Norwegian multi-instrumentalist Sylvaine is proud to announce a brand new headlining tour across Europe together with E-L-R.
The “Nova Iberian tour 2023” trek will start at the Bad Bonn venue in Düdingen (CH) on March 06 and sees the band traveling throughout France, Spain and Portugal until a final curtain at the Hard Club venue in Porto (PT) on March 12th. The band will also play in Greece on March 2nd and 3rd, 2023.
A full list of confirmed shows can be found below.
Tour Dates 2023:
02 March Thessaloniki (GR) Eightball Club
03 March Athens (GR) Temple
06 Mar 23 Düdingen (CH) Bad Bonn
07 Mar 23 Marseille (FR) Le Molotow
08 Mar 23 Toulouse (FR) Connexion
09 Mar 23 Barcelona (ES) Boveda
10 Mar 23 Madrid (ES) Wurlitzer Ballroom
11 Mar 23 Lisboa (PT) LAV Lisboa ao Vivo
12 Mar 23 Porto (PT) Hard Club
Sylvaine is supporting the release of her brand new fourth studio album “Nova”, which is out now! Stream, download & order the album here.
To speak to Sylvaine, the one-woman multi-instrumentalist, bandleader, and composer born Kathrine Shepard, is to speak to some spirit that exists beyond the veil of convention and stereotypes. This is not a woman playing to the vogue dark melodic folklorist trope that has become so prevalent in the metal scene but rather, this is a woman who is a serious and classically trained composer and arranger whose songs, that originate on unplugged electric guitars in lavender and black bedrooms, end up exploding against the unlimited conventions of what modern music can accomplish.
For some time, Kathrine Shepard has been seen as the petite pixie of the Norwegian black gaze scene but her small eleven features and lightheartedness belie the woman warrior behind “Nova”, her complex and personal fourth release. Following her 2018 “Atoms Aligned Coming Undone” release, Sylvaine (a play on the name of one of her beloved French poets, Paul Verlaine) gives us “Nova”, an album that is both a musical and personal reawakening of a singer/composer finding her way in this world.
The Lord of the Rings type choir arrangement heralds in the opening of her latest release as we the entranced listeners follow her to the realm of Lothlorien. The creation of this ambitious release began in 2019, before the world changed before all of our eyes. Experiencing a personal loss in a time the world was suffering a collective loss, Sylvaine composed on her guitar and wrote in her notebooks, eventually leading her into the small rooms of Drudenhaus in early 2021. Sequestered away in the countryside of France, the Norwegian native and her musical cohorts would all contract Covid. Asthmatic since birth, our heroine isolated herself in a small room to score out the different soprano and alto melodies of an actual choir to make her vision for the opening track “Nova”, come to life. Sung in an imagined language, the syllables of NO-VA continued to emerge, suggesting to the singer something linguistically symbolic and important.
“I’ve been wanting to write a choir piece since my ‘Wistful’ days”, she says, “Just a purely vocal piece. I love harmonies and the most personal instrument you have is yourself, your voice. I wanted to really show who I am this time around”.
Naked on the cover, which may raise some eyebrows, Sylvaine insists to her fans that this is a symbol of her own vulnerability and personal rebirth that transpired over these years of creating “Nova”. “Nova” in terms of language is connected to words such as nuova (Italian) or nueva (Spanish), meaning ‘new’ and speaks to a rebirth, to loss, the temporality of life, grieving as nothing lasting forever, but looking forward as new doors are forever opening.
Recording Line-up:
Sylvaine – Vocals, guitars, bass, synths, arrangements
Dorian Mansiaux – Session drums
Current Line-up:
Sylvaine – Vocals, guitars, bass, synths, arrangements
Live line-up:
Sylvaine – Main vocals/guitar
Dorian Mansiaux – Drums
Florian Ehrenberg – Guitar/backing vocals
Maxime Mouquet – Bass/background vocals
Guest Musicians:
• Lambert Segura (SAOR) – Violins on “Everything Must Come To An End”
• Patrick Urban – Cellos on “Everything Must Come To An End”
Weblinks:
www.sylvainemusic.com
www.facebook.com/sylvainemusic
