By Keith Walsh
I fear that for many of us, Valentine’s Day is about more than just colorful cards and candy hearts. With her new tune released today, Margot Day of Metamorph portrays love in a delightfully dark and melodic way.
Produced by Erik Gustafson (Adoration Destroyed, Eva X), “Love In The Wreckage” tells the story of a stormy and frightening love, under an enigmatic, multi-faceted moon. With instrumentation by Day and Gustafson, and informed by their shared Goth aesthetic, the effect is quite fascinating. And when Margot blazes into an organic flute solo near the last third of the tune, it’s exhilarating.
Day is a practicing Wiccan who fronted the band The Plague in New York city of the 1980s. I had the chance to ask some questions about her music, past and present, how she uses technology to create new sounds, and how the pandemic led her back to programming electronic beats.
Synthbeat: How does your work in the 80s goth scene inform your new work?
Margot Day: Fronting my band The Plague in NYC and self-releasing Naraka in the 80’s informs and influences everything I do. The first Plague concert was opening for the Bad Brains at a huge abandoned building squat on the LES. Then there was the Limelight and CBGB’s. We, the underground were all in it together. Rebellious, wild, collaborative, creative.
But my performing didn’t really start in NYC. I started in the theater as a baby with my dancer mom. The stage is home. And the stage is ritual. Music is my life.
Synthbeat: What DAW (digital audio workstation) are you using? What sort of inspiration do you find creating music digitally?
Margot Day: The artistic freedom is unimaginable. To record my voice and flute myself, instead of in a studio. I have a high tech portable studio that I set up here in the jungle. I can get the exact feeling, vibe, and sound of my voice and flute that I want.
This is my first self-recording experience but not my first DAW experience. I started programing with Cakewalk in the 90’s on the Album SACRED! Me and my partner Kurtis Knight (Metamorph) sampled everything. Sounds of icicles breaking, rain falling, power tools and even a sound recording from the planet Neptune – and then using these sounds to make beats and bass lines..… I loved it. Amazing to make music out of organic sounds from nature. For me music and nature are interlaced. And all of my Metamorph music is tuned to A = 432hz – which is natures sound frequency.
For most of Metamorph I stepped away from the Computer, and Kurtis Knight took over for our Metamorph Music releases while I focused on performance. Then 2020 happened and everything changed. Our festival and concert bookings got canceled. We ran away to the Jungle.
Driven to create, and the necessity to share led me back to programming. I am using Logic Pro now and loving it. Empowering to embrace DAW and be able to fully capture these my new musical visions that are haunting me.
Synthbeat: There’s some synths in there, which ones?
Margot Day: Erik did the synths for ‘Love in the Wreckage.’ Here is a quote from Erik ‘I use an array of vst/soft synths in the Logic X world; and no hardware synths at this time. Some favorites are Logic’s own ES-2, and also ReFX Nexus 3, as well as Toontrack’s Ez Drummer 2.’
Synthbeat: How did Erik’s production change the sound of what you created?
Margot Day: The vision remains the same. My song structure is mostly intact. But Erik took ‘Love in the Wreckage’ to another level. I feel like Erik read my mind. Erik is utterly brilliant and I am so fortune to work with him. LITW was originally called ‘Chaos Magic’ because LITW had its own chaotic vibe – taking the world’s chaos and transmuting into words and music. Somehow in a perfect synthesis, Erik’s production weaved in synth, bass and truly inspiring guitar, entwining with my flute and vocals.
Synthbeat: I love your flute playing. Did you learn in public school?
Margot Day: I started at the age of 7 at home in the country with my artist dad while he played the piano. My life has always been full of nature, music, art and dance and the desire to share and the hope to inspire…..
Synthbeat: Thanks Margot!
About Metamorph: Based in New York City and Vermont, Metamorph is a live band that prior to COVID put on an exhilarating live show, and will do so again. In addition to Margot Day on vocals and flute, Metamorph features Kurtis Knight, Anomaly on bass, and Joe Netzel on drums, as well as dancers Rivqah Cas and Kitten Mapants. “Love In The Wreckage” features guitar, bass and drums by Erik Gustafson, and lyrics by Margot Day and Julifer Day.
Margot Day dot com
Metamorph On Bandcamp
‘Love In The Wreckage’ On Spotify
‘Love In The Wreckage’ On Apple Music
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