cuppa with a mate: the man who makes face-melt music 🫖

Hi, I’m Phoebe and chances are you signed up to my mailing list at a sound bath or via Bandcamp. I also record and release ambient music under the name IKSRE (which stands for I Keep Seeing Rainbows Everywhere 🌈). I also love taking photos, pondering big questions and seeing photos of your pets.

Time for another “meet someone I like heaps and want you to know about too”. And this one is someone very close to home - someone I get to play gigs with on the reg. He’s unreal.

Before we do though, some exciting news from me. Three years in the making, my second album of sound meditations (a follow up to “awake within the dream”) is coming. in all her forms (sound meditations vol. 2) will be released on Constellation Tatsu on 6 October. I can’t wait to share the first single with you next month. Meanwhile, here’s the artwork. 👀

Back to business. Go pour yourself a cuppa (for the non Aussies - this means a cup of Tea/coffee) and let’s get to know Karl Willebrant.

I met Karl a few years back when he reached out to me to ask whether I’d ever be keen to play gigs with him. I already knew his stuff and was a big fan - and the timing was perfect! I was booking my ‘abundance’ tour and wanted a support. In stepped Karl. So we went from being total strangers to playing a bunch of shows with each other over summer 2024.

Karl is ace. He’s one of those totally unflappable guys, who I swear, never gets even remotely frustrated. He’s so chill. And it shows in his music. I swear, whenever I hear his stuff, my entire being begins to melt. So much so, this album took over from Eno’s Thursday Afternoon as our fav soundtrack for yin yoga sessions at home. (Yoga teachers? Take note. Put this on and watch your class disappear into a puddle. Seriously).

Anyway, enough of my jibber-jabber, let’s find out some more about this legend human.

(spoiler alert: he’s set a new bar for the recipe question. Hot damn)

What’s your go-to ‘cuppa’ at the moment?

Almond mocha.

Share a book that you’ve read recently (or not so recently) and why you loved it.

Brian Eno - On Some Far Away Beach - I love biographies, especially biographies about musicians. I’m a huge fan of Eno and this book became a study and reference book more than anything. Every few pages I’m diving out of the book and into the music that Eno has collaborated, produced, written and played on with so many different artists and personas throughout his career. Inspiring!

What’s your go-to recipe at the moment?

Bocadillo de Calamares (Calamari Baguette with Alioli)

Cut your calamari in rings, coat them in semolina and egg (use buckwheat for gluten free), fry until tender.

Alioli - in a bowl add three fingers of olive oil approximately

1 egg

1 clove of garlic or 2 for extra spice

Blend with an electric hand blender, slowly blending the mix to a yoghurt consistency add a bit of salt and a dash of lemon juice

Find the crunchiest baguette you can find,

Add the calamari, a squeeze of lemon and be generous with the alioli.

Yum! Enjoy!

Favourite album or mix, to play at home on a Sunday morning OR when you’re cooking dinner.

My favourite album(s) at the moment are “Harmonia - Musik von Harmonia”. I’m going through a big Kosmische Musik phase from the 70’s at the moment and I love that motorik beat. I really like the track ‘Dino’ on this album, a great dinner making track or Sunday morning groove either way.

“Love as Restraint” by Crystalline Reflections aka Singing Sorrows, Desolate Horizons is a delicate and highly emotive album. The music ebbs and flows between beauty and grief. Highly recommended for a Sunday slumber.

A photo of the last time you were awestruck by somewhere, or something in the natural world.

I’m an avid fly fisher and have enjoyed exploring rivers in the Goulburn River and Lake Eildon regions in Victoria of late. I love to work my way up a new river, not knowing what’s around the next bend, to me the beauty of meandering water surrounded by lush forest is awe inspiring and certainly inspires the narratives in my music making.

Go outside and record the birds (or insects, frogs, rustling leaves - anything from the natural world) on your phone for 30 seconds.

This is one of many places we walk Luna, our short haired border collie, along the Merri creek with the sounds of the running water, birds, trees and the odd bicycle bell as they zip past. It’s a pleasant walk.

FINALLY! Tell me what you’re up to and whether you have anything exciting coming up that you’d like to share.

Sunday August 30th I’m playing with good friend, ruffles as part of the Warm Mids Afternoon series, this one is a Warm Mids mini! We’ll be playing together combining our sounds on each other’s works and seeing where it takes us, I’m putting some projections together for this one too. It’s happening at the Merlynston Progress Hall in Coburg North, 1 Novian Street, Coburg North from 2pm onwards, Sunday August 30th.

https://events.humanitix.com/warm-mids-mini-feat-willebrant-and-ruffles

There will be a number of releases up to the end of the year and a new live show with visual narrative based on my 2025 release, The Pilgrim (slowed and reverb) is in the works.

Then back to the rivers in summer!

Holyyyyyyy. I’m still drooling over that recipe. Pretty sure several of you (myself included) will be cooking up those noms sometime soon. Please lmk if you do.

Meanwhile, you can find Karl on Bandcamp and Spotify, and Instagram.

‘til next week, friends.

x Phoebe