Glittering between horror and euphoria Marina Zispin, the new project of noise experimentalist Martyn Reid and art pop explorer Bianca Scoutt, offers a decidedly fresh form of dance floor gloom. Despite sharing a similar taste for synth pop decadence and haunted vocals as the recent wave of goth revivalists, there’s a certain ephemeral touch that causes Zispin to stand out from the crowd. It’s hard to pinpoint on first, second or even third listen but there’s a sensation in their sound of something new emerging from the haunted. We caught up with Reid and Scout to discuss Zispin’s origins, the group creative process and the difference between existing within the gothic and acting as revivalists.
What was the genesis behind Marina Zispin?
Bianca Scout: I can have a little look over this. Essentially what happened is I came back for a little short period of time, from when I left Newcastle to go to London. We were put on the same line up at the old police house in Newcastle and we had never met each other. I think I saw Martyn as Depletion and I was just like, very, very blown away. I was taken aback because of course, I’m in experimental scenes in London, people doing noise. But I was like, wait, who is this person doing noise like this cause I was like you are really manipulating sound in front of me, not pushing buttons. What Martyn does is his old school it’s proper graft, it’s like proper gear shit. I was like, whoa, that was so moving and beautiful and tragic and everything and gorgeous. So obviously I was like, whoa, oh, my God, if I feel that way, I’m going to come and say something. I think it was only like a year later that we actually bumped into each other again and were like, Oh my God, it’s you hello, hello. We thought we were just gonna make noise music together but then we ended up chatting and getting on really well and talking about lots of things over the maps of the world. All of it was when I was living in Newcastle by the sea, I stayed at my dad’s at the time at Whitley Bay and it just had this Marina Vibe.
You mentioned being by the bay and the sea. Do you think that’s the cause of aquatic vibe of Marina Zispin’s music?
Martyn Reid: The Love Boat is a series from the 70’s and when Scout stayed at my house this was on the TV and I was watching it at the time. It kind of really reflected our lives and what was going on when we were hanging out. Because every day just seemed dreamlike. This was back in 2018 and it was just this kind of really idyllic summer. We recorded music every time we would hang out. We’d always end up like in some strange adventure. So it was a really fruitful time for getting to know each other. I’ll also add that a lot of Marina comes from just us, sharing stories and dreams. We never really kind of sat down and talked about music as such.
Bianca: We talked about our dreams a lot didn’t we. Like ‘what are we dreaming about? Let’s unpick dreams.’ Dream analysis.
Were any of the songs inspired by specific dreams then?
Bianca: Desert which is on Pattern Damage, but that is a Marina track. It’s literally Martyn reading and singing and coming up with the melody line of a dream that I had recently at that time.
Martyn: It was really inspiring to be in Scout’s room because you would have these dream journals. But not just dreams but a lot of stuff just stuck to her bedroom walls like thoughts and ideas and kind of manifestations. When we were in Scoutt’s room, we were of surrounded by all this inspiring stuff. It wasn’t just about dreams, it was also about the subconscious.
Marina Zispin doesn’t sound particularly like any previous projects done by either of you. How did the project end up sounding the way it did?
Bianca: That’s Martyn’s old backlog of stuff, isn’t it?
Martyn: When I was 16, I was, I was doing kind of similar music to this, but I just never released.
I was always more focused on noise and industrial music. I thought that was the path I wanted to take in terms of self-exploration. That specific kind of noise or experimental music seemed to, maybe it was bad reflection, but reflect everything that I felt. But like I said when I was 16 I had bought my first drum machine, so I was making these electro kind of songs. But that was always kind of held on the back burner. So when I first met Scout, I brought along some of my sequencers and things like that and I told Scout, I’d love to do some songs based around them.
Bianca: I had no idea that Martyn had this side to him. But I’m not surprised just because one person, puts out something that sounds like that doesn’t mean they’re not sitting on something, completely different. But it’s also not different. When I heard it just sort of blended. And then we were having such a fun time. When you find that kind of connection or collaboration with somebody. The world can just breathe. It happened very, very easily. We didn’t really think about it.
If anything, do you find creating as Marina Zispin has been more smooth or natural when your own work as solo artists?
Martyn: For me personally I feel like it’s way easier. You’d think it would be a lot more difficult because it’s got more structure than noise or experimental music. But I found that because that was such a big part of my life. That it became more and more self critical and I would just listen to things over and over again. Whereas when I’m working with Scout, it just feels more expressive. Sometimes noise got less expressive because it was always this battle between aesthetics versus expression and one can dilute the other. This was a problem that I had for a long time where it felt everything that I want to do comes from an emotional urge . But at the same time with aesthetics, you want to refine it. Trying to get that balance right got a lot ess satisfying. With Marina, it’s there’s definitely an aesthetic consideration. But there’s a lot more fun to it, too.
Bianca: You can just tell we’re both, just bopping our heads and having a good time with the song. We don’t give it too much thought; we don’t have to labour over the particular sound. We come to this space together to kind of unwind and relax and go woo. It’s very, very easy going, isn’t it when we play?
Martyn: Yeah, it also allows you to be a bit more audacious especially when working with someone like Scout. Because sometimes I’ll do something and it’s it’ll be something really silly musically and I wanna see what Scout’s reaction to it is. And then Scout will be like this is amazing. It feels really liberating to work with someone else because it kind of allows you to step outside this idea you have of yourself as well. Having someone else there to give you feedback on what they think about it and respond to it is amazing, y’know?
A lot of the tracks on the record are very dakwavey n moody, do you consider Marina Zispin to be goth?
Martyn: It’s kind of goth adjacent. When I was a teenager, I was definitely into Gothic music or whatever. I think I think it’s got sympathies with it, but I don’t think it is. I feel like we’re, we’re still doing our own thing. When I think about goth now, I feel like there’s some people who are doing the music quite well where it’s this modern revival sound and it’s really polished. But sometimes like it sounds a bit too calculated.
Almost like a pastiche, right?
Martyn: I feel like we just come from a completely different angle to that, y’know. In the 80’s goth was a way for people to deal with and give expression to the darkness in their life and of their own mortality. A lot of bands now that are trying to replicate that era seem to be trying to keep that expression from evolving. Instead they’re seeking comfort and security in familiar symbols and signifiers without really delving beneath the surface.
Bianca: Because also with our different influences still all of that stuff is still around, the gothic. Like if you just walk around the streets of England, y’know. Everything of our history is still really there. It’s not like homaging to Goth, we are Goth because we are in in it, it’s still here. And if it happens to sound a bit like that it’s because shit’s dark, y’know [laughs].
You talked about the creation process of it being quite joyful. Do you kind of consider the music to be joyous? Cause one thing I really liked about the album is it kind of alternates between quite ambient melancholy and really quite dancey moments.
Martyn: For me personally, I feel it’s quite a joyful experience, it’s funny, you mentioned Depeche Mode because I think Dave described what they do is like a melancholy joy. I really related to that a lot. It should be a joyful experience to create music and I feel the feelings that come out come out naturally because they’re always there. You can tell when there’s this is natural creative joy.
Jamie Stewart of Xiu Xiu said something once about Xiu Xiu being ‘music to dance alone to when everything else like fails.’ Would you say the same about Zispin?
Bianca: I like dancing with people. For me this is the first experience where I play live and people are dancing? It’s crazy. It feels so alive and crazy. We’re a little bit angry, we’re sad, but we’re also like, all dancing and were actually smiling on stage? It feels like we’re all together y’know, it’s a bit idealistic, but it’s the truth. I don’t feel alone, and I don’t want people to feel alone when they’re in that. But I do love listening to it alone, like I’m on a mission. It helps me, go through the streets, especially London transportation. So then to be in the space to get dancing to it is really, really, really, really nice. It’s a, really new, beautiful experience to have people dancing to my music.
Martyn: Also to add to that, I feel like for me, dancing is kind of one of the most expressive things in my life at the minute. I feel like it’s actually more expressive than or is equal to when I was doing noise music. Sometimes you do feel like if you’re dancing among the people, you cancel be in your own world.
I think there’s like so much catharsis in dancing. I really like Bianca, how you mentioned listening to it while walking and on public transport. I found it really good to listen to the album whenever I need to, get somewhere fast because the music just starts like carrying me like crazy.
Bianca: When it’s really heavy shit as well. Y’know you’re like [singing], “Can’t think straight. Are you afraid?” You know, I’m just like I have to go. I’m so glad you feel the same way.
With the ghostly like vocals, I feel like I’m in a haunted manor getting chased down the hallway, when in reality I’m like fuck I gotta make this bus.
Bianca: [laughs] It’s like a period drama but it’s right now. I love that. That’s so fun. All fun.
What actually is the origin behind the name Marina Zisspin?
Martyn: Originally, I wanted to call it Zispin because that was it was one of the anti-depressives that I was on. It’s just like well let me add something like Marina.
Bianca: Well, the thing that I’m on right now is a contraception coil, which is the mirena coil. That’s what’s inside me right now, y’know, like with medication doing different things because of society in different ways. So I was like, if you’ve got that Zispin shit I’ll put my ‘Marina’ coil in there for you [laughs].
Martyn: But also there’s a double meaning to Marina, because of the sea aspect.
Bianca: Because it’s not spelled the same, the mirena coil is what the contraceptive coil is. And then obviously the Marina and the bay, it’s all sort of silly and we like that.
I really like it as a name, reminds me of the stuff on minimal wave. Back to the album was much of the music constructed for a live audience?
Bianca: A whole load of those songs were made while being on tour. When we we’re rehearsing for that tour with the EP, whenever possible we would be in the studio and making music. Those songs are quite old and I’ve got melodies and Martyns, like constantly making loads and loads and loads of beats. So, we’re just like we’ve got this let’s do this on tour. They’ve kind of come about from performing them and then coming down to the recording process, do you think, Martyn?
Martyn: Yeah, totally and I and I think that it’s gonna carry on like that because we feel like that’s going to be exciting for us too.
In a way, do you feel that’s made Marina Zispin like quite a live oriented project?
Martyn: I wouldn’t say that, because while the live shows are important, I feel like a lot more satisfied with how things sound on record at the moment. Our live shows are so varied. Sometimes we have really great shows but there’s always something tehncially that goes wrong. Playing live is quite new to us and we’re still refining our live shows, I feel like there’s a lot more potential with what we can do.
Where do you see yourselves going forward sonically then?
Martyn: I feel we kind of go wherever were of feeling in the moment. I think it’s best we don’t kind of plan to because we’ve never done that.
Bianca: I like the element of surprise. It’s like we’re not saying nothing because we want it to be a surprise, we don’t do it for the surprise. It’s a nice thing to be able to come to. It’s like we were talking about. Y’know, conversations with people you can plan whatever you want to say but you can’t dictate where it’s going to go, because you can’t control these things. These things are what happens between the people who are there, in the present moment at the time, and what evolves in that moment from there. So that’s what it’s going to be.
Now You See Me, Now You Don’t is out now.
