Singer-songwriter and composer Laura Loriga was born in Bologna, Italy, and in the past decade she has been developing her work between her own country and the United States. With Mimes of Wine, her main project until recently, she has written and published three full-length records (Apocalypse sets in – Midfinger Records/Warner Chappell, 2009, Memories for the unseen – Urtovox Records, 2012 and La maison verte – Urtovox Records – ITA/Accidental Muzik – US, 2016), receiving high praise from the music press (Rolling Stone, Blow Up, Il Mucchio) and collaborating closely with her band both in the studio and in live performance.
Laura has lived in Los Angeles and then in New York, and both cities, together with Italy, have created a superimposition of influences that have led her writing to develop in a personal direction. From more abstract and classically infused atmospheres, she has gradually moved towards a kind of increased simplicity and rawness, complemented by an ongoing research in her sound palette, currently based on organs as opposed to the acoustic piano she started writing on. Her music is variegated and enriched by an array of acoustic and electric elements (among which drones, nyckelharpa, harmonium), a series of darker ballads sometimes far from song form but invariably led by her rare and striking voice, a compelling force across all the landscapes through which it moves.
At present, Laura has just finished producing a fourth album, Vever, written in New York between 2018 and 2020, and featuring the collaboration of a series of musicians among whom Josh Werner (Marc Ribot, Coco Rosie), Otto Hauser (Espers, Vashti Bunyan), Anni Rossi and Janis Brenner (Meredith Monk & Vocal Ensemble). The record will be released by Ears&Eyes Records on March 18th.
Today Glide is excited to offer an exclusive premiere of Vever ahead of its release this Friday. The album finds her fusing her own experimental impulses with folk and indie pop to make for a sound that is wholly unique. Channeling influences like Circuit des Yeux, Low, and Sibylle Baier, Laura crafts moody and atmospheric soundscapes that are both calming and thought-provoking. With sounds ranging from ominous to dreamy, she treats each song like its own organism that morphs into something new and unexpected. This is definitely headphone music that is worth sinking into with its combination of rich instrumentals and compelling lyricism.
Laura describes the inspiration and the process behind the album:
Vever has been for me both an experience of deep solitude and great collaboration, the two tightly intertwined from the beginning. There was a lot of walking around Brooklyn and Manhattan, a lot of nights out, lots of chats, watching and listening. Most songs are dedicated to people I have known or that are dear to me, so the lyrics are quite intimate in a way, but it’s the interaction with the musicians I had with me that made me imagine little by little how I wanted them to sound, as they surprised me continuously. Also, I substituted the piano I worked with in the past with a series of organs, and this guided melodies and my voice in a direction I still would like to explore more. To me, it is a record full of questions, mostly still unanswered, which I like.
LISTEN:
