Heute erscheint das Longplay-Debüt von DEN-MATE aus Washington, D.C. Exklusiv für Popmonitor hat One-Woman-Wonder Jules Hale, die ursprünglich aus Warrenton in Virginia stammt, die satten Shoegaze-Songs von Loceke kommentiert…
CHARLOTTE
Charlotte is a fictitious character, one of the many alter egos of the Loceke record. Charlotte is the insecure mannerism that we all revert to when we are feeling misheard, misguided, and misunderstood. The song is questioning that voice of insecurity we all come to time to time. At the time of this song I was just starting out making music and quickly saw how people treated me differently knowing that I stepped out of this characteristic of Charlotte. I was making music and in the process owning something of mine for the first time and departing from this insecure identity. The ending is an explosion at everyone who doubted that energy that I was capable of creating.
PARADISE
Paradise is a song about otherworldly escapism, trying to find a metaphorical or literal paradise in a seemingly hopeless scenario. I was living in a very remote area when writing this song. I wanted the perfect mix of what I wanted to listen to driving down the highway, sailing away or taking off in my own spaceship far away to nowhere.
LIGHT
Light is a love song, and in my own personal focus, how having a medical condition or sickness feels like a burden to the ones you love. you feel guilty that you need extra care and the desire of a perfect life is but a fantasy. Even the strongest of people need care.
SICK
Sick is a song that is really defined by how you interpret it. It could be looked at as a big love song, but I personally see it more as a self-love song through making difficult decisions. When you’re upset and you lose control of yourself, it isn’t a pleasant experience but there’s a sense of relief getting something off your chest in the hopes it gets better. It’s self-love through a hurdle of a harrowing experience.
COUNTRY
Country is about sexual assault and the aftermath effect of it years later while living in America. „There’s nothing I can’t be I’ve got 50 personalities that I can switch on instantly, I don’t know why I’m still trying“ is a statement of the intensity survivors can feel in wanting to make a new identity to feel separated from their trauma, something I’ve felt personally. Living in such a hyper-sexualized country, we are told how to look, how to dress, how to speak how to laugh, and ultimately how to think. Living day-to-day knowing what has happened to you, what has happened to others– others with stories you’d think aren’t imaginable– happens right here in our home and all over the world. Country is about instilled fear and trying to find something to help let you go of that fear, in this case a new identity to detach from trauma.
DC JUNKIE
DC Junkie is a story of a complete chaos. Destruction is a form of creation.
XOSO
XOSO is about loving something that’s toxic for your health– whether it’s a person, a substance, or an ideology. In this scenario, XOSO is a story about a homeless teen living in the city who’s addicted to drugs, and trying to get by. This person, like many others from my hometown, romanticize their addiction and have only started to acknowledge that it’s bad for them. XOSO draws upon the feelings of recognizing your own toxic health issues and struggling to weigh this against the pleasures of the habit.
REGINE
Regine is about a dream I had after a seizure. Like a lot of dreams after a seizure, they feel very real. I felt like some type of guardian angel visited me in my sleep and took care of me. Throughout the evolution of this song, Regine became a character of someone who nurtures and takes care of someone. I needed to take care of myself through this character.
LOCEKE
Loceke is what love sounds like to me. I wanted to capture the intensity and the textures and frequencies of how love sounds. I wrote this song thinking about how full and lush and complex but also simple love is– love is fulfilling, love is coming of age, love is a learning lesson and with love I always feel I’m learning and experiencing in different ways.
In Loceke the record, I talk about many different characters. We all have different parts of us– good or bad– but acknowledging we have them and getting to understand them is the main idea of this record. Loceke is an invitation to the world to get to know the different sides of Den-Mate. While my last EP Entropii was all based on elemental subjects, Loceke is a more cerebral record that describes the emotional landscapes of different personalities and accepting the good and overcoming the bad.
STILL LIFE
Still Life is about a car accident I witnessed and the mother who was driving lost her life and her kids were left behind without a mother. I could only express how i felt through recording this song. This song is the original recording of that night. It was important for me to end this album with a sobering dose of reality.
DEN-MATE
Loceke
(Babe City)
VÖ: 28.09.2018
