GLORIA returns, the Budapest-based composer, producer and vocalist who boldly experiments with electronic sound and musical clichés. Interested in the perception of music and the felt experience, all her songs sound marked, recognizable and innovative. GLORIA considers her music metamodern, constantly oscillating between vulnerability and irony.
«LVS», his latest GLORIA release, offers the listener a fascinating journey through the universe of electronic genres. All the songs on her new release GLORIA de ella were written by herself and Mark Moldvai helped her with sound engineering. Mark is also a founding member of the Hungarian band Neo.
GLORIA’s «LVS» EP will be released on the Ukrainian Masterskaya label on April 27th. It is an independent label based in kyiv founded by Ivan Dorn, a famous artist in Eastern Europe. At the moment, the tag team has left Ukraine due to the war and continues to work in Europe.
We have had the pleasure of speaking with GLORIA and this has been the result.
Can you tell us a bit about your experience? Where are you from / how did you get into music? Was it all internet based?
I think it started with my mom who supposedly sang to me every day to make me fall asleep. Then my dad showed me that I could record music and my own singing with a tape deck, which is a lot of fun for a seven-year-old. Songwriting started when I started learning to play an instrument at eleven. Practicing was boring and I started writing my own things instead right away. This is also the reason why I didn’t become a good instrumental player. I write on guitar and keyboard, but I don’t play really well on either. ¯_(?)_/¯
Who have been your main inspirations (both musically and in «life»)? And how have they affected your sound?
My goal was to make music that makes people move. Another idea was modularity. I’ve always been a fan of house and other electronic genres so I broke them down into atomic elements, mixed them up and built something completely new out of them. Much like playing with LEGO.
How would you define your sound?
Metamodern EDM
How has your sound evolved so far?
Looking back at my former project, morningdeer I have to say that it was more naive and hard to pick up, rippling and raw music. Gloria is much more confident and thoughtful, both in terms of sound and my approach to playing live. I’ve been searching for the right sound for a long time and when I found it and we released PTS, I already knew what it should look like on stage too.
What can you tell us about your last job? What inspired you? What do you want to convey?
We created GLORIA’s personality together with the Capa-winning photographer Éva Szombat, inspired by many things that concern me, such as digital capitalism and capitalist realism. The impact on the individual and society, as our lives are always revolving around work; that there is no stopping; and how our continuous technological innovation is intertwined with the eternal compulsion to improve ourselves.
What can you tell us about each song that makes up your latest work? What is hidden behind?
Behind the unstoppable, monotonous, all-consuming sounds of THD is the monotony of the daily routine, which we are all bored of, yet most of us feel powerless against it. And the two versions of LVS are two sides of the same coin: they embody the duality of simultaneously desiring intimate relationships and the intimacy and vulnerability that comes with it.
What projects are you working on right now?
Another EP is sure to be in the pipeline for this year, and at the end of 2022 I would like to present the Gloria live project, Timeless. I am preparing a unique performance in which I work with magnificent musicians, and several artists working in audiovisual and performative arts.
