Impressing last month with the track “Nonsense Mouth,” Ellen Warkentine premiered her surreal visual album of the same name yesterday, at an event held at Basic Flowers in downtown Los Angeles featuring a live performance installation by director Anjela Vega.
“Thanatos” marks chapter one of the music video series for Nonsense Mouth. Per the artist, it’s “namely about the Freudian concept of the ‘death instinct,’ the drive towards destruction, and the complicated matter of sitting in your own soul seat. It’s the first in a series of music videos that are essentially a ‘heroine’s journey’ towards rebirth, acceptance and individuation.”
Warkentine, an Ovation-award winning composer with the LA-based “junkyard opera” company Four Larks, shows both her talents as a musician and visual artist with this effort. The track itself features escalating vocals meshing beautifully with emotive piano, ruminating acoustics, and some bells casting a holiday feel. The video is a striking success as well, seeing the growth of a wintry background, as the forefront features artists embracing and showing the power of collaboration. “Thanatos” in all forms is engrossing, and an excellent first chapter for the music video series.
