Why Techno RuleBreaker Avalon Emerson Traded Club Bangers For Featherlight DreamPop
Avalon Emerson has spent the last decade creating techno that's as complex as a throwback: precious synth melodies and pastoral epics better suited to jungle spas than nightclubs. Best known for bold, visceral DJ sets, the Arizona native finds common ground with Italo Disco, where industry legends Coil can coexist with the explosive hyperpop of Two Shell and Cocteau Twins. She loves thunderous breaks, well-placed samples and the occasional eyebrow-raising curveball.
But with her new project, Avalon Emerson & Charm, she's transitioned from club music into a singer-songwriter style, and she's not sure what to call it. "I think 'pop' is a lazy word, but to be honest it's generic," she tells me from Notting Hill, London, where she's rehearsing with the band. Thanks to left-wing pop musician London Bullion (Nathan Jenkins), who produced the album in warm Balearic tones, the smooth non-retro feel of the record is similar to working with Westerman and Nilufer Jani.
Emerson is new to the dangers of DJing, but she wants to move beyond dance music for a while. ("It's disgusting, isn't it?" she laughs.) She and her husband, Hunter Lombard, married in 2010. She's relocating to Los Angeles in 2019 and is looking forward to a new chapter in her career, where she works behind the scenes for others scenery works. Musician. Her first two sessions were with XX and Romi. "A very sweet angel," Emerson said. "We worked in a nice studio and I didn't know what I was doing. That was at the end of February 2020. I remember reading weird things on Reddit and having conversations like this. It seemed very dangerous.”
For Emerson, the realization “My God, my work is done” turns into “ Do I even love my work ?”. During the infectious disease. Lockdown resulted in him jumping off the hamster wheel with nights out and international travel and instead focusing on songwriting. I delved into chord changes and explored verse/chorus/verse structures; Equally important, she needed "creative stillness" to allow her new skills to take root and bear fruit. Recording was sporadic, first with Lombard, then with Bullion, in a London studio, aided by collaborators including multi-instrumentalist Kevin Hebhedar and guitarist Joe Newman. Emerson used to ignore some of his paintings. "It's not really a song, it's just crazy beats," Emerson recalled in an interview with Bullion. But with the participation of his friends, even the most superficial ideas took shape. "It was a revelation to know that you can bring small parts," she says.
When I spoke to Emerson in mid-March, she was beginning to learn another important skill: the art of playing with an orchestra. "I can't sing live or anything," she admits. "We don't have the time in history for many artists to bare their legs live, so let's start cool." On the first night of a month-long stint at London's Membership Club, which was subsequently performed every closed-door Wednesday there was an audience of about five people, including his manager and a few close friends. This was her first public appearance. "I have boundless, boundless respect for bands now," she says, "because it's a whole different arena."
Pitchfork: Your new project appears to be a very tight left turn. Can you explain how that is?
Avalon Emerson: I've never been one to listen to dance music in my spare time. I've always wanted to make something that can be played off the grid and still hold up on a guitar or piano. I did traditional guitar music when I was in high school, and then when I moved to San Francisco I started making dance music and DJing. I've been in the middle of my music career for the last ten years because I ended up being good. By that I don't mean that my desire to make pop music was born out of a negative feeling of "I don't like dance music anymore". I still love him and continue to be an inspiration to him. Of course it's been less and less lately, but it's still a part of me.
After so many years of dance music, was it difficult to learn how to write proper songs?
It was a black box puzzle for me. I go to Wikipedia and look at different song structures and research all my favorite songs. I taught myself music theory, studied chord progressions. There were many times I felt like banging my head against a wall and there was no way to get there. I've worked with many other producers and songwriters, but I didn't really have success until I started working with Nathan.
How did you and his mix come about?
When I was living in Berlin, my friend Nathan Mickey came up to me and said, "Dude, you should listen to this song." He goes on YouTube and does the song "Blue Pedro" and they're both like, "Hey, I love that damn jam." So when I recorded "Long-Forgotten Tales" for DJ Kicks , I said, "I want that cover make. Who is better at making great covers? "Is that a good word? Does it make sense? He said: "These words have a strange meaning - they sound a bit silly when you sing them like that. Maybe we can find something else. It was very comfortable.
Your production and DJing can be a bit loud and heavy, but this record is really fun in many ways.
Ever since I got into dance music, there's been an arms race to get bigger and faster, and that's not exactly what I'm dealing with. The messed up version that people want when they go to the club, I understand it and I respect it and I can DJ it. But when I listen to music, my idea of the perfect record is the Cocteau Twins record, Good and Beautiful Things. I wanted to make a good, beautiful record, but the lyrics in my head were dark, sad, and sometimes too dark. This joint is very important because something beautiful can come out of a place of pain. To be honest I think that's where most of the good art can be found.
You've had a very successful career as a DJ, but now you've had the time to record an album like this and tour with a full band. "Okay, so I turn off the DJ and do something else?" is it scary
for sure. This is a financial risk. I have a newfound respect for bands. DJ's definitely money, man. Me and my USB stick just got on a plane. In the world of clubs, hundreds of people can fill a room every night without even knowing the artist. I don't know how many people in this Belgian club where I DJ know who I really am. They come to the club to hang out and dance with their friends, not because they're obsessed with my latest record.
It is very difficult to make money live. At the gigs we do, "we're probably going to lose out for a while because we have this optimism that we can make money from other shows or festivals in the future." But in general it's very dangerous. are people leaving We have to sell these tickets, otherwise nobody will come.
How has your DJing style changed?
I feel like DJing is one of those skills that gets better with age. When I first went to a club in San Francisco, most of the DJs I liked were older guys who had heard a lot of songs and knew how to play, like Francois K and DJ Harvey. I was 19 years old and when I first heard Valerie Dorn's "Closer" I was like, "What's that song?" But Harvey has been playing forever, probably since he came out.
I have become more of an archivist in recent years. At the beginning of my DJ career, I was trying to find songs to play that weekend, like, "I'm going to play at Panorama Bar and I need to find some good artists." But these days, it's like, "This song is important and I should have it on my record chest even though there's a good chance I'll never play it."
In fact, the last time I played today was this six hour thing, I spent an hour playing all this late 90's early 2000's indie music. Years of unrelenting humiliation at the hands of Gen Z and a little older: "Your sides ain't cool, your skinny jeans ain't cool, your music ain't cool, the way you like bacon ain't cool, we keep saying 'We.' "We're old, we're not cool. So, like the cheap is back thesis, all these millennials were like, 'I used to be cool, and you guys are cool, Gen Z folks.'
I'm too young to personally remember some of these songs - I graduated high school in 2007, so I fell more in love with Ed Banger in the late 2000s. But everything was on hold: I played Ostra's "The Beat and the Pulse", Morgan Geist's "House of Jealous Lovers" and "Yeah (Crass Version)", a remix of "Still Going", on the LCD sound system. Then you have to play something modern at the end - what is important is a dialogue between the present and the past that is not only 100% correct, but like "it was better". So I played The Dare's Girls and it fitted perfectly.
Have you ever acted in "Women"? Avalon, this interview is over.
I know sorry! But hey, those punches.
It first appeared on Pitchfork