more from
NNA Tapes
We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Pluperfect Mind

by Dear Laika

/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $10 USD  or more

     

  • T-Shirt/Shirt

    A Gildan Softstyle t-shirt with a beautiful screen-printed design by Freya Nicolson (@GoblinStunts on twitter, @gremlin.tricks on insta)

    Comes in Black, Maroon and Pink, all with a Lilac design

    Sizing (chest inches): S 34/36 , M 38/40 , L 42/44 , XL 46/48
    ships out within 14 days

      £15 GBP or more 

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    ATTN UK/EU BUYERS:
    memorialsofdistinction.bandcamp.com/album/pluperfect-mind

    'Crimson Cheeks' [marbled cloudy clear + opaque burgundy] Vinyl inside a gloss-coated jacket featuring a holographic symbol. A full-color printed inner sleeve features album lyrics.

    Album Imagery by Isabelle Thorn.
    Design and Layout by Isabelle Thorn & Adam Downey.

    Download card included.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Pluperfect Mind via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      $21.99 USD or more 

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    ATTN UK/EU BUYERS:
    memorialsofdistinction.bandcamp.com/album/pluperfect-mind
    NB: ONLY COLOURED VINYL AVAILABLE TO ORDER FROM UK/EU

    Black Vinyl inside a gloss-coated jacket featuring a holographic symbol. A full-color printed inner sleeve features album lyrics.

    Album Imagery by Isabelle Thorn.
    Design and Layout by Isabelle Thorn & Adam Downey.

    Download card included.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Pluperfect Mind via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days
    7 remaining
    Purchasable with gift card

      $20.99 USD or more 

     

  • Limited Edition Cassette
    Cassette + Digital Album

    MORE TAPES AVAILABLE HERE:
    memorialsofdistinction.bandcamp.com/album/pluperfect-mind

    Limited Edition Cassettes
    Glitter Shells with Tape Labels

    Album Imagery, Design, and Layout by Isabelle Thorn.

    Released by Memorials of Distinction
    Licensed from NNA Tapes

    Includes unlimited streaming of Pluperfect Mind via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

    Sold Out

1.
[introit] (alors, une autre année a déjà passé dans cette capsule...) toute seule au-dessus des éthers on sent des sentiments abstrus supprime des mots rétroéclaires et lâche les baisers attendus (je suis encore là...) finalement, elle a decouvert après le décès de l'encens et les balbutiments grinçants la source de sa détresse larvaire les rêves dont elle n'avait jamais rêvé ont inondé son ciel et sous cette étendue au miel y'a'n esprit au plu-que-parfait i am awake from a death that lingers on in a solitude of inward life... there is no health in a heavenly body consumed in the light of a lilac moon at the sound of the seventh bell is the word you foretell [an entanglement of past symbols dissolves into meaninglessness]
2.
[thunder rolls in] inauspicious daylight your infant son a viper's prey i do my duty on your return i greet you with dewy reds and fatal jaws myopic impulse you take up your sword put me down put me down in vengeance kill your faithful hound lay me down lay me down regret enshrines me underground they venerate me make invocations falsely and offer salt all that separates their children from wildland sickness and the fauns is a candle's fire the breadth of a thumb put me down put me down in vengeance kill your faithful hound lay me down lay me down regret enshrines me underground put me down put me down my brittle body is rent and drowned [the dog, pt.1]
3.
Ubi Sunt 04:41
yawning ocean of days adrift and calm catatonic, watching sundown tremble against the wall washed out and faint i wait for nightfall in the mist of dusk backscattered, i see it: the shadow of an observer a spectre cast by a spectre where are my friends? where are my memories? where is my childhood? where is my tomorrow? [äääääääää]
4.
Phlebotomy 03:17
[thunder chorale] my blood is ebbing into bitumen estradiol and serum albumin i count the months for flesh to rectify by timelapsed clouds against a frozen sky
5.
from highland rivers to cambridge rooftops rosa you follow an inward life meaning from hollow an inward life (there is more love than you could possibly expect) (we exist we exist) [the seventh bell tolls]
6.
under an ebbing earth's shadow breathing in a century's mouldy air i feel my cheeks become crimson she sits as a mirror of desires and insecurities wilfully tousled tailored in twill holding a notebook she carries herself in my mind like a student of arts or of architecture an augur bewitching cognisance awakes in the bonfire averts the gaze in shameful negation intestines twisted in longing for alignment of the observable with the ideal locked and noumenal – calm, calm down! get over yourself! she's still there: reminder of love aching with shivers at its dawning and how special it is to be submerged in her sight and tentatively kiss… i build myself in her image with velvet skin and watercoloured eyelids this body is no longer granite a vision of lilith overtakes me and whelms me and i'm so happy i'm so happy i'm so so fortunate to be falling asleep in your arms to be at peace with it all [alleluia]
7.
last night i found us reconciled through sleep's meniscal silver screen supine beneath the waiting sky of quartz struck through with tourmaline the grass was softly cradling our bodies lost in weightless strands and silent conversation played between our penitential hands i am ready, i am ready, i am ready i felt your once familiar warmth, calm and forgiving without spite the field engulfed in soft blue smoke and flames made primrose in the light i am ready, i am ready, i am ready [the house burns]
8.
[the dog, pt.2]
9.
[thunder’s whisper] pluperfect mind to separate histories in two the ancient life of an unknown self forsworn in forgetmenot blue pluperfect mind procession of paradox lines a monologue of an anxious girl with nebulous future designs pluperfect mind that pummels and injures the skin in bygone shame and in questioning fixation on what might have been... [laika bids thunder farewell] [and thunder bids laika farewell]

about

Pluperfect Mind, the label debut from the 23-year-old UK-based musician Dear Laika (a.k.a. Isabelle “Izzy” Thorn), is an extraordinary creation — a beautiful and singular oddity which exists in the liminal space between dreamworlds and a blurry, watercoloured version of reality. It is a reflection on the past few years of Izzy’s life, during which she sought solitude in the North Wessex Downs while beginning her gender transition.

A consistent theme of the album is isolation, both from other people and from parts of herself, and the intention to overcome anxieties and reconnect. Pluperfect Mind also chronicles aspects of Izzy’s own transgender experience, from the painful tedium of waiting for hormone treatment to the elation of finally inhabiting a body that feels right. It captures the sense of being cast adrift between an uncomfortable past and an uncertain future, living outside of heteronormativity and caught in “queer time”. Izzy’s mercurial songwriting aims to suspend the perception of time, allowing the listener to inhabit an immersive half-lit world of mystical landscapes, volatile atmospheres and shifting rhythms.

A meditative album that grows richer with multiple listens, lush alien choir voices float in on “Phlebotomy” creating an intoxicating, ethereal sense of calm, while on “Guinefort’s Grave” we hear distant thunderclaps smudged over electronic fuzz and warbling synths. "Inward Life (We Exist)" opens with a piano, prepared with screws between its strings, tolling like a church bell, before blossoming into an elegy with yearning violins; elsewhere, descriptions of lilac moons, mouldy air, fauns and smoke-engulfed fields create an atmospheric folk opera. “Black Moon, Lilith” is the emotional zenith of the album, a song about desire, its reckoning and its actualization from a trans lesbian perspective that culminates in the triumphant sound of a string ensemble glittering and warped like holographic foil. Pluperfect Mind builds towards a seraphic finale in the title track, in which a beatific choral tapestry emerges from a sea of whispers and sighs and is finally consumed in a cloud of ecstatic, smouldering drone.

Having grown up singing in church choirs and listening to classical music, those influences can still be heard in Izzy’s music now. Although she rarely listens to classical music nowadays, the rich harmonies of composers such as Messiaen, Finzi and Ravel have left an indelible mark on her own writing, and she freely mutates samples of Bach and Beethoven beyond recognition. During her transition, having to make the shift from baritone to alto, she was captivated and inspired by the expressive intensity of Kate Bush, Vashti Bunyan and FKA twigs; her own clear, keening vocals soar throughout Pluperfect Mind, breathy and otherworldly. She whispers French poetry and lilts over lines about warped memories, exploring her inner world with gentle ruminations on love, hormone therapy and dreams.

Pluperfect Mind is a beguiling collection of vivid lyrics and celestial song, bound together with digital glitch and field recordings. Comparisons can be made to Björk, Tim Hecker or Bat For Lashes, but ultimately, Dear Laika’s exploration of the experimental and the mystical builds something intricate and intimate that is truly original and bewitching.

credits

released October 29, 2021

Dear Laika sings and plays piano, prepared piano, violin, and Roland Juno 106s

Produced by Dear Laika

Additional Production on “Guinefort’s Grave” and “Black Moon, Lilith” by Ruairi O’Brien

Mixed by Ruairi O’Brien

Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio (NY)

Huge thanks and love to Heather, Ruairi, Freya, Olive, Emily, Kiran, Lori, Rosa, Doug, Sonia, Josh, all of caroline, David, Pablo, Billy, Shelley, and my parents

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Dear Laika Cold Ash, UK

young woman singing the music

contact / help

Contact Dear Laika

Streaming and
Download help

Shipping and returns

Redeem code

Report this album or account

Dear Laika recommends:

If you like Dear Laika, you may also like: