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MABE FRATTI

Bill Orcutt & Mabe Fratti

Almost Waking

Mabe Fratti is a Guatemalan cellist, vocalist, and composer based in Mexico City, celebrated for her experimental yet deeply melodic work. Blending cello, voice, synthesizers, and electroacoustic textures, she builds songs that move between improvisation, ambient soundscapes, and off-kilter pop forms. Emerging from Mexico City’s improvisational and experimental scene, she has become a key voice in contemporary avant-pop

Bill Orcutt is an American guitarist and composer known for his raw, highly individual approach to improvisation. A co-founder of the 1990s noise-rock duo Harry Pussy, he helped shape a fiercely abrasive aesthetic that drew from no wave, hardcore punk, and free jazz. Often playing a four-string guitar in unconventional tunings, he combines shards of melody, sudden silences, and surging rhythmic bursts, creating music that feels both primitive and structurally intricate. In parallel with his work as a guitarist, he runs the Palilalia and Fake Estates imprints and develops his own audio software, continuing to blur lines between avant-garde experimentation, song form, and DIY practice.

Almost Waking
I had known about Bill’s music for a while: since his 2017 release under his own name. I connected a lot with his music and I had no idea that years later we would be collaborating! It was a total surprise that we started chatting on the internet of collaborating! — we bounced ideas back and forth, all starting with a series of guitar solo stuff that Bill sent me. I had a great time with the pieces and in some of them had the honor to collaborate with I. La Catolica in the studio here in Mexico as well where we were trying to decipher the harmonic possibilities of Bill’s ideas and very carefully develop some good melodies that followed correctly the guitar. The vocal melodies followed also the same principle of trying to get tight with Bill’s iniciatives. The idea was to leave a lot of space but in only one of the tracks I just went on with the idea of harmonizing shamelessly the vocals. The album ended up having this nostalgic vibe to it. I am so happy on how it turned out and grateful with the crazy coincidence that made it happen!


STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Breathy, avant chamber classical with free-wheeling psychedelic guitar and constantly evolving key changes, resulting in something that's as organic as it is surprising. Wonderfully deep, emotionally wrought experimental sounds, RIYL Constellation Records, John Zorn etc.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Almost Waking
El Inicio Es Cuestión De Suerte
Forced & Forced & Forced
Arise From Graves And Aspire

Side B
The Heaven Of Our Misery
Steps Of The Sun
Todo Puede Ser Error
A Rural Pen

Mabe Fratti

Sentir Que No Sabes

A sense of destiny hangs over Sentir Que No Sabes, Mabe Fratti’s fourth solo-credited album released in a five year span. Her work has always possessed a finely tuned sense of drama capable of expressing a range of emotional states, and across this new album, she conveys the struggle to process various relationships or situations–and the actions that come next. Sentir Que No Sabes is urgent and clear, poppy, generous and approachable, while showcasing a considerable emotional hinterland. It is also, as Fratti is quick to mention, “groovy.”

Written and recorded with her partner, multi-instrumentalist, and co-composer Héctor Tosta (I.La Católica, Titanic), Sentir Que No Sabes is the result of an intense, detail-oriented process. Fueled by a new confidence gained in their collaborative project, Titanic, and its critically acclaimed 2023 LP, Vidrio, the two hunkered down in the familiarity of their studio (aka Tinho Studios) to bash out the initial sonic coordinates of her new record. “We talked and talked, and discussed ways of playing and recording, until things became inevitable,” Fratti explains. “We recorded a bunch of demos at our home studio and that meant we had a lot of time to re-edit and experiment. We really dug in. We were super focused on detail.” Tosta also took up the controls as producer and arranger-in-chief for all additional instruments. The album was later completed at Willem Twee Studios in Den Bosch in the Netherlands, and Pedro y el Lobo Studios and Soy Sauce Studios, in Mexico City.

For the final studio recordings, the pair were joined by drummer Gibran Andrade and trumpetist Jacob Wick to fill out and expand on Tosta’s percussion and brass arrangements. This small group of friends were able to work quickly and openly, and without fear: a testament to the exhaustive groundwork put in at Tinho Studios. This can be heard in three short, intermediary tracks that also manage to be the most aggressive on the record: “Kitana” (a scratch-laden instrumental that acts as a strange prelude for the last track, “Angel nuevo”) and a pair of two-minute instrumental interludes, “Elastica” I and II. None are throwaway mood pieces; rather they act as emotional cue cards, and hint at the way Fratti and Tosta created the overall atmosphere of Sentir Que No Sabes.

TRACK LISTING

1. Kravitz
2. Pantalla Azul (Blue Screen Error)
3. Elastica II
4. Oidos (Ears)
5. Quieras-o-no (Whether You Want To Or Not) 
6. Enfrente (In Front)
7. Elastica I
8. Márgen Del Indice (Index Margin)
9. Alarmas Olvidadas (Forgotten Alarms)
10. Descubrimos Un Suspiro (We Discovered A Sigh)
11. Intento Fallido (failed Attempt)
12. Kitana
13. Angel Nuevo


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