The Blue Hour - Moving Foward Through The Flowering Sky

AÑO: 5 | NÚMERO 46

THE 13th UN A R E V IS TA IM A GINA RIA

THE BLUE HOUR MOVING FORWARD THROUGH THE FLOWERING SKY

[ Interview with The Blue Hour by Pablo Müllner ]

MOVING FORWARD THROUGH THE FLOWERING SKY

3 Today is a cold rainy day, I´ve through some odds lately, and felt particularly bad about not taking the time to sit down and deliver my questions to The Blue Hour. But instead of rushing into those questions and ask about exact facts, release dates and tour dates, I feel like going again through their exquisite internet catalogue. The music of Blue Hour defines a different path. It sets the mood for a very contemplative time of my afternoon while I watch the rain slowly falls through the window. I even get to burn some Ratnamala incense. I go through the songs beautiful discordant melodies, their sparsity and their offbeat arrangements, not even thinking in terms of song by song, but rather a full emotional landscape that is compelling and for the most part soothing, but it is never light weighted, it is such a trip indeed. An inner trip, most accurately, because it seems that the Blue Hour secret musical powers rely on confronting the listener with his own state of mind, and making him/her deeply questions him/herself. First question comes easy as breathing: “How come I don´t get to do this more often?” and “Why do more people get to know The Blue Hour?” Well, for those who haven´t heard (of) them: they are Marselle Hodges in divine vocals and music, and Brian Hodges in almost every other instrument you hear. Oh, and yes, they are a couple.

Hi, Marselle and Brian, it is a pleasure to ask you some question about your music, as well as listening to it, I got a really some stressful time and this afternoon I think connecting with your songs (again) was very comforting. How usually do you get people to tell you that sort of thing? I mean feeling comforted by your songs?

Marselle: Wow! First of all, I love these questions. I love that you truly get what we are trying to convey—a peaceful quickening of the spirit. I’ve also been through a lot of stressful times lately. When I write and sing, it takes me to a very magical place inside. I feel that I am in touch with a kind of spirit that lifts me above my troubles. When the lyrics come and I hear the melody, it truly feels like a warm flow of energy passing though my body, bringing me peace. I want our listeners to feel that with me too. I think that the world needs more of that feeling.

that means that it is connecting, which is really all any artist can hope for. There are a couple albums that I have returned to over the years for my own comfort: Current 93’s ‘Thunder Perfect Mind’ and This Mortal Coil’s ‘Filigree & Shadow.’ Both of those albums speak directly to my soul, transport me to a another world. I can get lost in the layers of instrumentation, the poetry of the lyrics, the character of voice.

When music has that effect, it is achieving one of the highest goals of art and it will never get old. My greatest hope is that our songs will leave a legacy of peace and beauty.

I thought it would be an unusual thing to say about your music, because it is not quite an easy listening or musical backdrop for meditation, it demands a full attention, and it is very baroque and complex, but at the same time it gets into the unconsciousness very quick and all of the sudden you are all surrounded by Brian: I never tire of hearing that our music it. Do you think it has to do with a very brings someone a sense of comfort. To me, technical fact like the use of middle/far

eastern melodies/arrangements or it is a more “metaphysical” reason?

Marselle: I do love eastern music and have always been drawn to it, but I have never considered our music as having an eastern influence. But that’s probably because the music comes to me organically. I write most of our songs in our studio, which overlooks a birch forest. I will listen to the tracks and try to match my words to the rhythm to the swaying of the trees. The melodies will then come to me, with the harmonies reflecting the layered winds.

to write what I call ‘events’ into the mix—little sound characters that appear here and there, move around, bringing motion and life into the music. I try to capture texture and experience: the whisper of a wave licking a pebbled beach; the staccato of a coyote’s hunting song; the flanged thrum of a hummingbird’s wing. I want the song to breathe, and I want to hear the echo of the breath reflecting back from the far shore. To me, a Blue Hour song should provide a landscape for dreams with Marselle’s voice providing the viewpoint soaring above and through it.

There is most definitely a metaphysical Brian: I am so glad you picked up on that motivation underlying the Blue Hour. Music is aspect of our music—to me, it’s one of the the first art. It is where we combine imagery most important things that we can bring to a with tone and nature. It is visualization and world that is already chock-full of very good vibration. It transfers worlds and emotion and music. I try to write music that has depth, like experience from one mind to another. It is a deep lake. The lake may seem calm and still nothing short of magic. on the surface, but it is overflowing with life The very first time I listened the new and energy below. To bring a song to life, I try

5 singles: “The Flowering Sky” and “Moving Forward” (both from 2018) I felt a straight connection with Marselle voice, even when I didn´t understand the whole lyrics it was really something very keen to me, like something that´s completely new but that also is unexplainable familiar. I wrote down things that suggested: Kate Bush, 4AD, Secret Garden (the Moving Forward Reprised remind me a lot of this celtic band), 2046 (the Wong Kar-Wai film) and even japanese folk … Are you even familiar with any of those things? What are your most personal inspirations?

Marselle: Kate Bush, Nina Hagen, and the early 4AD singers (and many others) were huge influences on me. ‘The Flowering Sky’ is an ode to the return of spring and promises of light after a particularly dark grey rainy winter. I wrote ‘Moving Forward’ for my mother who passed away last year, so it was coming straight from my core. I believe that when someone projects their true unfiltered emotions in music, it can’t help but resonate with the listener. I think what drew me to my influences was the raw connection I would feel in their music. I really do hope that each song connects with our listeners in an emotionally honest way.

Brian: My influences are a blend of music and literature. I love magical realism— particularly that strand of literature that so subtly blends magic into the ordinary that it goes almost without notice until suddenly the world is no longer recognizable. I love music that does that as well, taking familiar sounds and subverting them. The master of that kind of subversion, to me, is Current 93.I rely heavily on that band when trying to devise ways of subverting my expectations.

I am also very influenced by Nick Cave and Marc Almond, who are two of the most accomplished narrative songwriters. Finally, I would have to tip my hat to the Legendary Pink Dots and Coil for their sense of electronic

anarchy—there should be no rules, only results, when composing electronic music.

(I was, by the way, fascinated by the sixtiestinged Japanese folk act ‘Ghost’ for several years).

I also thought that Marselle ´s beautiful, haunting singing should had some Far East influences (that´s why in some parts reminded me of Kate´s voice). How about instruments… Do you get to play real eastern instruments or it is the western guitars and keyboards emulating those sounds?

Brian: As far as instruments go, I don’t typically start a song with any set idea in mind of what it is going to sound like or what specific sounds I’ll use. I will just start with a sample loop or play a chord progression on guitar or keyboard and see where leads me. Once I feel like I have a good melody, I try to give the song its own voice by adding and deleting sounds until it sparks a sense of completeness. I think that the sense of eastern music may come from my preference for sounds that are familiar but foreign — for example, I like to use bells or guitarets in place of piano because they have a similar percussive and tonal plucking effect while being less immediately recognizable.

I think that incorporating sounds that are almost recognizable helps us to create an otherworldly effect. It’s like a dream where everything is “just off”—anything is possible in that dreamworld.

I think it is a nice balance when Brian´s voice appears through the songs, is it a narrative choice or more of a matter of sound and balance?

Brian: It’s a bit of both, really. During my several-year hiatus from music, I focused on writing short fiction. My love for storytelling impacts my approach to lyric writing—my songs tend to be much wordier and offer a very different perspective (‘False Moon

7 Glow,’ for example, is based on a short story called ‘Imitation Moon, Imitation Night’ about watching a person literally turns to dust).

Marselle’s songs tend to be more sparse and inviting, focusing more on symbols, imagery, and places. Personally, I am a huge fan of her writing because it tends toward universal themes, inviting the listener to share her experiences. Also, when I think about arranging a collection of songs as a complete statement, I am guided by Dead Can Dance’s approach on their early albums. I am a huge fan of Brendan Perry’s songs, but I love the restraint shown on the albums—they felt special, called for my particular attention due to their relative scarcity.

I cannot let pass the fact that I´ve been listening to a few artists also from Seattle crafting this baroque, dreamy sort of pop…

Do you feel there is something like a scene or that you do things mostly in your own?

Marselle: It’s funny you say that. I just recently connected with some Seattle bands on social media and feel a similar spirit and emotion in their music (particularly, Charlie Nieland and Static Shore). If there are other similar bands, we’d be happy to learn about them. I would love to imagine that we’re all connected to some divine voice and sound emanating from Washington—after all, it’s happened before (e.g., grunge). And, in truth, I think this sort of thing happens around the world.

Hour. Between 1998 and 2001, the Blue Hour released two albums of romantic ethereal neofolk (‘Evensong’ and “A Windless Path’).

At the time, I was also playing keyboards and guitar for the psychedelic goth band, ‘Black Atmosphere.’ Although the first Blue Hour albums were very well received, and although I got to work with several incredible musicians in the neofolk scene, I always felt that my musical vision was not fulfilled—the limitations of one person, one voice, was just too much. That and the demands of life forced me to put the Blue Hour to bed indefinitely.

The second manifestation of the Blue Hour is much more interesting. Marselle and I met as teenage street kids, sleeping in abandoned buildings and dancing the nights away in Seattle’s new wave clubs. After a couple years, however, we lost each other—twenty years later, we reconnected. After that, I began writing music again in order to teach the craft to Marselle’s daughter. That endeavor became ’One More Mystery.’ which saw the addition of Marselle’s voice and melodies – creating the magic that I had longed for in the Blue Hour.

Back to the beginning, you released two beautiful singles these years… Are these songs preceding a new full album, or are you planning released more music in the near future? You also produced a very atmospheric video for Moving Forward.

The location and the layering of images are so haunting! Could you tell us something about that video?

Brian: Yes, we have a new album coming out very soon. More singles and videos too (we are even planning a video of one of my new songs). We are always writing (we occasionally publish previews of unreleased songs on our social media channels).

I also noted that there´s a gap in the Blue Hour discography: an early phase more like a full band where Brian was the main singer and then a second phase where you worked as a duo, producing your last two albums “Always” (2017) and Moonsongs (2016). I am too curious to ask what happened in between those two phases?

Brian: You have a keen eye. I took a very Marselle: As you know, ‘Moving Forward’ long break between manifestations of the Blue is a song about losing a loved one. My mom

and two of my close friends passed away last year. ‘Moving Forward’ is about the struggle to move on from the pain of their loss. It’s about the little things that remind you of your loss, that snap you back into grief. It’s about raging against people saying things like, “they’re in a better place.”

Because the song was so personal to me, I produced the video myself. I shot much of the video and edited it on my iPad. The video is made up of several layers: a shot of the waters passing by while we were leaving Seattle on the ferry; a beautiful cemetery in a historic port town on the Kitsap Peninsula (Port Gamble);

and several images of me singing the main and backing vocals. My hope was to create a visual journey of my emotional journey through such an extraordinary loss. It was meant as a cathartic release.

How about playing live? Those very complex, layered songs must be harsh to translate to live music… How do you do that? Are you doing live shows these days?

Marselle: Yes, playing live is challenging with all of the vocal layers I put on our songs.

Some of our songs translate well for live

9 performance without the layers. But to me, the layers are part of the song’s landscape. If they are missing, the song is fundamentally changed. So, for future performances, we are working on a plan to let me trigger various layers. We are also producing backdrop videos that will include shots of me singing some of the layers (similar to our videos for ‘Moving Forward’ and ‘Wheel and Web’).

We are very picky about our live performances. We love to perform at art galleries or unique events, like the Witches Ball (for which we composed the ‘Moonsongs’ mini-album last year). I am still thrilled to remember watching a troupe of fire dancers performing to ‘Wheel and Web.’ Brian: Our music is gentle and nuanced.

We need an appropriate venue and audience for it to succeed. That said, we played a two shows last year. The first was at an art gallery, where we played live over loops with a film backdrop. The second show was a strippeddown acoustic show supporting the neofolk band, In Gowan Ring. Both were very different and both were very well-received.

captured several ideas that resonated with me. It refers to the time when light has a transitional and otherworldly quality. The word blue also refers to moral struggles such as blue laws and blue movies. And, for me, it was also a reference to Marlene Dietrich’s film, ‘the Blue Angel.’ We’ll definitely have to check out the movie and add it to our list of references for the band name.

Is there´s anything worth mentioning about the projects of the band or the near future before saying Goodbye?

Marselle: We have many projects we’re working on right now. In addition to the new Blue Hour album, we have been writing and recording an album of gothic lullabies (babies need good music too, right?). Brian has been remixing several bands and just released a remix of a song by John Fryer of Black Needle Noise on a limited edition single. We are expecting to receive a remix of the song ‘One More Mystery’ by Pieter Nooten—we are beyond excited to hear that remix after listening to his new album ‘Stem’ on repeat.

On top of that, we have been writing music for films and television, which is very fun and exciting.

Brian: I am extremely excited to be composing music to accompany a dramatic reading of my fairy tale, ‘The Fey Hounds.’ It is a dark story about the consequences of trying to cheat fairies, which will be packaged as a CD/book with some truly incredible artwork from Mexican artist Osiris Puerto.

Well, to finish, I wanted to joke about how Marselle could be gothic Deva Premal sister, but anyways we can skip it… I found out about a movie called “The Blue Hour”, which is surprisingly akin in spirit to the band, it´s part of a Japanese ghost story and a LGBT romance story, so I really want to watch it right now. Did you know about that film?

Marselle: Ha! I had to look up Deva Premal OK, The Blue Hour, thank you very … now I’m hooked! She is a kindred sister much!!! indeed.

Marselle: Thank you! It’s been a pleasure to talk with you. Your views have been so Brian: As for the movie, I have seen reference appreciated. Really we are huge fans of to it frequently, but never seen it. I originally Revista13!! chose the name the Blue Hour because it

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The13th U NA R EVISTA IMA GINA RIA