CMU Approved

Approved: Mira Calix

By | Published on Thursday 10 January 2019

Although she has far from left music behind over the last decade, Mira Calix has perhaps become better known for her mixed media installation work, incorporating sound and music. However, she has just announced a new EP, ‘Utopia’, her first release on Warp for a decade, which sees her return to making more straightforward electronic music.

“The past few years I’ve been making mostly installation, which I find thrilling”, says Calix. “But the nature of my practice means I tend to work with many hands, many speakers, many materials, many musicians, over long periods. It was really refreshing to make this EP, to give myself a time limit, a strict set of rules, a tight sonic palette, and be fully autonomous as a writer, producer and musician”.

“In a way it’s going back to my roots”, she adds. “But it also felt completely fresh, playful, to just build some tracks around a cinematic scene – something for friends to move to in the early hours of a louche house party!”

Although a standalone project, the EP’s genesis does lie with another media. An alternate version of lead track ‘Rightclick’ soundtracks Adam Thirlwell short film ‘Utopia’, with was released last month. The EP version very much occupies its own world though, and provides a contained view into Calix’s complex and intriguing creative universe.

Watch the video for ‘Rightclick’ here:

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