CLAIRE ROUSAY - LUCY LIYOU

Claire Rousay

Based in San Antonio, Texas, Claire's acute assemblages of sound are both a diaristic portal into the life of their creator, and an exercise in dressing and undressing the bare audio field using compositional threads that feel loosely entangled, yet fastidiously woven. A prolific run of recordings since 2020, culminating in this year's 'everything perfect is already here' (Shelter Press), has seen Claire come closer than most modern sound-makers to aesthetically nailing the temperament of a world turned inward.

Now, as music leaves the house once more, Claire's live show - in both solo mode and trio formation with close collaborators Mari 'More Eaze' Maurice and Theodore Cale Schafer - brings a singular reflexivity, unflinching honesty and adroit humour to the performance space, with an ever-burgeoning audience accepting the invite into her soundworld.

Lucy Liyou

San Francisco-based artist Lucy Liyou synthesises field recordings, text-to-speech readings, poetry, and elements from Korean folk opera into sonic narratives that explore the implications of Orientalism and westernisation. Though their music reflects the work of genres such as post-industrial and musique-concrète, Liyou is influenced by audiobooks as well as music from the Impressionist period and Neoclassical period.

Combining all these disparate sonic elements into critically cohesive pieces, the musical world of Lucy Liyou alternates between beautiful serenity and unsettling entropy. Gorgeous bits of neoclassical music fragment into decaying shards, voices get warped beyond recognition, and shimmering light makes way for bitcrushed noise. This fragile equilibrium translates perfectly to the stage, where Lucy Liyou will perform as a duo with Nick Zanca, combining piano, vocals, guitar, and electronics.