Luna Maes
I'm in lovey

Luna Maes graduated from KASK & Conservatorium as a singer, with a master's degree in jazz-pop. For her final project, she founded a group with which she made an update on grunge, cut with subtle particles of garage rock and bluegrass. When we meet with Luna, she is in the rehearsal studio with her other project, Kleinpunk, preparing a first EP.

LUNA MAES
We are currently rehearsing hard to finetune everything: re-arranging the music and getting rid of the flaws. For the recordings we will be working with producer Jan Viggria (The Guru Guru, sb).

STIJN BUYST
Kleinpunk was not your graduation project, but the group originated at KASK & Conservatorium?

We were put together in combo classes, which we took with Peter Lesage (Ertebreakers, Gabriel Rios, sb). There they bring together random students, from all years, and two hours a week you play together. Once, when the pianist in my combo didn't show up, Peter put me behind the keys. Suddenly I was sitting there with a Nord Stage synth in front of me: quite overwhelming. It was my idea to start singing in Dutch, even though I had never done that before. Peter then invited us to De Kreun to play a set in the support act of Flip Kowlier. And because there is both kleinkunst and punk in our music, we called it Kleinpunk.

SB
The Kleinpunk songs I heard already sounded quite absurdist.

Exactly - it's about almost nothing, but that's just funny. Humor is very important in the lyrics. For example, 'Hand en Voet' is about someone crawling through life and thus whining about the state of the Belgian road surface. But a lyric can also be about small details: how you put your hand on the table, about someone's skipping voice... In terms of lyrics, Spinvis is an important example for me. His lyrics are so poetic and real, even though he is very modest about it. I draw inspiration from everyday conversations. I find that afterwards, I often start putting that conversation into a metre and then put words in there that people don't often use.

SB
For your graduation project, you did create a completely new band.

You get to choose what you do for your thesis project. But because at Kleinpunk I work mostly with spoken word, that wasn't so suitable to show what I learned in my vocal training. So in October, after long hesitation, I started writing for a new project with Roel Delplancke on drums, Robin Lambrecht on guitar, Anthe Huybrechts on keys and Ruben Van Hijfte on bass.

SB
And you sang in English. Did that feel a bit like a disguise?

Yes, it kind of did. But I still tried to bring that absurdism.... I think lyrics are very important. They don't always need a concrete message, but it always sets the mood. When I talked to Lien De Greef - Lady Linn, my coach this year - about my lyrics, she really liked those absurdist things: sneaking in something cute and chamois like “I'm in lovey” in a grungey song, with a solid guitar underneath...

SB
You mentioned Spinvis, do you have any examples in English?  

PJ Harvey! She always writes about very sad things, but then again her music is so badass. That contrast always produces something new. By the way, I don't believe that new things can't be made anymore. If you throw enough different people together, something unique will always come out of it.

SB
You dedicated the concert to your late friend, singer-songwriter Matt Watts.  

I heard half an hour before I had to go on stage that Matt had ended his life1. So I just had to say something about that. Because I could have gotten really emotional, and that whole concert could have gone wrong. By speaking openly, I hoped to be at ease.  

Earlier this school year, Matt and I had worked together for a week at Mais Quelle Chanson, Kapinga Gysel's non-profit organization, where we wrote songs together with children. So I hadn't known him very long, but in that week we had laid the foundation for a beautiful friendship. Kapinga was really very close to Matt.

SB
I can imagine that such a graduation concert is a very strange situation anyway. If only because there are a lot of acquaintances and a jury in the audience.  

Yes, it is a bit strange. Music is all about breaking loose and being free, and then immediately after your concert you have to go up in a little elevator and - 'ping' - to a jury that tells you what was good and what wasn't.'  

SB
Do you know in advance who is on the jury?  

Yes, and by being at KASK & Conservatorium for five years you also know in advance who will like what. But I also know that those judges try very hard to let go of their own preferences when judging. The atmosphere of such an exam remains really goofy.

SB
There was a beautiful a cappella passage in your graduation project.

Yes, of course you have to be able to tick off a number of competencies for an exam. But for me, that part also went back to my childhood, when my father was completely enthralled by the bluegrass soudntrack of the film 'Oh Brother Where Art Thou' (from 2000, by the Coen brothers, sb). Singing together with your family is, of course, a very simple method of connection. And that music is also totally that: singing together on the porch, with someone on double bass, a guitarist and then someone rattling on some pots and pans. I was raised very atheist, but that religious aspect in those songs, all that suffering, and the dark minimalist sound of it appeals to me a lot. That song was also written from the point of view of parents of a child who has run away from home - 'Oh no, my child is gone!' Just because I haven't experienced that suffering doesn't mean I can't feel it when I sing.

SB
What lesson from your education will you always remember?

Lien always told me that if you're really yourself in a project, then it's unique anyway. And from Peter Lesage I learned that when you play together, that you have to leave space for the other players before you add anything yourself. When you look for a musical click, it's really about dosage. That was a real eye-opener.

SB
Are there any fellow students you look up to?

I find it really hard not to name people from my own projects, because I really look up to them. But in general, I think what music production students do is often even more striking, because they immediately start with the mindset of being a musician. They often play multiple instruments, think directly from songwriting... They are really the homo universalis of KASK & Conservatorium. Neil Claes - the singer of Lézard - had a very impressive graduation project: in the space where the audience was sitting, there was an old bulky TV. In another space Neil played, as if he was performing in a Flemish television broadcast of the 1980s, complete with a presenter. That was really a total experience.

SB
So, you've graduated now. What next?

Now it's just beginning. Although I did get a very good basis. And especially a network: my fellow students are my peers for the next ten years.

¹ Do you have questions? You can contact Tele-Onthaal for an anonymous conversation on telephone number 106 or at www.tele-onthaal.be. Those with questions about suicide can contact the Suicide Line on freephone number 1813 or on the website www.zelfmoord1813.be.