Originally from Brazil but adopted by Amsterdam for a decade now, LYZZA is one of the most radical DJ/producers in the international avant-pop scene. From her first steps as a DJ in the ballrooms of the Dutch capital and in clubs such as Paradiso and the NYX, she has made connections, thanks in part to her tracks released on Soundcloud, with the influential collectives Fade To Mind and Bala Club and with queer icons of the clubbing world such as LSDXOXO, Jasmine Infiniti and Mykki Blanco with whom she toured for several years. As a multidisciplinary artist, she has collaborated in various capacities with the likes of Nicolas Jaar and Amnesia Scanner and now releases her work for Big Dada, a sub-label of the historic British electronic label Ninja Tune. Last summer, LYZZA, was one of the main characters of Villa Lena’s residency. It was an opportunity to revisit this experience by talking about her path and aspirations not only in music.
Lyzza performing at Villa Lena, courtesy Villa Lena Foundation
Piero Merola: Tra i diversi artisti e artiste coinvolti a Villa Lena sei senz’altro una delle più seguite e conosciute in ambito musicale per chi da tempo segue la scena avant/techno e il panorama del clubbing internazionale. Si tratta di un’esperienza inedita per te?
LYZZA: Among the many artists hosted in residencies and projects at Villa Lena, you are certainly one of the most well-known musical names for those who follow the avant/techno/ scene. Is this, for you, a new experience.
You had already had the opportunity in the past to measure yourself with this type of “more dilated and thought-out” performance that is not necessarily related to the demands of measuring yourself with the audience of a club. Maybe it is perhaps closer in approach to that of someone working on a soundtrack or a sound design. How did this connection with Villa Lena come about? How do you think it helped you grow or discover new perspectives on your profile as a multimedia artist? What memories will you take with you at the end of this journey?
I’ve always somewhat actively separated my music production from dj’ing because of the reason you mentioned; to me producing music is a way to genuinely express myself without needing to actively consider other people during its initial creation process. Because of this, the measuring aspect didn’t feel as alien, compared to having a new space/studio to work in that VL provided me. Being able to leave your laptop somewhere away from the space you constantly inhabit, without it being a traditional work space or a third space, not always moving a few meters between your bed and your desk, or sometimes even making your bed the production space ; was incredibly inspiring and even ignited motivation to ‘go to the studio’ every day. It can be hard to create a certain level of distance to your work when you’re the artist but also the sonic producer of the artistic world you inhabit and involved in every single process. I reckon this was one of the first times I was able to separate the art from the artist, which from an audience perspective I don’t feel like you should do, but now realize as the artist it’s almost necessary to be able to analyze, reflect and possibly improve.
Lyzza performing at Villa Lena, courtesy Villa Lena Foundation
On the sidelines of the residency you released a new single, “A Fool’s Journey,” which you described as an introspective track inspired by the “breakup” theme you had been working on for a while. Do you feel particularly drawn to this kind of more reflective atmosphere after the release of a rather “catchy” album like “Mosquito”? What do you listen to and what inspires you recently? On this journey, on what routes is Lyzza’s musical research heading?
I’ve been realizing that when I create music, I tend to create in between gaps of ingesting knowledge, and then reflecting that through my own experience, but hopefully being able to translate something onto people or let people into a experience I might feel like we can deal with better if it’s spoken about. I guess some would call it ‘tapping into the Zeitgeist’ and then ‘transmuting’ it into art. With ‘MOSQUITO’, I was trying to relay themes of feeling like the odd one out and how we all might feel like we aren’t comfortable in spaces or, how our presence in spaces can make others feel uncomfortable- How funny,that everyone notices the things we want to ignore. It’s almost like these feelings are part of human conditioning. Then, also mosquitos are known to be one of the most viral insects in the world; if we were to relate that to the concept of ‘virality’ within the 21st century, the reason things go viral is because we can all agree or relate to it, and we think that’s funny or want to share that with others because we’re made to think that we’re the only ones to experience certain things and things like memes and viral videos show us that we’re actually more like each other than we think. All that to say, I’m quite reflective overall but those things manifest in specific ways. Right now I’m working on themes of subversion and ‘Third place solutions’: in simple terms, as the world is moving forward I feel like we can’t go left and we can’t go right so we’ll have to organize and invent a new direction to move into. I believe in Utopias.
Lyzza, “Deserve”, courtesy of the artist
Name some artists or a label/collective that as co-curator you would bring to Villa Lena as the protagonists of a residency and explain why they would be suitable for this kind of experience.
I would love to see Enantios Dromos and Scopeta Shepard from the Limitrofe Television collective do the residency. I reckon they would make use of the surroundings perfectly and they, like me, have also always created from a sense of urgency; Id be incredibly curious to see the work they’d create outside of a commission or their surroundings.
Piero Merola
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