ADULT. & Swans’ Michael Gira Merge With ‘Breathe On’

From new album 'Detroit House Guests'...

ADULT. are electronic auteurs, a production team whose vivid, utterly distinctive voice exists in a solitary universe.

It's this very fact which makes their new album so intriguing, with 'Detroit House Guests' exploring facets of collaborative art.

During recording sessions ADULT. would invite each collaborator to the studio for three weeks, with a song expected to emerge in that time.

Out on March 17th, guests include such creative lynchpins as Douglas J McCarthy from Nitzer Ebb, Shannon Funchess from Light Asylum, Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe aka Lichens, Austrian thereminist Dorit Chrysler and multidisciplinary artist Lun*na Menoh.

Clash has nabbed new cut 'Breathe On', constructed with contributions from Swans' Michael Gira.

It's a titanic crossing of paths, with those brutal electronics wrapping themselves around Gira's emphatic vocal performance.

A real merging of universes, you can check out 'Breathe On' below.

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Michael Gira has an incredible catalogue – how did he get involved?
We asked him, he agreed.

Was the track laid down in the studio, or did you work separately? Did you give notes to guide his performance, or was he allowed free rein?
The entire concept of the album is that each artist lived and worked with us in our Detroit home. We were awarded a John S. and James L. Knight grant to fulfil this concept. That said, he lived in our home and we worked in our studio together. It was a completely collaborative, immersive experience. Which is why we feel this album so unique.

Many collaborations are done over the internet. We wanted this experience to be very organic, unknown, and somewhat out of our control. No guidelines. Being together 24 hours a day in a domestic, non studio environment, brings a completely different vulnerability to the process and the work.

There's a heavy visual art influence in ADULT. – how do you think this manifested itself in the production?
Michael Gira and ourselves all went to art school. We share a certain bleak humor and absurdity in our work, both sonically, lyrically, and visually. Also, our approach to music making is very different than traditional trained musicians. This allowed the three of us to work together in a language we all understood intuitively.

The whole album is geared as a collaborative affair – what do you gain from this approach? How do you maintain the threads that tie this album together?
We never want to make the same album twice. This is our sixth album. This concept and process pushed our album down an avenue we would not have taken on our own. It broke us out of the usual thought patterns you sometimes fall into during the creative process.

As for what ties the album together, since each collaboration was ADULT. (two people) and one other artist we had the majority of influence in the collaborative process. In addition, the album was recorded and produced by us, which ensures a strong sonic tie be made from one song to the next.

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ADULT. will release 'Detroit House Guests' on March 17th.

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