🎵 IT068: Songs to sing along the end of the world.
✏️ Amanda González Alarcón
🗓 17.02.20
Amanda is a jokingly self-proclaimed ‘illustwriter’ (escribujante), from Santiago, Chile, currently based in Barcelona via Mexico City.
Hola Amanda! Can you tell us a little bit about your tape and your song selections?
I think I’ve been thinking about the end of the world since I was little. I was born in Chile, right under the Ozone hole, so I grew up with the feeling of being vulnerable to this opening to space right over my head, and that we had to take care of it. Climate change has been very present throughout my life, as it is with today’s teenagers, and in the current scenario, the future does not seem brighter. (I also made a little book last year, called “No quiero que se acabe el mundo” or “I Don’t Want the World to End” which also touches on the subject). I made this tape as a soundtrack to this age, aiming to combine a bit of nostalgia and some kind of hopefulness. It’s therapeutic. My dad always tells me not to think about the world ending, but I think I need to cry about it in order to let some brightness and hope in, and keep on walking in days coming.
What direction did you take with your cover art, and what was your process?
I really like stars, they have become a personal motif in my work. They also remind me of the tarot card, which represents hope. I didn’t intend on the cover ending up looking so alike to the card– the hands, the star above and the water below; but the idea of the end of the world usually makes me think of uncertain tides, that’s why I drew a rolling sea. The first song, “The End of the World” (a Sharon Van Etten cover of Skeeter Davis), questions how some things keep happening, like the sun shining and the sea rushing to shore, even though it’s the end of the world. It’s a love song but I love that image of things that have happened forever and will keep on happening. May our presence in the world end, stars will go on shining above.
What are your fave album covers, records with a great music and artwork combo, or musical projects with a visual component?
i,i – Bon Iver
2019, Jagjaguwar
Artwork & Art Dir: Aaron Anderson, Eric Timothy Carlson
2019, Jagjaguwar
Artwork & Art Dir: Aaron Anderson, Eric Timothy Carlson
I love Bon Iver’s latest work. Their style has mutated so much through the years, and I love the direction it has taken. All the visual work in i,i is infused with the collage-y feel of the songs. It’s a collaborative album with a synthetic sound and mix, driven by Justin Vernon’s voice, which gives it such an impassioned humanity. It makes me think of our relationship to technology and art. It’s there and you can hear the engines running, but I think it’s less dystopian cyberpunk and more like everything we do, we end making about love and existential angst.
I Am Easy To Find– The National
2019, 4AD
Design: OSK
2019, 4AD
Design: OSK
That and The National’s I Am Easy to Find, accompanied by the short film directed by Mike Mills. It makes me cry. A lot.
What did you listen to growing up?
Mucho rock y pop en español – Soda Stereo, Los Tres, Los Jaivas, Los Prisioneros, Javiera y Los Imposibles, Julieta Venegas, Café Tacvba, Virus. (Also, we all miss late 90s – early-2000s Shakira). Chilean folklore, like Inti Illimani, Violeta Parra and Illapu. My mom also loved Lenny Kravitz, Faith No More and Peter Gabriel, and my dad loves movie soundtracks, so there was a lot of music that I was very familiar with even before having seen the movie it belonged to.
And what’s on heavy rotation for you at the moment?
I’m in my Latinx R&B/trap/synthpop/indie stage. I’m heavy on Girl Ultra, Reyna Tropical, Lido Pimienta, Chancha Vía Circuito, Cuco, Chicarica and Diego Lorenzini (tiny rec: his cover for Paloma Mami’s “Goteo”).
Mucho rock y pop en español – Soda Stereo, Los Tres, Los Jaivas, Los Prisioneros, Javiera y Los Imposibles, Julieta Venegas, Café Tacvba, Virus. (Also, we all miss late 90s – early-2000s Shakira). Chilean folklore, like Inti Illimani, Violeta Parra and Illapu. My mom also loved Lenny Kravitz, Faith No More and Peter Gabriel, and my dad loves movie soundtracks, so there was a lot of music that I was very familiar with even before having seen the movie it belonged to.
And what’s on heavy rotation for you at the moment?
I’m in my Latinx R&B/trap/synthpop/indie stage. I’m heavy on Girl Ultra, Reyna Tropical, Lido Pimienta, Chancha Vía Circuito, Cuco, Chicarica and Diego Lorenzini (tiny rec: his cover for Paloma Mami’s “Goteo”).
What’s happening in your creative world at the moment?
I’m working on “The Contingency”, an effective toolbox comprised of questionnaires answered by people amid the quarantine. I’m illustrating some answers and publishing them on Las Paltas (it’s in Spanish, though). I also do Cafetando, kind of an illustrated research project on coffee shops – more like drawing while drinking coffee. And right now I’m doing an online workshop to make your own creative grimoire. It’s focused on exploring one’s creative process and making a personal manual out of it. That and other editorial projects because I really want to make books. :^)
Where can we find you?
I’m amandinalaandina on instagram and my website is amandina.cargo.site
Thank you, Amanda.
TRACKLIST
Sharon Van Etten - The End of the World / Daniel Johnston - True Love Will Find You In The End / Soko - We Might Be Dead by Tomorrow / Tom Rosenthal - All of Them Dreams / Kath Bloom - Come Here / Nico - These Days / Angel Olsen - Unfucktheworld / Y La Bamba - Ojos Del Sol / Helado Negro - Imagining What to Do / Alejandro y Maria Laura - Una Fiesta Cualquiera / Erlend Øye - For the Time Being / Little Jesus - Norte - Bonus / Niña Tormenta - Va a Llover Hasta el Domingo / Jessica Pratt - Back, Baby / Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou - Homesickness, Pt. 2 / Andrew Bird - Rising Water ︎