#nedelle torrisi

[joanofarc]

counting shit, nedelle and thom (2004).

and forever lazing out making eyes at you i'm wondering if she's counting, too

[varsovan]

MOTH from Allison Schulnik on Vimeo.

Film by Allison Schulnik * 2019 * 3:15min Gnossienne No. 1 * written by Erik Satie * Performed by Nedelle Torrisi **************************************^****************************************** MOTH is a traditionally animated, hand painted, gouache-on-paper film. It is animated mostly straight-ahead, with frames painted on paper almost daily for 14 months. The film seeded and bloomed from a moth hitting my studio window and continues as a wandering through the emotions of birth, motherhood, body, nature, metamorphosis and dance.

MOTH Copyright Allison Schulnik 2019

allisonschulnik.me

[upalldown]

Sufjan Stevens - Javelin

Tenth studio album from the Detroit-born indie folk singer-songwriter features contributions from Adrienne Maree Brown, Pauline Delassus, Bryce Dessner and Nedelle Torrisi

11/13

Once when Sufjan Stevens was in college, he brought an injured crow to the biology lab to help save its life. “You are doing the universe a great favor,” a woman who ran an animal sanctuary told him once he called her to the scene. This is one of several stories Stevens tells in his 10-part essay included in the elaborate physical edition of his latest album, Javelin, all in service of exploring his ever-expanding definition of “love.” He writes in an inquisitive and self-aware tone, joking about how that experience with the crow provided “endless fodder” for his collegiate creative writing: “So much meaning, so little time,” he reflects. But if a young Sufjan once sought these encounters for their symbolic potential, the present-day writer of this essay, and of these songs, tells a more pressing story: even more meaning, even less time.

Over and over again on Javelin, Stevens contemplates the end. Sometimes his language, along with the hushed longing of his voice and the romantic sweep of his largely acoustic instrumentation, points toward the demise of a very long relationship. “I will always love you/But I cannot look at you,” he explains, tracing the broken logic governing the loss. “It’s a terrible thought to have and hold,” he admits after wishing ill to someone he once held dear. “Will anybody ever love me?” he asks in the aftermath.

Instantly, the songwriting feels as raw and direct as ever. And indeed, Javelin is Stevens’ first proper album in a long time that seems designed with no grand concept to unify the material or inspire theatrical adaptations; no autobiographical insight to make you reconsider everything you thought you knew about him; no jarring musical change-ups to remind you he is a proud member of the Beyhive. Running under 45 minutes, Javelin begins with a deliberate inhale and ends with a cover of a deep cut from Neil Young’s best-selling album—a track that Stevens manages to make sound even sweeter and more hopeful than the 1972 original.

Like much of his defining work, Stevens wrote, recorded, and produced Javelin almost entirely alone, minus a few key appearances: some guitar from the National’s Bryce Dessner in the dazzling eight-minute “Shit Talk,” and frequent vocal accompaniment from a small choir that includes Megan Lui, Hannah Cohen, Pauline Delassus, Nedelle Torrisi, and the activist and writer adrienne maree brown. It’s got at least one song that instantly joins the ranks of his very best (“Will Anybody Ever Love Me?”) and plenty that draw direct lines to previous high-water marks, both thematically and musically. Centering the devotional melodies and heart-tugging intimacy that characterized his early masterpieces, it’s the type of record, two decades into an artist’s career, that tends to be called a “return-to-form,” suggesting an embrace of his strengths and a diminished instinct to surprise or provoke.

But is anything ever so easy? The intricacy of Javelin is central to the essays and art accompanying the album: collages that overflow with faces of friends and family and heroes, paintings whose colors seem intended to combat Seasonal Affective Disorder. Many songs follow the path of these maximalist projects, beginning with gentle fingerpicking or piano before fireworking into electronic symphonies, orchestral crescendos, and choral rounds. The cumulative effect suggests that, while each story might begin as a stark, personal inquiry, Stevens strives to lead us somewhere divine, an altitude where our lives might appear more beautiful and still.

It is through these trajectories that Javelin, despite its tone of endless searching, becomes one of Stevens’ most uplifting records. In “Should Have Known Better,” a sudden burst of Casio keyboards accompanied an optimistic glance to the next generation—a rare bright spot on 2015’s grief-stricken Carrie & Lowell; Javelin is filled with these kinds of turns. With the notable exception of “Shit Talk,” which dissolves into a long ambient coda that lingers like fog after heavy rain, each song ends somewhere brighter, fuller, and lusher than it began. “So You Are Tired,” which includes Stevens’ most heartbreaking set of lyrics since Carrie & Lowell, climaxes with a lapping wordless refrain from the choir. As his words zoom in closer to a separation (“So you are tired… of even my kiss”), the soothing, major-key resolution suggests an elemental sense of peace, leading to a blend of emotions that feels entirely new within his songbook.

If there is anything Stevens learned from his last proper solo album, 2020’s pared-down synth-opus The Ascension, it is to tell these complex stories in simple ways. Take, for example, “My Red Little Fox,” a love song cast in waltz time, where Stevens uses one of his most classically beautiful melodies to express a series of escalating refrains: “Kiss me with the fire of gods,” he sings, then, “Kiss me like the wind,” and eventually, “Kiss me from within.” Here is the story of Javelin in miniature: The first two are seductions, spoken from person to person; the last is more like a prayer. If the lyrics on Javelin lack the proper-noun touchstones of Stevens’ story-songs, these ones gain authority from an intrinsic sense of self and place. They are approachable like pop songs, but delivered with the same precision as his folk confessionals. They break our hearts from within.

“I know I’ve often been the poster child of pain, loss, and loneliness,” Stevens recently wrote to his fans. “But the past month has renewed my hope in humanity.” He was referring to his ongoing treatment for Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare auto-immune disorder that left him learning to walk again after losing feeling and mobility in his hands, arms, and legs. In the lead-up to Javelin, he has taken to Tumblr—long his preferred method of communication—to give frequent updates on his recovery. Sometimes he finds humor in the situation—a post about his dream wheels, the “Porsche 911 of wheelchairs”—and sometimes his words are more troubling (“Woke up feeling trapped”). But nearly every post ends with a positive affirmation, or at least a sign-off with a series of X’s and O’s.

This is the tone that Stevens now favors, something familiar and close, where the stakes are high and his sense of empathy is pervasive. This tenderness is partially how “Will Anybody Ever Love Me?,” with its Morrissey-level self-deprecation and whispered instructions to “pledge allegiance to my burning heart,” manages to feel less like a breakdown and more like time-lapse footage of a flower turning toward the sun. Throughout his career, Stevens has used the language of love songs to express religious devotion, and vice versa. Across Javelin, he seems intent on understanding and being understood, with the purpose of exposing the common thread between his pet subjects: raising the endless questions that lead us to seek meaning in one another, and rejoicing in the euphoria of sometimes finding it. And if it sounds like he is occasionally singing to us from rock bottom, it’s only so we can witness the steady ascent onward.

[todrobbins]

MOTH from Allison Schulnik on Vimeo.

Film by Allison Schulnik * 2019 * 3:15min Gnossienne No. 1 * written by Erik Satie * Performed by Nedelle Torrisi **************************************^****************************************** MOTH is a traditionally animated, hand painted, gouache-on-paper film. It is animated mostly straight-ahead, with frames painted on paper almost daily for 14 months. The film seeded and bloomed from a moth hitting my studio window and continues as a wandering through the emotions of birth, motherhood, body, nature, metamorphosis and dance.

MOTH Copyright Allison Schulnik 2019

allisonschulnik.me

[fuckyeahstephensondheim]

Somehow I missed this when it came out last year. If you wanted to hear one of Sondheim’s most devestating meditations on love reset as an 80s adult contemporary pop ballad, you are in luck.

[nofatclips]

Fourth of July by Sufjan Stevens from the album Carrie & Lowell

[advicefromparadise]

My Advice From Paradise hotline is open now through the weekend! LEAVE VOICEMAIL or TEXT 747-2-ASK-NED ☎️ (747) 227-5633 ☎️ questions answered on my NTS.live radio show Monday

[muchpreferredcustomers]

Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N and Nedelle Torrisi - Condemnation (Depeche Mode cover)

[burlveneer-music]

Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N and Nedelle Torrisi - Condemnation

Condemnation is a 7" single released in memory of film director, musician, and artist Travis Peterson who passed away in December 2016. Peterson was a close friend of all four artists featured on this record: Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N and Nedelle Torrisi. Proceeds from the sale of this record will go to Didi Hirsch Mental Health Services in Los Angeles. Get the 7" single: http://smarturl.it/Condemnation7 Stream Now: http://smarturl.it/CondemnationStrm Download: http://smarturl.it/CondemnationDL Peterson had collaborated on music videos with Gonzalez, Holter and Torrisi, as well as with Ariel Pink, Glass Candy, Geneva Jacuzzi and many others. The double A side single (also available digitally) is comprised of two different versions of the classic 1993 Depeche Mode original. Depeche Mode was one of Travis’ favourite bands. In addition to his music video work, Peterson directed many short films including Salvation Mountain (which received a Big Sky Award from the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival), Indio, USA, (which received a Student Academy Award nomination when he was a student at AFI Conservatory), and Circus, among others. He also worked for the BBC News as a camera operator and editor. Travis also played music in bands such as MOOG, Pong, and Cherubino. Holter, Gonzalez, Torrisi and M.G.N said: “Aside from being an authentic and talented artist and collaborator, Travis was a great friend beloved by many in Los Angeles and around the world. Known for his infectious laugh, sense of mischief, and passion for art, music, and architecture, Travis was simply a pleasure to be around. We hope you will check out a link to some of his work.” http://www.travisjpeterson.com Video directed by: Jennifer Juniper Stratford

[cloud-gays]

Can you please put your music on shuffle and tell me the first 10 songs? I want to test something 📝🖊🧐 (obviously fine if you don’t want to). Hope you have a nice day💛😙.

yeah sure friend!!

i put my 5k liked songs on spotify on shuffle bc that's funner than my phone's songs (which includes the tabinof audiobook lmaooo)

disclaimer, i like to press that heart button, i probs dont remember much about these kajdhsj

just how i love you - burkhart

condemnation - julia holter, ramona gonzales, nedelle torrisi

high speed - coldplay

body - julia jacklin

all my friends have dogs - broox

moon - sleeping at last

intertwined - dodie

i think ur a contra - vampire weekend

the hand you deal - fenne lily

chord left - agnes obel

[madartlab]

Mad Quickies: cosmos/art synergy, beautiful Baikal, hand-painted moth animation, and a long overdue obit

Mad Quickies: cosmos/art synergy, beautiful Baikal, hand-painted moth animation, and a long overdue obit

Oh, hello! I didn’t see you there! I’m busy ending this week and starting my decompression for the weekend. Won’t you join me in perusing these fine items we call the Mad Quickies…

……….

“Science and art are often thought of as incompatible. In most universities, they’re housed in separate buildings. In bookstores, they’re shelved in different aisles. But astronomy and art have been inseparable…

[theseventhhex]

Nedelle Torrisi Interview

Nedelle Torrisi

Los Angeles-based Nedelle Torrisi has been a musician since the day she was born. Her 100 percent Sicilian parents were a jazz drummer and a classical pianist. She began studying classical violin at six, singing at seven, and eventually went on to study jazz voice at Berklee College of Music, finishing her degree at San Francisco State University with an emphasis in jazz music history. While Torrisi’s roots lie in the jazz world her musical career - from her previous solo albums to now, her work has always contained more of a 90s-R&B sensibility. That appreciation carries over to her new LP, ‘Only For You’. Torrisi’s newest solo LP, was conceived while she was living in the Bay Area but came to fruition during a somewhat impulsive move to back to Los Angeles where she had been living. The goal was to study again - learn new things, have her worldview challenged, and try out a different life… We talk to Nedelle about having cleaner production, avoiding social media and TV shows…

TSH: How would you personally sum up the intent that was coming into play for your latest record, ‘Only For You’?

Nedelle: The intent was simple - I wanted it to be my most “pop” album so far. To write concise pop songs with hooks.

TSH: It’s been noted that the production is cleaner on this release, was this intentional for certain reasons?

Nedelle: Yes! My fiancé Billy Uomo and I co-produced the album, and tried to make it as clean as possible to match my intention of writing poppier songs. Kenny Gilmore (Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti) who recorded my last album produced a couple songs, too. And the band Inc. worked on one. David Greenbaum (Beck) and Gilmore mixed the album.

TSH: Do you embrace the improvised nature when forming new songs?

Nedelle: I think every song starts with improvising, whether you’re working with a melody, lyrics, or just messing around with an instrument. It’s all about catching something that you find interesting, and then exploring it.

TSH: Moreover, with this album, did you tamper with many unconventional and experimental approaches?

Nedelle: I didn’t use unconventional approaches, but there were many different approaches. Like, I would manipulate samples and then write a song using them as a base. I had people send me tracks from other cities. I made multiple versions of some songs to get the tone right. Sometimes I would make demos and build the final recording out from them.

TSH: How key is it for there to be some sort of cohesiveness when you write your songs?

Nedelle: Cohesiveness is important so you can easily communicate to the listener. In the past, I’ve written some songs that have more cryptic lyrics, or weird parts that might not seem cohesive. But with this album I wanted to laser beam all aspects from my brain to your ears!

TSH: Tell us more about the sentiment behind the track ‘Rich Kids World’ …

Nedelle: The song speaks to the fact that we are sold this capitalist idea of “achieving your dreams” in this country. That if we all try hard enough our dreams will come true. But there are also inequalities and obstacles that are important to acknowledge.

TSH: Also, what sort of energy were you looking to imply with the track entitled 'Candy'?

Nedelle: The chorus is mostly lifted from a Cameo song. Except for a line sandwiched in between the two chorus lines. It’s a sick song from a great band. I re-wrote the verses to make my version of the song about a man who can’t resist the temptations of a woman. Cameo’s lyrics are, “It’s like Candy” and I say, “I’m like Candy, and now you want a piece of me. You never knew it tasted so good.” It’s just a sexy, fun song.

TSH: For yourself, what’s the most liberating aspect in forming new music?

Nedelle: Any moment in which something clicks is the best moment in life. (Until the next moment like that.)

TSH: You’ve previously stated that your compositions involve musical theatre, how does this often come into play?

Nedelle: I’m just really into musicals. There are no super-strict parallels between my music and musicals. Maybe a bit of innocent, wide-eyed vibes lyrically, and my voice sounds a bit Broadway, too.

TSH: On a daily basis in life, what sort of distractions do you wish to avoid?

Nedelle: I’m trying to cut down on social media, and ideally I wouldn’t even have a computer, lol. I find the internet and social media to be very destructive, distracting, and it's making people more stupid. I really think this era of content overload is making people feel isolated and depressed, but if we just put down our phones and computers more often, we’ll feel more relaxed and happy.

TSH: What’s been the most difficult of questions to answer on your ‘Advice from Paradise’ blog?

Nedelle: A lot of questions are about unrequited love. Does he / she like me? What should I do? I wish I could help people get over unrequited crushes and move on, but that impetus ultimately has to come from them. There have been many doozies over the years. My archives are as long as War and Peace at this point.

TSH: What was it about possibly being a social worker that intrigued you?

Nedelle: Both of my parents worked at a prison – dad taught English so prisoners could get their GED’s. Mom taught prisoners a skill so they could get jobs when they’re released. My aunt and uncle were social workers too. There was always a strong sense of civic duty, and a general sense of empathy and kindness among my family members. In the end, though, the idea of going back to school was too unbearable, ha!

TSH: You viewed the Tarantula TV series recently, what did you like most about it? Also, what else have you been viewing in recent times?

Nedelle: Haha, are you stalking me? I LOVE Carson Mell - everything he writes and touches is solid gold. It didn’t get picked up for a second season because TBS, sigh. But it’s sure to be a cult classic. I like Wyatt Cenac’s Problem Areas, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath, and Real Time with Bill Maher. My favourite shows of all time are Sex and the City, Dexter, The Wire, and recently I loved The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.

TSH: What lead to the following tweet to be posted ‘Whoever discovered the artichoke was really hungry…’

Nedelle: I was just thinking of how there’s really not so much food to be derived from the artichoke. Like someone found that uninviting, prickly vegetable and said, “How can I eat you?” Speaks to the creative and enterprising nature of humans.

TSH: Finally, do you feel there are defining traits that you will bear in mind with future musical releases?

Nedelle: I’d like to record myself and not rely on anyone else. It was super-fun working with my true love Billy Uomo, of course, but it’s just easier to make stuff on my own. It’ll be more lo-fi, but I’m fine with that.

Nedelle Torrisi - “Rich Kids World”

Only For You

[fingersonblast]

Nedelle Torrisi with the amazing video for ‘Rich Kids World’ from her new album ‘Only For You’

[elsantodelrock]

Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N y Nedelle Torrisi: Condemnation

Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N y Nedelle Torrisi: Condemnation

Ramona Gonzalez, Julia Holter, Cole M.G.N y Nedelle Torrisi son nombres que te sonarán familiares, ya sea por separado o asociados a otros proyectos más, en memoria de un amigo personal de todos ellos, el directos y músico Travis Peterson, con una noble intención, reversionan un tema de Depeche Mode.

Condemnation es un tema que retrata esa realidad alterna en la que viven las personas que, como…

[nofatclips]

Blue Bucket of Gold by Sufjan Stevens from the album Carrie &  Lowell