OK, I’ve found my favorite music video of 2020, and it’s for Ale Hop‘s track “Jungle Depredation” off her album THE LIFE OF INSECTS. It’s got every element I’ve ever wanted in a visual – microscopic animals, anthropomorphized vegetables, UFO lights, squishy raw organ meat – and no wonder I love it, because the way Ale Hop creates is from a 360 degree perspective of experience, sensation, and movement. Her fourth studio album is out October 23rd on Buh Records, and you can order it here. The music Ale Hop creates is like kind noise; the experimental nature of her work is strange and wonderful, and instead of attempting to throw your energy off balance the way noise feels to me, it’s integrating all of your bodies into one. And when I read about how she built her inspiration by actually living with and among insects in her Berlin flat, the feeling of entering a new universe when listening to her music makes sense. Right now, hit play on this amazing video and experience this microverse for yourself…
The composer began to craft the album The Life of Insects after spending one month living with different types of insects in her home studio, which she bought from a local insect dealer in Berlin and built little terrariums to record them for the sound design of a film she was working on.