Singer/songwriter/producer Marza Panther is here to deliver a truly unique sound to the music industry. Her integrative style means that she brings in various genres to her sound, allowing for an experience that is completely unmatched from other eclectic artists. As an artist who is highly influenced by the various contributions the music scene sees today, Marza Panther is able to use a surplus of everyday sounds to create the atmospheric sounding she brings into her songs. Marza Panther has recently released her track "Nite Sweats", which features these prominent artistic features that remain true to the kind of artist she is.
Marza Panther opens up the track "Nite Sweats" with an incredibly mystic and otherworldly synth choice. Eventually, vocalism gracefully enters the track, immediately activating our most primitive senses. Marza Panther is the kind of artist you can easily get along with. Her style of music is transcending and brings about a surreal environment. The moment we listened to the mixings of Marza Panther, we knew we came across something truly eclectic and modern. There haven't been many others that create the collective soundings that Marza Panther is able to manifest, which makes her music that much more attractive. "Nite Sweats" continues on with the deep and thoughtful production, and as you find yourself in the midst of listening to the track, you realize that you become almost lost in the powerful transforming effects within it. We feel hypnotized by the work of Marza Panther, and we hope she continues to produce similar soundings so we can continue to experience such genuine emotions.
Listen to Marza Panther's "Nite Sweats" here.
Hi Marza Panther! How did you break into a career in the music industry?
I am a refugee from the wonderful world of classical music. I started my musical journey as a cellist around age 7. I had a hard time with the conformity, although I gained a deep appreciation for the roots and history of Western music, and Eastern European composers in particular. My dad was a jazz musician, so I grew up listening to that genre as well and being immersed in blues, folk and world music. But once high school rolled around, I instantly gravitated to metal, goth, and alternative music, and pretty much stayed in the dark lane from then on. I went back to music school for cello performance like 7 years ago, but this time around I was no longer hemmed in by classical expectations, so I was able to start making music I really liked while still incorporating my roots.
You're a multi-faceted artist; a cellist, composer, singer, and songwriter who blends and experiments with different genres. Where do you draw most of your inspiration from when you're creating music? I think the natural world is a big source of inspiration for me. I grew up in a hippie community, and my dad gave me a leaf press as a kid instead of normal toys. For a while, I walked around with a Tascam field recorder capturing weird sounds from the LA landscape, and a lot of those wound up on the record. I remember recording an old man drinking from a water fountain in Los Feliz and just getting really excited about it once I applied some warped reverb. The most precious sounds I captured were from my dog Jesse James who died last year. His panting and slurping wound up on two tunes. I had taken a 20th-century composition course, and during that, I wrote a piece of music for 3 bags of potato chips and piano. My neighbors performed it with me... then they ate the chips. Learning about Jon Brion in music school influenced my production style a lot. He was often using broken instruments to disrupt stability. Arthur Russell made a big impact on me too because he used the cello in "wrong" ways that were so compelling. He really put zero limits on himself in terms of what he was willing to try. His heart was just open to trying and failing. Another source of inspiration is film music. I love Kenji Kawai, Mihaly Vig, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Bernard Herrmann, and so many others, and I always make a point to find out who wrote the scores to the movies I love. Lately, I've been listening to Hildur Guðnadóttir, Daniel Lopatin, and Jeff Russo. In terms of popular music, I used to listen to a lot of classic 70's metal like Pentagram, Trouble, UFO, Highway Robbery, Saint Vitus, Electric Wizard. That phase lasted a while, but when I tried to make music in that vein it didn't quite come outright. I was also influenced heavily by Japanese bands like Guitar Wolf, Melt-Banana, DMBQ, and Boris, but again, what came out of me didn't sound like any of them. My sound is probably an alloy of all the above, combined with The Cure, Jesus and Mary Chain, Jeff Buckley, Nina Simone, Cat Power, Elliott Smith, Savages, Wovenhand, Altin Gun, Black Violin, Priest, the Entrance Band...and lots of others!
We really loved your new single "Nite Sweats". How would you describe your creative process behind this record?
I actually wrote this song 10 years ago in Seattle, but it was much slower. I liked the bass line and it just stayed with me over the years, so I decided to revamp it for the record. In the studio, I just kept adding more and more samples and tidbits -- children laughing, a woman moaning, television clips of a kidnapping -- until it felt like I had reached the limit. I think in the bridge there's just like dozens of strange sounds I found from this site looperman.com. Of course, there's cello in the song -- always! If I had to summarize, I think my process is to just keep adding things to the stew until it tastes good n' flavorful. Sometimes I add too much, and my producer Jason Lowrie has to undo my soup, which is much trickier.
What inspired you to write "Nite Sweats". Is there a specific message you'd like your listeners to take away from it?
Nite Sweats is kind of a dancy #metoo song. Somehow the music that came out of me as a reaction to my #metoo story was Nite Sweats, and I had to own that. So maybe it's about transmuting dark experience into dance energy? That sounds right. I am okay with people projecting their own meaning onto songs, however. I think that's natural. So I don't feel compelled to explain everything too specifically.
What can we expect to see from Marza Panther throughout 2020?
2020 will be an amazing year for panthers, Marza Panthers in particular! I have a new lineup for my live band that I'm really excited about, so we're hoping to start booking shows around LA asap. The Nite Sweats music video premiere is imminent, as is the release of a new single, Autumn in the Spring (about a real-life vampire) and the video for that song. And of course, the record, Mathanas, is coming out in the coming months. It's been two years in the making, so it feels like a tremendous event to me. Also in 2020, I'm hoping to complete my acoustic record, which is a collection of songs I play around town that people always ask me about, but they just don't exist yet in download form.