ALBUM PREMIERE: Kate Koenig Blends Poetic Lyricism with Experimental Folk Sounds on ‘Immortal Rhythm’

Photo credit: Samantha Singh

Kate Koenig is a singer/songwriter and journalist. They are self-described as being “A very hungry experimental-folk caterpillar that eats Fleet Foxes’ progressivism and Kate Bush’s iconoclasticism and Jeff Buckley’s zeal and Leonard Cohen’s disenchantment,” and is still eating while you read this bio. They are also a fierce advocate for mental health awareness, which comes out in the deeply personal, introspective theater of their music.

Their new album Immortal Rhythm, due out January 31st, was written and produced by Kate Koenig, and was recorded at Harvestworks Digital Media Arts Center in New York, NY. Kate Koenig has the creativity and vocal expression of Joanna Newsom, combined with an expert use of auxiliary percussion, paired with an unheard poeticism.

Today Glide is offering an exclusive premiere of Immortal Rhythm in its entirety. Immortal Rhythm is a complex collection of experimental folk songs that will give an individual meaning to every person who listens to it, but we all come away feeling the same way: Human, raw, grateful.

Watch the video for the album’s closing song “My Protector,” listen to the album in its entirety, and read our interview with Kate Koenig below…

How do you feel Etemenanki differs from this new album? What did the writing process look like for each LP?

I wrote Etemenanki in an inspired sprint of creativity right before and through the early days of the March 15, 2020 NYC lockdown. It’s largely informed by my love of the music of Nick Drake and Fleet Foxes; it’s ambient, experimental in a soft way, and 90 percent of it stands on its own, band-less feet. Ironically, I wrote more than half of Immortal Rhythm before the writing and release of Etemenanki. The rest was written between 2021 and early 2022. I didn’t write any of it with a band in mind, but most of it ended up proving to call for that kind of production. My friend Courtney McNally — who plays drums on “Nothing to Miss” — was the first person to really encourage me to put a band together.

What inspired you to add cello in “Chromatic Sun”? What was it like to work with Lara Brodsky in the studio?

There’s actually a very simple explanation for that! The engineer of this record, my friend Kevin Ramsay, came up with the idea. He was putting together a composition for a string quintet while we were wrapping up the record, so maybe it was partially influenced by that. It was great working with Lara; she’s very kind, professional, and has a natural connection with the instrument, which made the process of recording the part laidback and fun.

Your album art- with the busts of statues on the floor and how they seem to be conversing- What does this mean?

There’s really no meaning behind it. It’s a picture I took at a museum I visited in Copenhagen a few years back, where their statues were laid out in a seemingly intentionally comical way, which I found greatly amusing. It was my favorite shot from the ones I took there, especially because it looks weird and vaguely sad, kind of like how my music sounds — so I thought it made for a fitting cover.

What is “Siren Song” actually about? A sexual encounter, abuse, the mythical bird-women, or a little bit of everything?

The personal inspiration behind “Siren Song” is one I’m not comfortable disclosing, but I will say that the verse about harpies and sirens, et cetera is intended to be feminist. In the verse, I’m trying to turn these sinister, corrupt symbols into beautiful ones to resist the sexism that bore them.

“Caligula” is very poetic. How do you write your lyrics? Do you consider yourself a poet as well as a musician?

Thank you so much! I definitely don’t consider myself a poet, although I feel good about how I’m sometimes able to write lyrics that very accurately represent my feelings. Writing lyrics is an interesting process for me — I try to follow the comet of free association, and the chain of ideas that hold hands with one another. I feel like a faithful pursuit of that flow ends up revealing abstract metaphors that prove to have a subconscious depth that neither a writer nor audience can fully understand, but can be more acutely honest than anything more consciously derived.

I also know that “Caligula” is the name of a Roman emperor- what inspired you to write a song with his name?

I sometimes take inspiration from ancient Greek or Roman mythology and history. I find that things that have resonated culturally for so long can hold a lot of meaning. Caligula was also a pretty horrific person, and I think the lightheartedness of the song’s first few lines makes them darkly funny … which is part of my aesthetic!

How did you get some of the interesting percussive sounds throughout your album? Especially the sounds in “Minding”? I’d love to know all the instruments in that song.

The metallic, percussive sounds on “Siren Song” come from a Hammerax cymbal-like piece of percussion — in this case, placed on the snare — which my drummer Jared Pease thought to include. On “Monkey’s Tail,” I achieve some of the more interesting sounds on guitar by playing a combination of regular notes and harmonics at the same time in the main riff. Then on “Minding,” I programmed the drums using the Impulse drum machine that comes with Ableton. I went for some preset sounds that had a sort of bricolage effect, like someone is just hitting random metallic and wooden objects. The rest of the sounds on “Minding” are just synths, and acoustic and electric guitars.

As a multi-instrumentalist, how do you juggle taking the time to practice? Between vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, and piano, you’re doing a lot!

The short answer is that I only really practice acoustic guitar, which is the instrument I feel the most connected to out of all the ones I can play. My electric guitar chops come from playing acoustic, I only practice singing when practicing singer/songwriter songs (by myself or other artists), and I only practice piano when I feel inspired to. You may notice that I’m not doing anything terribly complicated on the album on these auxiliary instruments!!

Dare I ask…(In regard to ‘Idle Hands”) What is your favorite vice?

The wholesome explanation that I’ll offer is love addiction — a fairly common and largely discounted “vice” I think.

What is your favorite book and why?

For fun, let’s say A Wrinkle in Time, because it’s so inventive and fantastical. Honorable mentions go to Harpo Speaks and Gene Wilder’s autobiography.

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