The Invention of Language
Herlop’s present sound is defined by a rejection of traditional narrative in favour of pure aesthetic impact. She largely avoids intelligible lyrics, opting instead for a self-invented syntax of phonemes and syllables chosen solely for their texture and frequency.
She treats the voice as a rhythmic modular synth. These "words" are chopped, layered, and panned into complex lattices that bypass the listener's intellect and speak directly to rhythm and emotion. For Herlop, music isn’t a story to be told; it is a composition to be built—self-contained, resistant, and completely indifferent to the constraints of translation.
The Solo Engineer: Process and Production
What makes the performance captured in this film so striking is the sheer autonomy of the execution. Herlop is a multi-instrumentalist who produces most elements in her music with collaborations along the way. On stage, she operates as a one-person orchestra, navigating the keys, vocal loops, and drum pads simultaneously.
While the 2022 album Pripyat relied on a dense, often claustrophobic layering of vocal glitches and darkened harmonic shifts, Nekkuja (2023) signals a shift toward a more expansive and high-frequency sonic palette. The production on the latter is marked by a sharper percussive attack and the integration of environmental field recordings like water and birdsong, that are processed with the same rhythmic volatility as her synthesized beats. Rather than serving as ambient background, these sounds act as active tonal components within her complex arrangements.
