The Eyes in the Heat X Twin Playlist

18.10.2012 | Blog | BY:

The Eyes in the Heat“s debut album Program Me was released this month on Kill The DJ records – an all-female, Paris based label.  Already named album of the week on Juno, Twin caught up with vocalist Zizi Kanaan to talk music, women and representation…

Where did the name The Eyes in the Heat come from?
It came from a Jackson Pollock painting – but I think we choose it mainly because we liked the suggestive quality of the phrase. I remember when I was a kid I would get severely stricken, almost painfully so, by shyness, and what I remember most about the feeling was this extreme pressure and heat behind my eyes. I felt like I was being watched from all directions, and this sort of extreme projection had the effect of sort of freezing my gaze.

Who are The Eyes in the Heat?
We are Lebanese/American, Zizi Kanaan (artist/vocalist), British musician/DJ Oliver Ho (aka Raudive) (machines and guitar), and Marseille born Jerome Tcherneyan (percussion).

Is it important for you to identify as a female musician?
Yes – but only in the sense that the female musician is still under-represented and far too frequently categorized. I like exploring the point of view of both sexes. I believe firmly that both sexes can strongly identify with the idea of the other. Identity is a construction, there is no one-way to be or see – and this can be as difficult for men as it is for women, constantly feeling they have to uphold a certain accepted role.

 What ideas inspire your music?
 I am really into the idea of the Freudian slip. I think sometimes that most of my lyrics are one long slip of the unconscious. I also love mistakes. Losing control is so healthy sometimes! I love it when you trip, on the street or someplace, and for that one, brief moment, you lose yourself, you lose your sense of control, the sense of ‘you’ becomes dislodged, and for one small second, you are free from all your self-demands…

Do you have any opinions on the difficulties of women building a career in the music industry and the difficulties in doing so?
I think things are still pretty backwards and reactionary. It’s always noteworthy for instance that whenever there is a new all-female rock-group it’s still seen as striking and out of the ordinary, in a way that an all-male band isn’t.

This is an issue that just keeps going in circles, without much progression. In the Seventies and Eighties we had a lot of all-female punk-rock bands, riot grrrl feminist movements, all female post-punk groups etc. whereas we seemed to have moved backwards from that position now.

Wouldn”t it be interesting if the majority of all industries was run by women. Wouldn”t that be strange? Can you imagine it? I often wonder how different things would be if society were run by a mostly female workforce. I think a lot of people still have a difficulty with entrusting the qualities of intelligence and competence to women, and the mere fact that we have to imagine what it would be like for women to be in the majority shows how behind we still are. Why are women still in the position of having to prove themselves…

That’s why it’s fascinating to work with the label we’re on, Kill the DJ. Not only are they the only surviving, truly independent label left in France, but it’s also founded and still run by two women. This gives them a very different take on the whole techno, DJ, post-rock culture, which can often be quite male dominated and very much into ideas of traditional masculine hero-worship. As a band we’re very much working to try and dismantle those sorts of ideas, and so it’s a perfect home for us.

 Do you feel like you are part of a particular scene? If so, what is it?
 We are now part of the Kill The DJ family, which is very energizing. It’s very exciting considering their historical relevance in terms of the feminist/gay/lesbian scene in Paris, and what they have accomplished with an all women outfit. France still feels like a very politically driven place, so it’s great to be involved in that network, that history!

Twin asked Eyes in the Heat for their top nine tracks…

1/  B-52″s – Private Idaho
They have this post-punk meets 60″s garage style – amazing organs and grooves. The vocals are great in this too. This group really rocks!

2/ Talking Heads – Cross Eyed and Painless
The best line of all time “lost my shape, trying to act casual” which is pretty much how we feel a lot of the time.

3/ Frank Zappa – What”s the ugliest part of your body?
We absolutely love this track – short, sweet and desperately to the point. Identity as a social construction, physical beauty, ugliness – it”s all in the mind!

4/ Laurie Anderson – Language is a Virus
She has a huge talent for creating a free narrative that floats through the music, using words like musical notes. She has such an ironic, wry, sharp wit and an interesting take on gender identity.

5/ The Flying Lizards – Get up (Sex Machine)
This band is very unique, somewhere between avant-garde music and post-punk pop. Discordant sounds mixed with sparse beats. Her vocals are beautiful too, very English and satirical. I love this song, and the way they have managed to dismantle and anaesthetize such a “sexually – driven” song.

6/ Jean Shepard – The Root of All Evil is a Man
I love the whimsical melody of this song, it”s so floaty and sweet it almost passes you by how dry and vengeful the lyrics are.

7/ The Watts Prophets – Prostitute
This group were a forerunner to contemporary hip-hop. You can still feel the dark, dripping New York streets in this atmospheric social take on the city”s underbelly life.

8/ Planning to Rock – Doorway
What an excellent, unusual performer – exactly what the music industry needs more of…

9/ Lydia Lunch – Mechanical Flattery
She reminds me of a female Tom Waits – a very sinister, scary song…yikes! what a song to end on… I hope you”re not reading this in the morning. Definitely a song for sleazy, dark venues…

Listen to their playlist 

 

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