Anna Calvi’s new EP with Iggy Pop

The new project of Anna Calvi boasts three great collaborations: Iggy Pop, Laurie Anderson and Matt Berninger of The National. It’s about “Is This All There Is?“, EP out March 20th.

At the end of last year Anna Calvi returned with a cover of Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s “I See A Darkness”, performed together with Perfume Genius. The new EP opens with “God’s Lonely Man”, a song in which Calvi relies on Iggy Popvoice of his destructive internal monologue: “He is unsettling, raw and honest, a unique force. His presence was perfect for the narrative of this song.” The song aims to be a cry against emotional inertia and desperation, transmitted through guitar and drums.

“Is This All There Is?” is the first chapter of a trilogy of records that explores identity through the experience of falling in love. The idea was born from the change in perspective experienced by Calvi after becoming a parent:

Having a child was so transformative that it made me consider the possibility that everything in life could change, and that is scary but incredibly liberating. I no longer wanted to take anything for granted. I want to exist in the best way possible for my son. I wanted to ask myself the most fundamental human question: is that all there is to it?

In the EP Calvi also reinterprets the Kraftwerk classic “Computer Love” together with Laurie Anderson. Following her work as a composer for Peaky Blinders and writing an opera with the visionary director Robert Wilson, the new EP presents itself as a cinematic soundscape:

Compose the music for the last two seasons of Peaky Blinders it really changed the way I create music. I’ve always imagined my songs as little films, but with this EP I wanted to explore a narrative that could exist through all the songs.