CAMP LIMBO
Scout girls dancing with electrics through their bodies, cookie crumbs scattered on venue floors, the echoes of 8 bit synth bleeps and hazed choruses; Camp Limbo opens like a summer's video game, in a way that bends the rooms edges. 2 figures are moving in sync, with harmonics that seem to speak and a crowd under audial oath to listen. Everything consumes the stage, the duo's revival of dead dance floors is invoked by recurring pulse and strobe.
Order wouldn't exist here, save the blow of the signal whistle
interview
What was your most prominent musical memory that made you want to start CAMPLIMBO?
G:
Bonding over Nirvana and Full Metal Alchemist, the first few words exchanged between the two of us
A:
It’s hard to refer to what started Camp Limbo itself; we had no idea what we were doing in the beginning. We just knew we wanted to do music together from the get-go.
I do look back fondly on when we first started messing around in a run-down building back home with the worst setup known to man; everything felt pure. I want to keep chasing that feeling forever.
What does your music symbolise for you?
G:
curiosity, longing and duality
A:
Pretty much, a never-ending cycle.
what part do the scout girls play in the world of camp limbo?
G&A:
The skouts, like many other elements within the project, are a symbolic representation of a larger thematic foundation within CL (CAMPLIMBO), intended to guide its lore and understanding through visual means. In this case, the skouts could represent the unseen strength of the feminine figure, our [gleo and aydn] detachment from the universe as present characters, among other representations. They help shift the focus away from us as two individuals and towards everything else about CL, including “everything” surrounding the skouts.
In reality, many of the layers behind CL cannot be explained in their entirety through our personal definitions alone. They rely mainly on individual interpretation and the viewer’s ability to give them their own meaning beyond the initial definition.
With that being said, aside from the fact that the skouts play a huge part in the lore on one side of the mirror, they are also one of the most appealing visual aspects of Camp Limbo in this plane.
There’s a lot more to be uncovered about the skouts as an identity.
what is your favourite song that you have written?
What does it represent for you?
G:
From the songs we’ve released recently, lyrically, probably Sangria. I feel like we were both quite on the same frequency without even saying a word to each other about it, which I’ve noticed happens quite frequently when we’re creating, whether remotely or together, and whether we’re working on the music or creative direction/development. It was like an epiphany of sorts. We don’t usually tend to mention things like this. I thought it was bizarre, but in a good way. It was blissful. Also, the lyrics felt like they just flew out on their own when it came down to actually sitting down, writing and structuring everything, including the instrumental, which is always a good sign for me when we’re songwriting.
A:
My favourite song I’ve made so far is actually unreleased but we do play it on our live shows, it’s called Nosedive. It’s a very important track to me cause I feel like it was the first time we finished a track and I can look back and say that I accomplished the idea that I had set for it from the get go, it’s an incomparable feeling. It’s also my favourite track to play live and it pushes me to the limit, feels like an adrenaline injection and I can tell the crowd feels it too.
Don’t wanna speak too much on the track itself as it’s not out yet but hopefully will be soon, just figuring out the right moment for it.
Your shows are quite immersive and give the audience a part to play. What was the intention with this?
G&A:
There are numerous ways to look at it, and we like to leave many of these aspects up to interpretation. However, we do believe the live shows are the best entry point into the world of CL. It’s all visual, and all of the energy is felt intensely for all parties. Everything is experienced at once, almost epiphanically.
We’ve always believed that, as an artist, you have a duty to your audience when it comes to live shows, giving them a unique experience they wouldn’t get simply by listening to your music.
A:
I try to think back to other artists' shows that I've been to in the past and incorporate what worked for the audience into our own.
There are no limits to what one can do in a live performance and I want to keep experimenting and pushing boundaries.
What are you curious about?
G:
I wouldn’t even know where to start with that one, I’m an extremely curious person by nature. But definitely anything relating to brief interplanetary discoveries and Backrooms or something.
A:
I guess my current hyperfixations are cryptids and anything Cormac McCarthy has ever done.
Does your persona in your music relate towards your personal life?
G:
Not really, especially because I feel like my persona in the music is often from a third-person perspective. But on the other hand, I do feel like the project [CL] in general has indirectly taken a lot from the most personal parts of our beings to create itself out of thin air.
A:
I feel like I stumbled into a sort of persona over the years when I’m creating. I consider myself a reserved person and like to keep to myself and my own, so it felt like the only way was to detach.
Whats your pre show ritual?
G:
Hoist the flag, equip the skouts, have a cookie or two, tie bandanas, round up the troops, prep the whistle.
A:
Blow out all the different candles in my head, leaving only one, nothing else exists or matters besides the show.
Where does your mind go when youre fully immersed in music?
G:
It’s hard to say. I’m a delusional wanderer, so my mind will just go to random places, but they usually relate to whatever I’m working on for CL, or just creating in general.
When we initially launched the rebrand with the creation of our last singles, I used to imagine a circus inspired by the ones from the 50s, with the “Freak Shows” and the motorcycle cages and all that. Then, I went on to see a black Jeep driving between rows of black chrome, burning palm trees lining each sidewalk on some random street in Miami under a grey, psychedelic sky, like something straight out of Hotline Miami or GTA V. Massive conceptual inspos for the project, by the way, especially for RAID and Kabin Fever as a movement.
But now, the only thing I can imagine with most of the new music we’re working on is just a desolate, silent, almost uncanny deserted “paradise,” with vast white sand stretching as far as the eye can see. And maybe a concrete road cutting through it, for some reason.
And that’s it.
A:
Usually depends on the idea, it’s usually a blank canvas. My mind floats between endless dusty, desolate plains or empty corridors and rooms. I like empty, vague spaces.
I feel like our latest two releases reflect both ends of that spectrum in a way.
Dream blunt rotation (band edition)
G&A:
The The, the cure, nickelback, Selena Gomez & the scene, blue man group, linkin park, jackson 5, maroon 5. In that order
What world are you trying to build with your music?
G&A:
That is still to be revealed, if ever, through our own words. We would, however, like to have it presented as a gift. Whatever it happens to be.
We want the project to be something that is fundamentally immersive and enjoyable for everyone, especially for whoever experiences it from the other side of the screen. As if it were the equivalent of going to a festival in the desert, a sports match in a stadium, or even a circus in the middle of the woods. A real spectacle.
Hence our reinforced detachment from self-indulgence. We are not a standard music act, collectively speaking as an audio-visual project. Not because we’re special, but precisely because we want this to feel like a gift, overall.
We like treating it, or rather approaching it, more like a movie or TV show in its scripting and presentation. The project isn’t inherently about us, even though we are on stage with the skouts, for example. The project is meant to be worn by whoever chooses to wear it.
