NAU NUA: INGA LILJESTRÖM

To shed the last skin

Inga Liljeström, singer and composer, was born in Bellingem on the north coast of New South Wales in Australia although it’s obvious the Scandinavian origin of her name due to her father who arrived to Australia from the Swedish part of Finland, what also explains Inga’s love for the Scandinavian culture. When she was a little child, she started writing poetry surrounded by rivers, mountains and animals and listening to the early Rolling Stones, Melanie Safka, Nick Drake, Maddy Prior or Bob Dylan. At 10 she was given a classical guitar and when a year later her mother joined a religious community and became the leader of the tambourine players, Inga started to sing with them learning to improvise with singing. As a teenager, she joined a rock band playing bass and later Inga studied jazz vocals at Southern Cross University before moving to Sydney where she founded the avant-garde rock band Helgrind with co-composer Felicity Fox. This experience led her to explore into electronics and string instruments for her two first solo albums: Urchin (Self Released 1998) and later her critically acclaimed album Elk (Groovescooter Records 2005). Since then, she has released many albums always exploring new ways for her music and she has performed many shows around the world- In 2009 she moved to France where she recorded the album Black Crow Jane. Still based in France, now she presents her latest album We Have Tigers, which has been created and recorded along with multi- award winning Australian composer Michael Lira.

Why did you choose music as your way of expression?

I wanted to make music since I was a child, I was so moved by voices and the emotion the voice carried. My first love was Melanie Safka, I loved the texture of her singing, the unearthly fragility. This was from the age of maybe 6. I was a shy child, so I kept all my dreams to myself regarding wanting to one day be a singer. Music was played all the time at our home in the country, we had mountains and a river close by, neighbour maybe a mile away so the stereo was always on and loud, the windows and doors open and us outside. When I was a bit older, maybe 10 or so, we moved into the small local town, and I’d go to the church after school when nobody was there, and sing my own improvisations, and hear the amazing reverb and acoustics. I was sold. I love art too, but when I had a choice to do either art or music at university, I chose my heart’s desire, music. I was never really ambitious, I loved the people who were drawn to music…like discovering your tribe.

How important is it for you to be member of a "tribe”?

I love the feeling of being around like minded people and souls- a feeling of belonging, where everything you are is acceptable and even loved, and they laugh at your terrible jokes, and can see the real you. It’s important for the soul. I really make an effort in my life to see people- to really see them. I read about this recently in Amanda Palmer’s book and it’s so true. I often think about apes hanging out in the forest, just being together, lazing in the sun, eating…this is tribe. And I’m drawn to those that have a love for music and art, as usually they are a little off kilter and different, and I can relax around that. I don’t have to pretend.

Has it something to do with loneliness?

Maybe, but I really enjoy being alone, I relish it. I’m not afraid at all of spending a lot of time alone. I use to travel alone, sometimes for a few months- just discovering, writing, experiencing. I’ve always loved it, and I find my most magical experiences in life have been when I am brave and stepped out alone, travelling, meeting people, or just being in a new country and not talking to a soul, just talking to myself, and discovering. Being alone but not lonely. It’s the balance of being with your tribe, and then having times of discovery alone, to really know yourself.

How do you live loneliness?

I think where there is a gap in my life is living abroad now, not seeing my tribe who I’ve known for so long, who know me so well and I know them so well too. We know each other’s histories and so we don’t need to make excuses or pretend- we can just be. So the loneliness I feel now is more about an emptiness of not being with my tribe, though I now have a little family and this certainly fills me up, but it’s different of course than friends and fellow artists. I miss community- or the community I was a part of in Australia. I’ve been away from it now for 6 or so years and I have a deep longing to move back, but there is a fear there too that everyone has changed, moved on…and perhaps I have too. So this is the missing piece and the feeling of loneliness, physically being with my tribe.

You started your career in 1998 with a self- released album titled Urchin. What are your memories from that period?

My first solo effort was Urchin. Previously I’d been in a group called Helgrind, a heavy, experimental rock group that I co- founded. This is when I first started composing and it was a great way to break all the rules and create noise and anarchy. But at the same time, I wanted to sing with more emotion and I was really drawn to the more fragile singers, those with a little more of a jazz feel or drawing from roots such as Billie Holiday and Nina Simone. So this is when I started writing my own music on an old keyboard and teaching myself to use music programs. It was both a great period of discovery and also frustrating, as there were so many things I wanted to do musically and could hear, but could only get rough sketches on the recordings. When I listen to Urchin now, I am surprised in a way at how untamed I was, how uncensored lyrically, the flaws in the voice like gapping wounds sometimes, the punk attitude. The string arrangements were rough and the recordings too…but in a way I like it. That was me then, unrefined and wild.

I’ve only had the chance of listening to the revised edition. It’s a very interesting album with a very original instrumentation and vocal work that at the same time links perfectly well with the British sound from Bristol in the nineties. Why did you decide to revise it and how did you feel working on your early tracks again?

The Bristol scene I adored, those female singers, and music where you didn’t have to sing loudly…it was more about the character of the voice and the emotion, the beauty. This really appealed to me. Originally the Urchin album was a self release, and I had boxes of the album under my bed for a long time as I had no idea how to get it heard or in shops. Groovescooter released all my other material, so we thought it made sense to release Urchin too, but with added tracks from that period, some remixes and tracks from around that time that otherwise might not be heard. I’ve definitely become more refined as a vocalist, not sure if it’s a good thing, but it is how I prefer to hear myself I guess…but then recently, I’ve been wondering if I have watered myself down, tried to make myself more ‘acceptable’…healthy questions and perhaps next album you’ll hear more of the ‘edge’ I left behind.

After your debut album you have released Elk (2005), Quiet Music for Quiet People (2007), Black Crow Jane (2011) and Two Dangers (2014). How do you see your artistic evolution?

In a way I can see my own rebellion in this evolution, Urchin was wild and untamed. Elk was polished, beautiful and electronic and consequently took years to make, Quiet Music was improvised and made over two nights, Black Crow Jane was recorded with a live band and had more of a rock influence, and I allowed for the musicians own tastes and personalities to effect the sound, Two Dangers was quiet and intimate, not a sign of the rock and edgy style that had preceded it. So it’s constantly to want to evolve and shed the last skin, and a desire to keep exploring. I’m not sure why I am like this or if it is healthy for a ‘career’- it’s not so safe but, it keeps me interested…like discovering new ground, new land each time. And I really do like to go where there is some fear for me…so the next album might be solo, which for me it’s the most frightening yet…totally exposed, but I feel it is necessary as a part of my own evolution. Elk, Quiet Music, Two Dangers, We Have Tigers, these albums I see more as music to accompany visuals, as I imagine characters and places, a story to thread the album together…Urchin not so much as it was the beginning, the learning of how do put an album together. I like working like this, I imagine putting on a record and life happening to it…as this is what music does for me- it captures and expresses life so well, in feeling where words fail.

Now you release We Have Tigers, which is a collaboration with Michael Lira, founding member of experimental bands Vicious Hairy Mary, Darth Vegas and gypsy swing ensemble Monsieur Camembert. I think you and Michael played all the roles in the process. What could you tell me about the process of the album?

The making of this album was really quite easy, it really flowed and because Michael and I know how to run our own home studios, it made the recording experience enjoyable and exciting. Having control of what you are doing and the ability to change it in your own studio is one of the best things about making music today. Each song would begin with me in my studio in France, recording a guitar bed, vocals, choosing a feel. I’d then send those parts to Michael in Australia, he’d record all the instruments you hear on the recording, and send it back to me. Sometimes it would be perfect and no need to alter anything, other times we’d make a few changes and that was it! Michael mixed it, I’d give my opinion, then we had our friend Bob Scott master it. I made the artwork for the album and then, done! We decided to put it out ourselves rather than go through a label, as the music ‘industry’ is in such a state of flux, and it means we’ve had no middle man at all...just us. Actually promoting this album has been a test. Those big corporate PR companies certainly monopolise the press and radio and it's hard to get a foot in the door.

The atmosphere is dark and tense. I have a strange feeling of a fluid inside solid when I listen to your new songs. Is that dense atmosphere a natural consequence of your personalities or is there any other intention?

I think both of us find beauty in those dark recesses of the soul. We are not afraid of this, and I find the colours are more rich, the smells more deep, the taste more unusual and satisfying...I think of it like films, you can go mainstream and know what's going to happen, and you know the story already, there are no twists or turns...these do make you feel good because it's easy and no challenge. Our music is more challenging, but not uncomfortable...for us it's more intriguing and filled with romance, but with a darker essence. We like minor keys with an occasional major to create a shift in feeling for this album. I guess I’ve always been attracted to what people would call dark music. Though I just find it beautiful. rich and dark tapestries of sound and words to match.

Could you explain me a dream you’ve had while sleeping?

I had a dream recently that involved a lovely girlfriend of mine. I wrote to her about the dream the next day. This is what I wrote to her.. ‘In the dream I had a labrador retriever, yellowish fur and a beautiful gentle soul. The little country town where I was living had its element of rough rednecks...dangerous and unaware. They had wounded my dog and thrown him in the river...I saw him float by in a fast moving river- seemingly dead or unconscious. I asked for help from some locals in a store though I could no longer see him (the dog) in the river. We walked downstream and eventually came across a huge hollow log, and you were living in there...it was a beautiful nurturing space, both witchy and with a few mod cons. You welcomed us in, and said you had found the dog and he was slowly healing. He was lying in a lovely bed you'd made him, and the television was on, just comforting sounds for him while you were pottering around the kitchen...motherly, supportive, nurturing. He saw me and he dragged his body on the floor a little towards me...I could see he was in the exact right place to heal.

An interview by Juan Carlos Romero

Photos courtesy of Inga Liljeström

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