S@P Presents :: Cibelle

2 September 2008

Interview by Rob Wood, Music Concierge. Around the World II CD available at Phillips de Pury & Company.
Buy CD

Cibelle, Lot 144, "Sweet Seduction", 2008, Photo by Rankin

The second musical maverick to be showcased at Saturday@Phillips is often hailed as a Brazilian Bjork. Operating on the fringe of Latin and electronic music, Cibelle is certainly an artist driven by a restless need to experiment as much as entertain. Whilst also working within poetry and video art, it is her music that has garnered her performances with the likes of Gilberto Gil and Seu Jorge. Her version of a song written by Ari Moraes is presented on the Saturday@Phillips compilation. She describes ‘Esplendor’ as a Polaroid of her taken from another time. She also gave us a current snapshot of her thoughts on everything from art to promiscuous UFO commanders…

In the context of Brazilian music, where do you see yourself coming from?
“Like a lovechild of Tom Zé with Rita Lee (from Os Mutantes) that has grown up with various foster parents, Caetano Veloso being one of the daddies, having a late 60s Gal Costa for a nannie. I am an Abravanista. ‘Abravanar’ means free yourself, let it go, be loose, flexible. Explode in colours is what Rick Castro would say, he is the Abravana master.

What was it like singing with Gilberto Gil?
“Such an honour. On the list above, let's say he'd be my uncle.”

You’ve been described as a ‘tropical punk’ taking influences from 1960s tropicalia and London’s electronic scene, what music is inspiring you at present?
“I've been DJing ‘exotica’ for a few years now, that's now fully functioning in my body while making music. The spirit of tropicalia will always be present, but I think the ‘abravanismo’ is what's really kicking in, falling off the system's trolley. I'm just having fun at the moment filtering all this music I've been DJing through my own devices and seeing how it comes out. I wanna make Nora Dean have a baby with Raymond Scott, Tarzan fronting a band produced by a late 50s UFO commander who's having an affair with a hulla dancer.”

Cibelle, 2008, Photo by Rankin

Why do you choose to live and work in London?
“Because I love east London. I don't live in London, I live in east London mostly. I love Dalston - the African prints, the hair shops, the Jamaicans on the street hanging out, Chinese shops - all this makes my day.”

Your last album ‘The Shine of Dried Electric Leaves’ was a critical success. Are you working on a new record? Tell us about your latest music?
“I'm working on it now… for the first time I'm recording at home. Josh Weller will be on the album, I love him to bits. Also Gabriel from Metronomy has been in a couple of times, my flatmates as well. It will probably be co-produced and engineered by Damian Taylor, he is Bjork’s musical director in her band, he plays the reactable and everything else with lights blipping on it.”

Your music always seems to be pushing at boundaries with a restless inventiveness. Why aren’t you content to simply write pretty songs?
“Because I don't function that way, I lack attention span for it I think... and I am too sonically curious. I need to fiddle, sweat music, let it all hang out.”

You’ve performed at Carnegie Hall in New York alongside internationally respected musicians Vashti Bunyan and Devendra Banhart. What does it now feel like to be playing alongside leading contemporary artists, photographers, and designers at Saturday@Phillips?
“Lovely, my heart is the ‘the art’ before you go into the ‘music folder’, so I'm pretty excited.”

How much of a role does art play in your life?
“A big role, actually THE role, it's my life, I am an artist firstly, I use mostly music to express it, but I also make visual art and collaborate with other artists, such as performance artist Rick Castro (Galeria Triângulo - SP, and AVAF), Fabio Gurjao ( Deicht-NY , fur.uk.com and AVAF) and Doug Aitken. I am one of the characters in his ‘Sleepwalkers’ piece, he extended it for the MOMA in Miami, so I went down there to film last November. It's such a beautiful piece, not to mention how sweet it is to be on it alongside Tilda Swindon, Donald Sutherland, Cat Power etc. I'm part of a collective called FUR, we have an artzine by the same name, it's online at fur.uk.com… I also performed at the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern performing the live sound track to Hans Richter's ‘Dreams That Money Can Buy’ with The Real Tuesday Weld, for the re-hanging of the surrealist collection. It's a very inspired 40s surrealist film with works by Man Ray, Calder, Duchamp, Max Ernest and others.”

Cibelle, 2008, Photo by Rankin

Do you work in other art forms?
“Yes, I'm fascinated by the mundane, about human behaviour, what makes us… do what we do. I just made a piece for FUR called ‘For God's Sake Please Don't Dye’, it's an A0 black plank of wood with the title texturized on it. You can read it when the light hits it with a load of black hair coming out form the middle. I find it funny when people use ‘for god's sake’ with things like that, like hair dye, like changing one's appearance, it's not like ‘please don't DIE! please don't disappear’, it's just hair. There are more important things out there to panic about. I love working with hair, there's something that makes people feel wild about it, some people feel disgusted, other people feel like they wanna stick their faces in it. It's plenty of fun for me to see people's reactions to things and find out why they reacted that way.”

Have you ever been to an art auction?
“I'm an auction virgin.”

If you could collect any art you wanted, what would be on your list?
“At the moment, that squashed pink car right at the entrance of Philips de Pury & Co would be just fine. It makes me want to eat it.”

Rob Wood
Music Concierge
www.musicconcierge.co.uk