KATE NV

moscow

I hear the noiseless sounds of divine Hellenic speech

Слышу умолкнувший звук божественной эллинской речи Pushkin

Alexander Pushkin, “Iliad Translation” (1832)

“The world has started to realize that Russia is home to some really cool people––who make really cool music.” That statement in Russian, made not long ago to a highly-thought-of Moscow magazine, came on the heels of bona fide Western interest. Katya Shilonosova––Kate NV––was already a respected musical figure in the capital, thanks primarily to her collaborations with Zhenya Gorbunov and Glintshake. Now, however, her renown as a solo artiste has grown swiftly.

Glintshake likes to frame itself as a mix of “the Russian avant-garde, Soviet new wave, and jazz. Taken as one, [it forms] a single anthem to the paradoxical freedoms, spontaneity, and absurdity of Russian existence.”

Now, in related terms, she hears Fader speak of her “perfect, minimal music for every day”––aka a morphing of “collagist, abstract pop” into “fluid MIDI chirps, manipulated vocal snippets, and playful xylophones.” Shilonosova explains: “It’s as if the music was not written by myself, but my chair.” Absurdism is still alive and well.

She continues to associate the cool emotional range of these instrumentals with the inanimate world, once again in English: “The main purpose of a present [for example] is to bring you joy in the moment, but soon it's just a memory and you can say ‘bye’ to the object. It doesn't mean anything to you anymore, because you already got the impression. That’s what a present is: to bring you joy, even if it's only for thirty seconds. Objects are just objects. They inspire you at some moment, and then they can just not inspire you anymore. And it's OK.“

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