This might be my favourite song on the record. Michael Patterson did a wonderful job with the mix.

"We worked on it first in this wonderful studio in Paris. Obviously there's a strong argument for making records in unspectacular places with as little distraction as possible, and we have done that too, but there's also nothing like taking a break from comping vocals and going across the street for oysters, or finishing a session and heading straight for Le Baron or wherever. We made the most of our time there, certainly.

"The recording itself was sometimes a little difficult, though, and we ultimately had to take the session away from the producer, who was having some problems in his personal life, and finish the mix in Los Angeles with Michael Patterson."

Runaway

"This was supposed to be the hit. Listening back now, it should've been. When we were recording this, it felt like a hit. It wasn't gonna be the first single, but it felt like the one that was gonna crossover. Other people thought that too. For whatever reason, it didn't really happen. It was a popular song among our audience, but it wasn't like it became a proper smash hit or anything.

"I don't think it's underrated within our audience, but I think it's something that we could have done a lot more with. Every band has this story, though."

Season of Illusions

"Most of the tracks were in decent shape from our own studios before we went to Paris, but a few, like Ghosts and Season of Illusions, really took off once we were working there.

"Mira's songwriting was really coming into its own by the third and fourth albums, too, and this might be my favourite of hers.

"When we first started, I was the only one who really had any experience. And then, album by album, everyone was putting in more songs and getting better and better.

"By then, Mira was getting really good at writing, and Season of Illusions is one of our favourite things we've done. She'd done other stuff before that, but at that moment this was up there with the best we'd got.

"Normally she was doing these kind of rap-y vocals in Bulgarian. Then at some point she started writing in English and writing more and more melodic songs.

"She was a little bit in a pigeonhole of just doing these really unique rapping tracks on each album, so by the fourth one she had an urge to do something beyond that. She's lived in England most of her life."

Burning Up

"This was one of many 'not quite' singles on Velocifero. It ended up having a new lease of life on the [housing market crash movie] Big Short soundtrack - which I suppose is pleasing symmetry, given my earlier comment about making this during the financial crisis.

"When we were recording it, in 2007, it was the last summer of calm before the neoliberal bubble burst. To think back to that feels eerily nostalgic now; it was the last moment when things seemed 'normal' (they obviously never were).

"Listening back, the record sounds of its time, but also sticks out a mile in some respects."

Kletva

"This is a cover of a Bulgarian singer songwriter from the 1970s who Mira's family knew [Kiril Marichkov]. He actually met us at our first show in Sofia in 2003.

"It's a great song. He remarked that Mira's accent on the track made her sound like a hillbilly, or something like that.

"A video exists of us performing this on the set of a children's TV show, which might see the light of day, eventually."

They Gave You a Heart, They Gave You a Name

"This one, I feel, was a little bit neglected - It was a good song, but didn't get as much attention in the studio as the others.

"We really began to hit a squeeze with the time we had available, and I always thought we could've gone much further with that one.

"With hindsight we could've kept it back for another record."

Predict the Day

"This one has very different production to the rest of the record, and was mostly put together by Reuben and Helen. They'd tried something quite different to anything we'd done up to that point.

"When we started playing it live, it kinda went up a level, too, as tracks tend to do. You'll have a version in the studio and then you've toured it for a year and it ends up in a different place. This track developed beyond the version here.

"The album version's production is very minimal, while the rest of the album is very dense. This is a bit of respite [laughs]."

The Lovers

"Some people at the label wanted this as a single. We didn't agree. Listening to it now, I think that they were right.

"I feel like the album is very dense and there were obvious singles on it. This one was one of the best tracks on it. I don't know why it wasn't one.

"We were pushing tracks further and further to the end of the album. A lot of reviews at the time were saying that this was one of the ones that we were doing that was interesting. Maybe we underrated it.

"To be honest, this song is most like what is on the new album. It was just that we did so much stuff in a short space of time back then.

"This track just came up really quickly. It's buried in this sea of reverb and has this really eerie sensation to it. The new single [The Animals] is kinda cut from the same cloth, as it's as dark as that.

"One of our labels in Germany were demanding that this should have been the single, but we already had Ghosts and Runaway and we didn't need it. In hindsight we should have made a video for it."

Deep Blue

"This was actually two tracks, initially. Mira had a song already demoed and Reuben had a very musically different track without a vocal. I could imagine them together. So, as an experiment, I decided to take Mira's song and combine it with Reuben's track. It became more than the sum of its parts in the process.

"I think this is the closest yet to a definitive album. Tracks like Deep Blue helped that. Witching Hour took many by surprise because it was so different to the previous two records. We had changed a lot. But on Velocifero we were already refining what we had evolved into."

Tomorrow

"This is one of my favourites. We had it for a few years prior and it went through various reinventions.

"The video by Neil Krug was something really special, too. We were up at Montserrat in Catalunya, but we had no idea what Neil was going to do with the film.

"I've no idea why this one is so late on the record, or what we were thinking by putting it there, as it's one of the strongest singles we ever put out. We were often doing the opposite of what we were advised. Maybe this was one of those occasions."

Versus

"Helen and I did this like a duet. Everyone in the studio was a little stunned when the first vocals went down. We received some compliments from people I really respect about this one. I'm still very proud of it.

"I'm proud of the album. It might be our best. I would normally say Witching Hour, and most of the audience seem to agree. Witching Hour is definitely better produced, it is a special record. But I also think this one had a power to it, which was perhaps overlooked at time of release.

"It wasn't easy to make either, or cheap - and at any moment it felt like the whole project could collapse."

Source

Ladytron wallpapers

I made 118 Full HD Ladytron wallpapers. Download.

Ladytron - Paradise Theater, Boston, MA, 2006

Format: MKV, MPEG-2, 720x576
Size: 4.1 GB
Source: Rick Smith

Content:
1. Intro
2. High Rise
3. Evil
4. Sugar
5. He Took Her to a Movie
6. Soft Power
7. Playgirl
8. Blue Jeans
9. International Dateline
10. Fighting in Built Up Areas
11. Destroy Everything You Touch
---
12. True Mathematics
13. The Last One Standing
14. Seventeen

Download both parts: part 1 | part 2.

Ladytron released the third single, "Far From Home"

The first photo with the entire band in 7 years

Ladytron will play a small UK tour (Glasgow, Liverpool, London) starting on 2 November.

Helen Marnie's all-time favourite female voices

Helen Marnie shares a playlist of her all-time favourite female voices

When I think about the music, in particular the voices, which have touched me in some way, I would say around 80% or more are woman. Perhaps it's that I can just relate to the way a woman can use her voice, the way it gels with my brain, or maybe it's that I feel how she feels. That I have, at some point, endured something she has, and that's why the voice reaches out to me and triggers receptors and makes me emotionally involved.

So, for this playlist, I wanted to share some of the female voices that have inspired me, from my youth through to what makes my ears tingle now. The vocals I'm drawn to aren't necessarily technically brilliant. In fact, usually the opposite. All those power vocals make me yawn. It's more the tone I'm interested in, or how technology is used to affect the voice. On Familiar, Agnes Obel takes her own voice down a register or two to create what sounds like a male voice dueting with her. The result is pretty awesome. Two of the artists I've chosen sing in both French and English, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Free Love. That is just a win-win in my book.

-Helen Marnie

Sneaker Pimps - 6 Underground
Tori Amos - The Waitress
Broadcast - Come On Let's Go
Mazzy Star - Fade Into You
Massive Attack - Teardrop
Stevie Nicks - Edge of Seventeen
Nina Simone - Mood Indigo
Heart - Dreamboat Annie
Joni Mitchell - Marcie
Randy Crawford - Street Life
Charlotte Gainsbourg - Lying With You
Agnes Nobel - Familiar
Anna Calvi - Hunter
Nightwave & Rye Rye - Awesome
Patience - The Church
HQFU - Dust & Dirt
Free Love - Pushing Too Hard

Source

Ladytron's new album is self-titled

Ladytron announced more details about their long awaited 6th studio album. It will be called Ladytron and it will be released on 15 February 2019 on !7K.

Track listing:
1. Until the Fire
2. The Island
3. Tower of Glass
4. Far From Home
5. Paper Highways
6. The Animals
7. Run
8. Deadzone
9. Figurine
10. You've Changed
11. Horrorscope
12. The Mountain
13. Tomorrow Is Another Day

ClashMusic interview (2018)

For a while there it looked as though we had lost Ladytron.

The much-loved group covered Noughties digital pop in swathes of black, a stylish, artful project that merged terrific songwriting with a slew of fresh innovation.

Largely silent for seven years, Ladytron recently began to stir. Work on a new album is progressing, with the band recently sharing new single 'The Island'.

A brooding, dystopian return, its taut paranoia and synthetic feel is perfect for these unreal times, and comes equipped with a magnificent short film.

Shot by Bryan M. Ferguson in and around Glasgow, it opens with the birth of a humanoid, The Experiment, and we follow its troubled, threatened existence.

An intense yet beautifully shot clip, it's a sign that Ladytron don't just want to match past glories - they want to surpass them.

Watch the video below, then check out a full Q&A with Ladytron after the jump.

Ladytron have been away for so long, how do you go about assessing what the group means, and how it should sound in 2017?

Daniel: It was really quite basic. We decided in July 2016 to begin making a new album. five years from the last one's release. A few years later than we had expected. We began working on material and during that first phase it actually felt easier to be making a record after this amount of time, separate from chronology, or live shows or anything else. Then there's obviously certain things that strike you during the creative process - the world has changed tremendously in seven years, so have we.

But I can't say that we gave any conscious consideration to external factors in terms of how it should sound. We never do.

'The Island' recalls those stellar early singles, did you want to hone in on that electronic pop sound?

Helen: I think it was more a case of remembering where we came from, our strengths, and nodding to that time whilst also wanting to move our sound forward and develop as a band.

Daniel: To me it doesn't sound like the early days per se, as all of our albums had this sonic thread, but what is evident on the Island is that we approached this record with a blanker canvas than we have had for a long time. We were more free.

Recording sessions took place in the south of England, was this a productive time for the group? How was it to write another chapter for Ladytron?

Daniel: We were recording in the countryside near Cambridge, I've worked there before, but not for this amount of time. Staying out of the city was productive but it was a relief to return to dirt and chaos as a reward when it was wrapped.

'The Island' feels tied in to the current climate, to the general sense of disquiet many of us feel right now. Was this a personal song? Did any specific events – political, societal – spur its writing?

Helen: Yes, it is a personal song. It was triggered by an event in my own life, but equally it's broader than that trigger. I guess it's a cry for help, a call out to like minded people who are passionate about our world and where it's heading.

Bryan M. Ferguson is the perfect choice of director, were you fans of his work? Was there a lot of communication before the shoot?

Helen: A designer friend of mine actually gave me a link to Bryan's films, and i binge watched them immediately, falling in love with his sublime weirdness and heavy use of colour. I reached out to him hoping he'd be interested in making us something, and thankfully he was into the idea. His treatment gelled so well with the music and lyrics, i knew we were in good hands.

Glasgow is an odd but entirely successful base for this blast of sci-fi dystopia – was it always your intention to shoot there? Was the city's geography – or even weather! - an influence on the feel of the song?

Helen: That's weird, because i feel like Glasgow is the perfect base for a dystopian world. Bryan is based up here, as am i, so it was natural to film here. The shoot actually took place over the three hottest days this summer, so Glasgow and the outskirts are looking beautiful bathed in sunlight in the film. I think the sunny weather makes the visual even more creepy.

Daniel: For me, Bryan's film shows this banality of evil. That is amplified by the setting for those of whom it is familiar. If such a ghastly project existed now, in the UK, it would be managed by these kind of bored, dead-eyed, Serco employees. When I see something described as a dystopian future, it always strikes me that only those living in a very tiny bubble of privilege on this planet do not sense that we are already there.

There's a certain nihilism to the clip, do you feel this is balanced out by some lingering hope? What should we take away from such a potent visual message?

Daniel: It is heavy. I cried the first time I saw it. But it should be a reckoning. That in itself is hopeful.

How inter-connected are the themes on the new Ladytron album? Does 'The Island' act as a microcosm, or an outlier for the music you've created?

Helen: There are some definite themes that weave through, but it wasn't conceived like this. Only on listening back to the record, now that it is complete, did those themes become apparent. The Island is an emblem for the record, like singles always should be.



Source

Ladytron premiered the music video for "The Island"

Paper Mag interview (2018)

The second single teasing Ladytron's next album — the legendary Liverpool electronic act's first after a 7-year hiatus, slated for release in the first quarter of next year — debuts exclusively on PAPER today. Delivered in familiar Ladytron fashion, "The Island" feels like a nod to longtime fans who've been awaiting the group's return for so many years.

But like "The Animals," released in March, there's some subtle expansion of sound on this one. In fact, expansion is quite literal a description — vocalist and songwriter Helen Marnie tells us "The Island" intentionally affords space for crescendoing emotional effect.

The subject matter behind it certainly calls for it. In an interview with PAPER, Marnie explained how the song is both grim and hopeful — in part, a reflection of the push-and-pull of today's political and social climate.



What were you thinking in terms of sonic influences for the single?

We've been away for so long; it's been like seven years or eight years. [So] I wanted to write something that wouldn't scare people away, but also leaned on what Ladytron was good at and how we were before, but maybe introducing something a little bit different. I think "The Island" harks back to earlier Ladytron when we first started, right about 2002, 2003. I wanted it to be a bit more pop, but not pop in that cheesy sense of the word. That's why we've got high synths, arpeggiated synths, and things like that.

It's nice to hear something familiar, as someone who's been a fan for so long, but to hear hints of something new, too. It's not a huge departure, though.

No, I think that with "The Island" there's quite a bit of space, sonically. Whereas our last album I find a bit fuller. I think [the space can] build emotion.

Speaking of emotions, can you tell me more about the message? You referenced the disquiet that we all feel in a statement for this track. Can you elaborate on that?

If you read into the lyrics literally it's quite dark, I would say — quite bleak. But that's not really what I wanted to convey; that's not really how it is. It is a comment on all the social things that are going on right now, but I wanted to create a sense of disorientation, and maybe claustrophobia, which I think a lot of people are feeling right now. I think the lyrics are like juxtapositions. There's a lot of different things sitting together, but they're not necessarily agreeing with each other. I think everyone is feeling that disorientation and confusion. No one really knows what it is these days, and it's really hard to get the truth.

When you're talking about hitting the ground here, it feels very rock bottom. The lyrics mention sirens of the apocalypse.

Yeah, it's very much like that. Hopefully the only way we can go is up. It's just very trying times. But, you know, that's how things go. They go in cycles. Things do need to hit rock bottom in order for there to be resistance. I think that's basically the influence. Personally, it is personal as well, the lyrics. It's not just a social commentary. It's about me. But I don't really want to go into that.

I respect that. Can I ask, though, if it's personal for you specifically or is it in relation to the whole band?

Personal for me.

Okay. I wondered about the title, if the idea of the island itself is a metaphor.

Yes it is. [Laughs] I live in Scotland, so there's been a lot of things that have been happening here. I think that for the people that live in Scotland, we feel like we don't really have a say in situations. The UK is feeling quite small for me right now, and Scotland is obviously a part of the UK, but we're our own country, so I think it's also quite hard for us to accept certain things that are happening. So that's my reference to the island: We are this small place, and we don't really have a say sometimes. But equally, that's a bit political, and I don't want to go too political.

I can sense that you don't want to get too specific about politics. I respect that, but I do wonder where this is coming from...

Yeah, I think it's just unrest, really. And knowing that no matter how you act, how you vote, laws you pass, in the overall bigger picture, for Scotland it doesn't really make a difference to the outcome. That's the island. That's what I'm talking about. Just being this insular society that has a lot of control but is equally becoming more and more insular and small-minded.

Is there anything you'd like to mention about the forthcoming album?

Yeah. It's finished. It's being mastered now. We spent some time down in Southeast England recording it for about a month or so. I'm happy with how it's turned out. It took a while to get things right, but I think it's a good mix of Ladytron. I hope people will appreciate it. It's just exciting to finally have made it.

I'm definitely excited to hear it.

It's hard to know how people will react. But I like it. So that's all that matters. [Laughs]

Source

New single: "The Island"

Ladytron premiered a new song from their upcoming album. Here's "The Island":

The 405 interview (2017)

A sense of urgency pervades 'Alphabet Block', the lead single from Helen Marnie's second album.

A synthesiser throbs under heightened lyrics about being led to a dead-end. What feels like a claustrophobic way to introduce an album, its chorus comes in and soars like a big inhalation of breath. The steely confidence of the song is the perfect beginning of her second album, Strange Words and Weird Wars, as she goes for the jugular.

After the alternative electronic outfit Ladytron took a hiatus in 2012, lead singer Helen Marnie decided she wanted to continue making music of her own. The songs she wrote, featured on her debut album Crystal World, were more melody focused with softer, atmospheric arrangements as she touched on personal matters and the natural world.

Strange Words and Weird Wars is a decidedly more direct affair. After feeling emotionally drained by what she put into the songs on her debut, she wanted its follow-up to be more fun, brasher and energetic. I spoke to Helen about what it's like creating on her own, drawing a line under her work with Ladytron and embracing her pop sensibilities.

***

The songs on Crystal World were directly influenced by nature and the elements. Would you say this record is more a combination of your personal life and political thought?

Each record is going to resemble where you are at a certain point. I felt a little bit emotionally drained by Crystal World; it was quite heavy and I put a lot of personal stuff into it. I deliberately wanted Strange Words and Weird Wars to be completely different. Even you saying that you can hear the difference is quite pleasing because I wanted it that way. There's still a lot of personal things, but it's less about the beauty of your surroundings and more about having fun, reflecting on good things or seeing good things in dark situations.

'Alphabet Block' really took me aback when I heard it - it's a total bop that leaves you feeling trapped! There's an ominous, almost claustrophobic, presence in its theme but then it has a big, opulent chorus. Did you want to create that dichotomy?

I must give credit where it's due. I worked with my producer Jonny Scott, and he has quite an influence on this one since it's a co-write. It's a juxtaposition of him and myself. The claustrophobic feeling - you've picked up on something. It's about a situation that you can't escape, and you're not sure what the outcome is going to be, but you have to get through. It's a juxtaposition of the darkness of the lyrics and the upbeatness of the music and the instruments.

Even the way you sing on it, it's like the lines are stacked on top of each other.

Yeah, it's so wordy! When I wrote it, I thought "Oh my god, how am I going to sing this?".

The title, Strange Words and Weird Wars, comes from a line in 'Heartbreak Kid'. Why did it fit the record?

That song was one of the first ones I wrote for the new record. I always saw it as the closing song. It's kind of sad but euphoric at the same time - it builds into a big crescendo, and it's quite hopeful. But then new songs came into the picture and sounded like the closing song too! The title just popped out at me; I didn't have any other contenders in the works because it was the one that made sense.

The instruments and synthesisers you recorded with sound a lot sharper and the beats sounded harder than your debut. Did you bring a lot of new equipment into this record?

That comes from working with an amazing drummer, Jonny Scott, which influenced the beats on the record. I'm a musician, but I'm not necessarily great at writing drum patterns. I think it's also to do with the production. The instrumentation is not that far away from Crystal World but we used the Roland SH-101 and the Moog Sub Phatty which is quite prevalent across the album. That gave the deep bass sounds. We wanted to create a fun vibe that was more danceable and more '80s influenced. Crystal World had more folk-tendencies and was very soft. I wanted this one to be more in your face.

One of the punchiest songs is 'G.I.R.L.S'. Who are the girls you're referring to on that one?

It's an imaginary girl! Or it could be me. It's funny because people who I've done interviews with have picked up on this one too, but it was actually one that I wasn't sure of putting on the record. When I wrote it and took it into the studio, it was quite flippant and throwaway. I thought it could be too cheesy. I think we tamed it with guitars.

It made it as the third song too! I did notice an article which said it sounds like Ladytron but I don't hear that at all...

Well thank you, you're the first person that I don't know who has said that!

Is it frustrating for you as a solo artist when people still expect to hear Ladytron in your work? To me, the only common threads between the band and your own music is that they both use synthesisers and your voice but everything else is completely different.

It's really frustrating. I get it though because people love Ladytron, well, some people love Ladytron! Somehow I think people need to separate my solo stuff from that. There's plenty of other artists who are in bands and they go on to do another thing and it's not compared in the same way. I don't why I seem to get the constant thing where it's compared even it's completely different. My debut was different, and this album is nowhere near Ladytron.

Do you think it's because you were the lead singer?

Well this is it. Do people just hear my voice and think "That's it, she is Ladytron!".

I've seen on your social media and other artists who have gone solo, anytime you announce a new project or single, somebody will write under it asking when the next band album is coming out.

Some people are desperate to hear more and don't understand I'm doing my own thing.

But it also means they like you!

Exactly. I can't be down on it too much. I get it, but at the same time, I think when you've put your own time, effort and money into something it shouldn't be attributed to something else. Often people will ask if Danny (Ladytron band-member) produced this album and I'll be like "No, Jonny Scott produced this". Yes, he did work with me on my last album, but that means nothing. That's the past, and this is now. I think it's hard for women in music and things often get attributed to the men that they're working with unfortunately. Not to say Danny didn't deserve credit for his part, he produced the first album but I wrote the songs, and I should be given credit for that which often isn't the case in reviews.

There's also a sense of nostalgia and references to your youth on this album, like 'Summer Boys' and 'Electric Youth'. Was there anything happening during the writing that made you reflect on your childhood?

I don't think so, I wrote those songs three years ago. I made a change of moving back to Glasgow from London in 2012. When you're writing you sometimes look at important periods of your life. 'Electric Youth' is about a fun time in my life and getting into trouble and being a bit naughty.

Do you feel more settled living back in Glasgow?

Yeah I feel great. I love Scotland. I wanted to move back long before I did but it wasn't the right time. Now I'm here I don't want to be anywhere else.

'A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night' takes its name from the Iranian horror film. What struck you about the film and what did you want to create for the song?

The title is taken from the film but I have never actually seen it. What the song is about is not what the film is. The song is pretty sinister and really nasty. Even when I listen to it now, it gives me shivers. It's about a near-death moment where your life flashes in front of your eyes and you think "right that's a life gone". If you did something a different way what would have been the result. The album is quite full-on so there really needed to be a moment like that to let it breathe. It's important to show a different side. It establishes the first and the second half of the album.

Since you've been making records for over a decade now and this is your second album of your own, do you feel comfortable in your presence as a solo artist?

I think I'm getting there. I feel with this record that I'm more in control and I know what I'm good at. It's all a learning curve. If I make another solo record I'm sure I'll be insecure about that one as well. I think any creative person feels that. I'm more confident in my songwriting. I've proven to myself that I can do this and I'm quite good at some elements of it. I also like to collaborate and I think that can bring out the best in you. I really enjoy creating melodies and toplines, although I do write entire tracks too.

I remember you said before that you always felt like the cheesy one in Ladytron because you really love pop elements. Do you still feel like that?

No I really don't care anymore. I couldn't care less what people think of me. I think for a long time, going back to my days in Ladytron, if you mentioned pop it was like a dirty word. I don't think that's the case now. I think people have opened their minds now. I'm unashamedly pop now. Take it or leave it.

Source

Ladytron finished recording their 6th album

The new Ladytron album is 99.9% done

Daniel Hunt posted that the new Ladytron album is basically finished and the band destroyed an old Echoplex (tape delay effect device) during the creation process.

The album is 99.9% there.
We killed this along the way.

Crystal World now available on clear double vinyl

Order it from Les Disques du Crépuscule.

2xLP tracklist:
A1. The Hunter
A2. We Are the Sea
A3. Hearts on Fire
A4. Violet Affair
B1. The Wind Breezes On
B2. Sugarland
B3. High Road
B4. Laura
C1. Submariner
C2. Gold
D1. The Hunter (Stephen Morris Remix)
D2. Sugarland (Mark Reeder Sweet + Sticky Remix)
D3. The Hunter (Roman Nose Remix)

BBC Radio 6 Music interview (with Helen & Daniel)