Norwegian musician, artist and novelist Jenny Hval has released Iris Silver Mist (Remixes) following her latest album, Iris Silver Mist, released in May last year.
The EP features two reworks of ‘The Artist is Absent’ by Felicia Atkinson and Julia Holter & Tashi Wada. Felicia Atkinson describes the first remix as “the music as a cut up for ghosts and revelations”. On the second, Julia Holter and Tashi Wanda explain, “We are longtime fans of Jenny’s music. With The artist is absent, we wanted to extend the dream-like swirling of the chorus and to tease out some of the more fragile, elusive details of the production, creating a Baroque aria of sorts.”
The EP also contains a remix of ‘The Gift’ by Elaine Howley. She says:
“I remixed The Gift by sending stems through my 8-track cassette machine and looping/sampling them. I wanted the remix to have a liveness and warmth, a first thought best thought approach.
I was transported to the scene of Jenny’s song, the room after the show, the presence and tranquillity that exists in that moment when the room clears out. The aftermath of a performance and expending of collective energy, the feeling of possibility conjured in the space.
The main melody of the song is so great that I didn’t want to mess with it and decided instead to bring out other elements and to focus on repetition using a few words and sounds. Returning to presence can feel like that, experiencing each moment afresh again and again.”
Jenny Hval – Iris Silver Mist (Remixes)
LISTEN HERE
On Iris Silver Mist, one song bleeds into the next, just like a daughter is connected to her mother, the smoke of a cigarette sticks to a sweater, or the layers of a perfume unfold over time. A perfume, with its heart notes and scented accords, shares its language with music. Both travel through air, simultaneously invisible and distinct. Named after the fragrance made by the French perfume house Serge Lutens, Iris Silver Mist also moves like a scent – between flower and smoke, ghostly yet alive. The album is sensual, tactile and intimate – touching you as smells, sounds, and images do when they multiply.
Iris Silver Mist started with the absence of music; as live music disappeared during the pandemic, Jenny filled the void with perfume. It was only later she understood why: she was searching for another way to sense presence, to fill the emptiness music had left behind. During a series of performances last year titled I want to be a Machine, Jenny performed many of the tracks on Iris Silver Mist for the first time, before they’d been recorded, and surrounded by rice cookers, filling the songs with the misty smell of rice. Starting the album with a performance was quite an unusual approach—and it was also an intimate one. Emphasising the importance of the physical and live elements of music, the album’s thirteen songs hold the experience that was lacking in her life for so long.
Jenny Hval
Iris Silver Mist (Remixes)
Iris Silver Mist (Remixes) is available digitally from today – listen HERE.
Digital only
Tracklisting
1. Absences (Felicia Atkinson Remix)
2. The gift (Elaine Howley Remix)
3. “The artist is absent” (Julia Holter & Tashi Wada Remix)
Praise for Iris Silver Mist
“Fragile melodies, star-spun beauty and loveliness aplenty.” – Hi-Fi Choice’s Album of the Month *****
“A strikingly substantive and rewardingly elusive art-pop album.” – MOJO ****
“An artist worthy of the utmost respect and adoration.” Crack
“RIYL: Female genius in pop music, subtly epic songwriting.” – Pitchfork
“Music’s most playful deconstructionist.” – The Guardian
JENNY HVAL ONLINE
