‘The Eighth Note’ is 8 quick Questions with Wellington Musicians.
A chance for us to catch up with people & see what they’re up to, or introduce you to a new musician/band and their music.
Today’s guest is bedroom pop artist Alexa Casino.
Who are you? Tell us a bit about your music.
I’m Alexa Casino, I make pop songs. They’re simple, repetitive, electronic, dreamy, emotional bangers that I hope you can relate to.
What have you been working on lately? Any new tracks or albums on the way?
I was in the middle of recording a cover album of Kanye West’s 808s and Heartbreak, with clean vocals and distorted production. Was really excited about it. But my laptop is broken and I think I’ll need to star from scratch again.
Where is the best place people can follow you & find your music?
Soundcloud is where I post new tracks. Instagram for visuals, Twitter for tweets.
What were the 3 most influential albums to you growing up?
I feel like I’m definitely still growing up. . . I think The Black Parade by My Chemical Romance needs to be mentioned as the first album I listened to that wasn’t the radio or one of my parents’ CDs and at age 11 it was my introduction to emo. here I am 10 years later, still emo.
Animal Collective – Strawberry Jam was the first Animal Collective album I heard, I remember it changed the way I viewed music. It’s full of incredibly infectious melodies and is bursting with emotion. I remember being the only one at school who liked this weird music and people always asked for it to be changed but that just made me like it more, because it made me feel special.
Lontalius -The World Will Never Know About Us, an amazing and beautiful collection of short songs I would play on repeat for hours and hours. listening to this was probably the biggest inspiration for me to start making music and I still listen to it all the time.
Which other Wellington musician (s) would you most like to work with?
I really admire Waterfalls and Estere and Womb is my favourite band! They’re so dreamy.
What’s your favourite Wellington venue to play in?
My bedroom!
In your songwriting or composing (or the band’s songwriting) how do the
compositions and songs take shape?
I make loops on my iPad, mostly using midi. Usually I’ll start with melodies because I love melodies and they feel so natural. I record the beats on a loop next and layer them into pop songs. When I had a laptop I would use logic to further shape my sound, but I don’t at the moment. I’ll play my instrumental tracks on loop for hours until I get a vocal idea to sing over it, but most of the time my tracks stay instrumental.
Where/when is your next gig?
I’m playing a NYE set that I’m very excited for, it will be my first gig outside of Wellington.