Through compositions on self-made ceramic bells, electronic music, their voice and moving image, Glasgow-based artist Thefuries shares with us “music for the tranquility of the souls of survivors of sexual violence: requiems for the living, the living dead and the dead”.
These elements come into focus in a podcast which recounts and meditates upon their own experiences of sexual violence, as well as offering insight into their own artistic practice, and how one directly informs the other.
Content Warning: These tracks deal with the experience of surviving sexual assault; there is no description of sexual assault: Track 1 Death: Mention of death, suicidal ideation. Track 3 Rage: Threat of violence. Track 4 Survival: Description of aftermath of sexual assault.
Another Access
1. Death (1 Minute 32 Seconds)
Audio description: A slow sung unaccompanied song, from the undergrowth, a sad numb rest with pain in tongue, a plea
it creeps on me when my death creeps on me when my death it creeps on meI get so bored I get so bored I get so bored so bored of meI lay my body out to waste I lay my body out to wasteI don’t give it attention
I don’t give what it needs I want to feel at ease
I want to feel easyI want to feel at ease
I want to feel easy
2. Anxiety (5 Minutes 5 Seconds)
Audio description: A beat, whack. And building thundering hooves alongside. Loud listening, heightened awareness, a sharp breath in, and long breath out, an underwater heart beat and close loud squirming squeaks in and out of the mouth. ugh! double time, shouts of effort, to fight.
3. Rage (3 Minutes 7 Seconds
Audio description: Repetitive pounding beats, building energy, focus, ferocious, slips to malice, dancing on, laying in wait
make my night
make my day
I been waiting for you I been waiting for you I been waiting for you I been waiting for you I been waiting for you I been waiting for you make my day
come for me come for me
come for me come for me
come for me come for me
come for me come for me
come for me come for me
come for me come for me
i think you’re always round the corner
i think you’re always round the corner
i think you’re always round the corner anyway make my day
I keep watching for you I keep watching for you I keep watching for you I keep watching for you I keep watching for you I keep watching for you make my day
4. Survival (2 Minutes 37 Seconds)
Audio description: a knowing poem steadily read aloud.
I did not scream and I did not die
For now
I just do the uncertainty with which I walk
in Silence
dripping in the sound of air
I walk
I go to work
I get to work
dripping in the sound of air
I walk
I go home
I get home
there are no guarantees
but in this moment, I’m living
And save for later times The Lament The Healing
And a new attack of my own The before and after
The surviving
(a breath)
The before and after
The surviving
they can see me covered in blood, mascara and dirt rain drenched and filthy
I dry slowly waiting for forensics
they see a shell
a home without a host
they offer me the first ginger snap from a new packet and something did die
and I am who I was before
snap
I can’t eat that
severed
I’m changed and I can get out
when the body is a trap
I connect to the ocean salts inside and escape
I pool
I evaporate
I mist
I surround the perp
every time
they can not continue
I blind them
and fill the air with a putrid smell to make them gag
I am snow melt
I run ferociously
to the sea
encouraging my liquid self
finding movement in the ice
coaxing the stillness out of me
expanding
against my desire to be numb
5. Softness (3 Minutes 22 Seconds)
Audio description: ceramic bells, in slow motion waterfalls across the screen gleaming cool blue, cascades, in loops. Up down around about you, carrying a duvet for us to rest on.
Requiem For Survivors
What are the sonic manifestations of trauma? In this podcast the artist and musician Thefuries explores how the experiences of sexual violence can manifest in sound and in the act of listening. We hear their journey through the making of a series of intensely personal pieces for Counterflows At Home, including the making of several bells and exploring how the idea of the bell resonates as both alarm or announcement. Thefuries culminates in five pieces of music which cycle through some of the emotional states associated with the experience of trauma. These are woven through the podcast, interspersed with their insights on how the process has been.
The podcast was produced by: Alannah Chance
