ASTHETIK MAGAZINE DISCUSSES THE LATEST EP, 'LEAVE THE GARDEN' BY UPCOMING ARTIST AND CENTRAL SAINT MARTINS STUDENT, ANJU. GABRIEL WINTER DIVES DEEP INTO THE MIND OF THIS YOUNG CREATIVE AND DISCOVERS HOW SHE CURATED HER THIRD EP IN A Q&A STYLE INTERVIEW.
Anju is an Australian-Japanese singer/songwriter who's just released their third EP titled "Leave the Garden." Inspired by her first taste of heartbreak, the songs come from the heart and are written, produced, and recorded all by herself between London and the Japanese countryside.
It was two o'clock in the morning in London when the interview began as Anju is currently staying for the rest of the year back home in Japan until September when she will return to Britain to continue her studies at Central Saint Martins.
"I guess it started with a heartbreak... Ugh, I hate that!" she stated, annoyed.
"I made the EP into two separate parts. So the first three songs are the first part and the last three are the second. And so I tried to make it so that when people listen to it it's like a journey, from heartbreak to the stages of getting over it. So, the first three songs are very obviously about the end of the relationship. To give specific examples, "Seasonal Desire" is when I wasn't quite over the relationship breakdown and me trying to distract myself." Anju spoke about how this was her first experience of heartbreak and how she felt unable to deal with it directly. Learning that putting pen to paper and writing out her emotions onto a page was the right idea, and this EP has proved that.
The EP starts with 'Gone.' Toward the end of the song, we hear a conversation between a man and a woman seemingly in-love, as if over the phone. Anju says it was sampled from one of her favourite films, 'Baby Driver'. "If you know, you know. But it is actually sampled from [...] one of my favourite films. It just fitted in with the song and that scene stuck to me, I just... ugh I love that scene and had to put it in!"
Gabriel: "This isn’t your first time writing music, is there a crux to what you need in order to make a song, be it matcha, paint, nature or so on…?"
"What a great question!! Something that I always have with me when I'm writing is my journal. You know how some people write their lyrics in their notes on their phones, I don't like doing that, I like the feeling of splattering everything in your brain onto a page and adding drawings in there and taking it from there."
"It has to also be in my bedroom, I have to be comfortable. If I had to write in a studio I don't think I could do that. I would want to someday but right now I have to feel safe where I'm writing." It isn't the same thing when writing digitally, it doesn't have that tactile feature to the craftsmanship of the songs. The lack of emotion could affect the music and prohibit it from sounding as if it's from the heart.
Originally, Anju was prepared to soft launch the EP into the mainstream after having left social media for a while recently, but then luckily decided to publish and advertise her artistry. To which a warm response has been heard. She told that "Most of these songs would have been on my laptop and stayed there, so it's great to have put them out when I got my shit together in Japan." And for what it was worth, the EP has been well received, and rightly so.
The Central Saint Martins student talked me through her 4th song on the EP, 'Egg Anthem.' For its peculiar name, this acoustic break in her series of songs offers lyrics in another language. "The lyrics are in Japanese which I quite like because a lot of people can't understand them unless they speak the language, and it speaks a lot about how a girl is possessed to eat eggs in the morning and eggs in the afternoon. I saw it as a short film and I want to make it as the music video for the song. But I won't spoil it too much, I wanna keep it a secret." As Anju stated, a lot of her work is built around visualisations that had either come to her in the night or during a daydream here or there. "So, if it isn't from heartbreak, a lot of my music is usually just from visuals and I make the soundtracks to what I'm seeing."
"When I write I sort of try to distance myself from it and write as a character as if I was in a movie. I think I'm scared to directly attach my artwork to what I'm going through."
Now that you know more about this up-and-coming artist, go stream 'Leave the Garden'. Thank you to Anju for taking the time and liaising with Asthetik Magazine into the depths of the night to talk about your amazing new EP!
Make sure you check us out on Instagram @asthetikmagazine and follow us on our journey to bring you everything ASTHETIK. Follow Anju @banananju to support her on her music-making journey.
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