Audiofemme Holiday Party featuring Mal Devisa, Gold Child, Marigolds, The Rungs, Letters to Nepal

At AudioFemme, we love music. We love music unabashedly, though not always unconditionally. We love music fiercely, without shame or fear of judgement. We may not always understand why or how specific songs can inspire such emotional response, but we feel these emotions in ever fiber of our beings. Everything you read or see here will stand as testimony to that, in a time where so much music writing is based solely on judgements, rating systems, and obscure references to other bands. We are interested most in the way people experience music, not so much in the way they over-intellectualize or categorize it. Music is a thing that is felt once it is heard, and it is best celebrated rather than mumbled about at parties or smirked over in record stores.

Though we had noted a lack of female voice in music writing, further investigation has unearthed a wealth of rock journalism written by women, both from the past and in the present. We created AudioFemme to help make those voices better heard; there’s so much opinion, attitude, appreciation, humor, and terrific writing by women who love music as much as we do.

While AudioFemme is primarily written and edited by Annie White and Lindsey Rhoades (you can learn more about Les Femmes HERE) we want to have guest contributors, and often!!! We’ll be seeking you ladies out in the near future, but until then feel free to submit – if you’re a DJ, you run a venue, you work in a record store, you play in a band, or you heard something you just can’t get out of your head. Make mixes and we’ll post them. Ramble about your muses and obsessions – we’d love to read it. There are no limits to the scope of genres we’d like to cover nor to the type of writing we’d like to publish here, as long as it is passionate and positive!

Our ultimate goal for this blog is to take it to the streets, incorporating the way we experience music in our daily lives. We want to make you mixes, host parties, book shows, dance with you, and link with organizations like Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls and Make Music New York, all in addition to a smattering of video posts, show reviews, interviews, album raves, and musical rants.
Thank you so, so much for joining us.

Mal Devisa
Mal Devisa is the Amherst, Massachusetts based solo project of 18 year old vocalist, poet, and artist Deja Carr. Carr began playing music at age 12 when she and a group of friends started all-female band Who’da Funk it? After 5 years of performing, writing and recording, Carr began to learn bass and save scraps of her forgotten songs. Mal Devisa was born soon after, out of slanted basement walls and busted, dusty kick drums.

The sound is a hail-storm of genre-defying magic that spans jazz, noise, folk, hip hop, experimental and many other forms. Her lyrics are venomous and then sweet, her rhythms are lightning and whisper into the haunting DIY spaces she stumbles into. Afropunk writes: “Her ambient tracks invite the listener to get lost in a world that is of her own devising.” Mal Devisa’s sound is one you should see to truly hear. With incredible live performances, the project becomes more of a feeling, a moment, a time in space that requires you to get real and lost, with no intentions of being found.

In the past two years, Mal Devisa has earned her way into the arms of many beloved spaces such as NPR, Afro-punk, Cypher-league and various Indie music sources. Her constant touring and ability to store socks in her bass-case indicate she will not be stopping any time soon.

Gold Child
Marigolds
Marigolds is a four-piece rock band based in South Brooklyn. Drawing from an eclectic pool of influence — The Nerves, New Order, The Byrds, The Grateful Dead, The Clean — they favor bright, crafted songwriting and a driving live sound. They are currently recording their debut album. You can find them online at www.marigoldsband.com.
The Rungs
Letters to Nepal
“One of the things that you pick up on with LETTERS TO NEPAL is their uncanny knack for developing the scope in the sound. It acts as an extension to the music and in turn enhances the depth that presents itself. The compact overture in the structure is deliberately constructed from this as a point of focus. It allows the elaborate touches in the arrangement to comfortably merge over the playing, and in doing so things come full circle. What is also an excellent piece of craftsmanship is their approach on each track. Here they sense the worth of the patient calling. That allows for the precision in the running to sell you on what they are about as a band with a clear mark of distinction. That is honed in the patient calling that is alluringly developed to great effect.”
Unsigned&Independent.