Melanie Xulu chats to Melody’s Echo Chamber ahead of the release of her third album, Emotional Eternal.
MOOF: How does this record differ to your previous two?
Melody Prochet: I think it’s different because it’s arisen from the echoes of silence. I’ve been sitting in silence, not playing or listening to any music for a couple of years. That colours the music with something more ethereal, more space and air than previously.
Could you tell me about the meaning behind the title, Emotional Eternal?
I think Emotional Eternal evokes the spirit of the eternal and the polarity of life. It kind of sounds like a slow dawning of peace or the sound of metamorphosis.
The album references motherhood, Has becoming a mum changed your experience of being a musician?
Becoming a mother really triggered a sense of vividness, I became much more alive with motherhood. It feeds my sense of childlike wonder. It structured me a lot, I really needed structure. Having only one hour bubbles of time to create and be productive was beneficial for my creativity because I usually get lost in my reverie.
You worked with Reine Fiske of Dungen and Fredrik Swahn on this album, what was that experience like and what did they each bring to the album?
Getting reunited with them was the best part of the process. It was a very joyful surprise because I didn’t think I’d make another record… [Fredrik] Swahn has this extremely optimistic, welcoming and warm persona, and he’s a nerd with incredible capacities in soundscaping. Reine is a treasure chest of beautiful musical oddities, he’s known for his incredible record collection and all those musical oddities are imprinted in himself, so it’s pretty incredible. We are connected in some odd impressional way, we resonate on the same sounds and we all love and respect each other so deeply. They trust my musicality more than myself so it’s really helped me to restore some faith in my own work.
I read that you moved from Paris to the French Alps, that’s quite a change. Do you feel that your surroundings and being amongst nature has influenced your music?
Yesss! I’m free from the city! That was actually the biggest life-changing move of my life, I’ve lived in many other worlds before, I lived in Australia, Sweden, and California. They were all great but something was missing. My origin is here in the South of France. Now I’ve moved here, I really feel home. I feel almost complete – I’ll never be completely complete – but I feel it is a very peaceful otherworld here. I’m from a rural area, so the city is very difficult for me. I think the fact that I now live in this environment had an influence on the record, definitely.
Can you tell me more about the music you did or didn’t listen to in the lead up to this record?
I had been sitting in silence since my previous record. I didn’t listen to or play music for around three years. At home my partner was listening to beta waves and meditative music, and also Sigur Rós. Kind of ambient music… That was a seed planted in myself that I can hear on the record as well, a spiritual seed. In the studio we listened to a lot of music for sure, because Reine and Swahn love to listen to music. We listened to 70s classics like Özdemir Erdoğan, Selda Bağcan, a lot of world music.
What experience do you hope listeners will take from the album?
The first person who listened to the record was the boss of my label, and he said it has an ‘uplifting’ quality to it. I was very happy about that! I was like ‘wow, that’s really cool actually.’ If it has that uplifting flow that’s great. It’s a really good feeling.
Emotional Eternal is due for release on Domino April 29th
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