A “hyper-speed, attention-span shirking” set from a unique voice in experimental club music.

When Reba Fay was growing up in Washington, DC, she was an active member of the local punk and hardcore scene, and listening to bands like Suicide and DNA. In a 2018 interview, she describes hearing ‘Frankie Teardrop’ as the genesis of the Swan Meat project, which began in earnest when she discovered software could help her create the music she wanted to make.

Swan Meat’s first tracks were built from chopped-up recordings of poems and other audio samples. In the years since, she has developed her own plugins and Max patches to create her music, which has drawn on her personal experience of body dysmorphia and chronic illness as well as video games such as Metroid and Castlevania.

Fay’s prolific output is largely self-released, but she has appeared on labels such as Bala Club and Infinite Machine. Her third EP, FLESHWORLD, released earlier this year, saw her create a maximalist suite of harpsichord arpeggios and breakbeats influenced by Sega OSTs, anime, Hans Zimmer scores and emo YouTube stars.

Swan Meat’s FACT mix is a “hyper-speed, attention-span shirking” set that she “pieced together with a fine-toothed comb,” featuring tracks from Atari Teenage Riot, Coheed & Cambria and My Chemical Romance alongside a bootleg edit of Natalie Imbruglia’s ‘Torn’ and a donk edit of Slipknot.

“Some might call it obnoxious,” she says. “Lots of breaks, samples glitched to infinity, string arrangements, mash-ups, and some of my own music from a recent project I’ve embarked on, called the “Tearz Files.””

“For obvious reasons, time seems especially nebulous, fluid, and distorted lately; I’ve been finding myself reeling — weeping! — to the mall emo and prog rock revival music of my teen halycon days. Here I let my burgeoning quarter-life crisis take the mic a bit and tried to include some of these jams as well.”

Find Swan Meat’s music on Bandcamp.

Tracklist:

Coheed & Cambria – ‘Keeping the Blade’
Natalie Imbruglia – ‘Torn (Que & Rkay Bootleg)’
Opposition – ‘Bêta’
The Prodigy – ‘No Good (Nobody Remix)’
Slipknot – ‘Duality (Lemane Edit)’
Scooter – ‘The Logical Song (Digital Korrupterz Hardstyle Edit)’
Slipknot – ‘Duality (Stolen Velour’s Donk Edit)’
Chameleon – ‘Links (1995 Original 12” Mix)’
S3RL – ‘MTC (acapella)’
Sire – ‘Trip Machine (Jungle Mix)’
Q. Uomo – ‘Damn Cold Night’
I Hate Models – ‘Virtual Punishment’
Swan Meat – ‘Brave (Nunu Remix)’
My Chemical Romance – ‘How I Disappear (acapella)’
xxxxxxxxxxxxx – ‘xxxx (Mekuso Remix)’
Siqlo – ‘Parsley’
Teknambul – ‘Sh0ckw4ve’
Swan Meat – ‘Swan’s Lament’
t+pazolite – ‘256 Seconds World Tour’ 
Supire – ‘Twilight (21LU)’
Mekuso & y=0t – ‘Nothing on Four Days’
Morten_HD – Azure Dragon
djshshunj – ‘Together Again (nightcore edit)’
Melly – ‘Invaderz’
Littleguy – ‘Montre Folle’
Atari Teenage Riot – ‘Speed’
Swan Meat – ‘Tearz Circus’
Team Grimoire & Sennzai – ‘Chaos Magnvm’

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