Petite pretty girl with hypnotising eyes, Nicole challenges the construction of a woman "to-be-look-at-ness" by bringing a whole new experience with her musical language that feels so personal.
"Walking on an unstable thin line between severe depression and everyday life I had to break the stuff I had in my room in order not to break myself. I never opened the project to mix it because the mental breakdown started the following morning and placed me down for a year unstoppable. I don't want to mix it. I just want to send it out there and pray for the ones who are struggling with similar mental health issues. You are not crazy. The fight is an illusion but the mental and body weakness is real. Good luck to all." ( My head has gone insane from the album The Other London Eye)
There is so much to talk about! Your album is raw and full of emotions with meaning that you can easily go off on a tangent while discussing it.
Zuzana: You strike me as an exciting new voice in the indie experimental music scene and your musical style is unique. Challenging the perception of the female singer stereotype perhaps?
Nicole: I don’t know what the stereotype is. Channelling myself through music instead of visiting a psychiatrist is probably the most appropriate statement for my case.
It is a fact, I am indeed, a female. Another fact is that I never managed to be taken seriously for actual work in any studio. My naive and aloof behaviour didn’t help either, but that is a flaw I am not willing to adjust for the occasion, leaving music production a personal issue from start to end. I never felt bad about it, I just felt lonely. Like so, I ended up in London, the place where all people get mad eventually. I love those people a bit more.
Zuzana: Why is that?
Nicole: Some of them are economic immigrants, people who know how to feel gratitude in a system where others point out flaws everywhere. Some are dreamers, who paint the cultural atmosphere of the city and work hard in random jobs only to maintain everything London sells out to be.
London can’t exist without both of those elements and at the same time, it is those elements that become worn out, exhausted or hurt and get replaced by new ones eventually, continuing the circle of arrivals and departures. Nevertheless, those people are actively trying. And I am in favour of anything that opposes armchair critics.
Zuzana: The only mermaid was created upon your arrival in your homeland. Could you tell us a bit more about it?
"Like a child with no memories, the pills must have been working well. An old small classical guitar was staying still and dusty in the corner of the living room. Some seashells around the room could make percussion sounds but I should leave that stuff alone for a while. However, the ocean sound of the big shell spoke like an uncomfortably familiar sound of harmony and brought past experiences blended into a wave." Nicole (The Only Mermaid)
Nicole: Greece is a lovely land. My arrival was hell. What a great asshole must you feel like if you are in heaven and it feels like a nightmare to you! Adding a bit more judgement to my blindness, I was wondering where have all the people gone? That was the last time I found my way out through my music by recording The only mermaid.
All of my studio equipment and instruments were stolen on my attempt to send them back to Greece giving me another slap-in-the-face-sign to reset. This is why the only mermaid is recorded with only one small guitar and an old microphone I found almost accidentally and have never recorded anything ever since.
Zuzana: What do you appreciate most about creating a piece of music?
Nicole: The fact that it happens without notifying you. That’s the only moment I embrace that comes above me. You can feel it in your whole body. You feel the urge of running towards your guitar or microphone without knowing what it is you have to do!
I can’t hide the fact that since I lost all my stuff, there are moments I need to burst out in tears having that feeling but lacking the instruments...
Zuzana: What do you think is lacking in today's mainstream music scene right now?
I am a bit lost as to what is mainstream right now as I don’t follow it. I surely understand that when an industry needs to sell fast, it uses production line models. So, the quality of a handmade blouse is probably more interesting than a T-shirt from H&M. The music industry can’t be far away from that, I assume.
On the contrary, we are blessed with a huge number of artists in every corner of the world. What if the mainstream isn’t what I want it to be? What if I think it is shit? (I do). It is my own responsibility to find the artists I find authentic or beautiful. It might be a difficult journey, but when you finally hit a rock, look down and find out it is gold, then you embrace it even more! In a western world where everything is handed to us, let music be the one luxury that needs just a little bit of our exploration.
Zuzana: What's a song you consider a masterpiece from start to finish?
Nicole: The first masterpiece that popped into my head is Echoes from Pink Floyd which disintegrates and chants in favour of life at once.
In the next five minutes, another five masterpieces are going to pop into my head since you asked me. That is the brilliant world of music. Travelling back in time, with the lutes of John Dowland to the latest noise of the psychotic monks, there are countless unknown souls telling a music story. Maybe there are no masterpieces, but there are a million pieces of a music mastered above.