Interview by John Wisniewski
After ten years of tweaking and tweaking, the New York City-based dark electro-band the Sedona Effect recently released their long-awaited full-length album “The Year of the Snake.” With its industrial elements, dark lyrics and beats that pulse between EBM and Dark Wave, the Sedona Effect is a unique female-fronted band that combines sensual vocals with hard rhythms and distorted melodies that long for a harmony that the estranged self will never reach. Known for their theatrical performances, the Aquarian called the Sedona Effect “every bit a performance art project as it is an EBM band” and called frontwoman K Kalliope, “a multi-talented kind of Nina Hagen meets Billie Holiday.” M.K. Ultra Magazine was able to chat with the elusive K Kalliope to chat about the life and times of the Sedona Effect.
John Wisniewski: When and how did you form the Sedona Effect, K.?
K Kalliope: I started the Sedona Effect in 2011 as a solo project working with several very talented collaborators from various parts of the world. Making electronic music meant that we could send each other files across an ocean and still collaborate, despite not being physically in the same location, which was an amazing option to have. But of course, I also worked with many local musicians from New York City, especially once, the Sedona Effect started playing live.
JW: Is there a central concept for the band and your sound?
KK: I was inspired by New York’s extremes and felt dark electronic music was the best way to express that. It’s not really one particular sound I’m going for. I didn’t limit myself in my exploration and used elements from various styles. NYC is a crazy kaleidoscope of clashing things. I see our recently released album “The Year of the Snake” more as a series of different scenes that create a movie in your head, different tableaus of mental states or scenarios with very different qualities, “underwater,” “in space,” “at a show.” I had concepts of the dark side of femininity in my mind, and how that clashes with socially accepted female archetypes, the refusal to be defined or limited to be one or the other. The maiden and the mother with the wild woman, the witch, the whore, the monster, and the dissonance between that and socially accepted norms. I was interested in shedding skins and different versions of yourself, of dissonance, of being pure and perverted at the same time, morphing i.e., from the lover to the monster.
JW: What subjects or ideas do you find yourself writing about?
KK: It depends on the project, but the themes are always dark. For “the Year of the Snake” the focus was on nightlife, sexuality, borderline experiences, love, transgression, shame, darkness, the estranged self that searches for harmonies that it can never find. During the pandemic, I started writing a song cycle about grief. I’m interested in emotional states.
JW: Do you believe being a female vocalist adds an extra dimension to the music?
Yes. When I started the project, there weren’t too many female-fronted bands in this genre, and even fewer songwriters, but that has changed. I think it added more novelty 10 years ago than it does now.
KK: After releasing a pair of singles, what was it like recording your debut album?
Singles are lovely in that, compared to an album, they give you a fairly quick sense of achievement. Weaving it all together, tweaking things as the gear gets better year over year, revisiting and re-listening and re-recording requires a lot of patience and hard work. It’s very hard to ever get to a point where you feel this is finished. The singles gave me momentum, the album has taught me humility and endurance.
JW: What prompted your decision to record a song by Billie Holiday?
KK: Coming from theater, it was important to me to keep up with that besides my musical endeavors. Matthew Silver curated a show at “Bizarre Bushwick” called the “Circus of Dreams” and invited me to perform. I created an interactive performance piece that explored human fragility and how giving in to dark feelings could lead to cracks and destruction. I needed a song for this piece and chose Gloomy Sunday as a perfect expression of a state of deep, true feelings that lead to death.
JW: The Sedona Effect live shows are very flamboyant. Is this a conscious effort to stage your live shows like this?
KK: Yes. I love the ritualistic aspect and to bring music and theater together. In the past, I performed with a co-star, a 9ft boa constrictor called Loki. I didn’t “just” want to sing, I wanted our shows to be performances. Performing with Loki was a privilege; it brought wonder and magic to the stage and the audience, and created a unique energy of encounter.
JW: Any favorite new bands on your radar you would like to mention?
KK: My dear friend Scott Irvine just released a new instrumental album called “The Cold Light” that I love.
JW: What are your future plans and upcoming aspirations for the Sedona Effect?
KK: Next year, we plan to tour to promote the album.
Bandcamp:
https://sedonaeffect.bandcamp.com/album/the-year-of-the-snake-2