For her second album as mui zyu, nothing or something to die for, Eva Liu built on the eerie lullabies that soundtrack her debut LP, last year’s Rotten Bun for an Eggless Century. She’s still making hypnotic dreamscapes and off-kilter bedroom pop, working again with her Dama Scout bandmate Luciano Rossi as co-producer, but this time they’re more immediate, and fleshed out with lush string arrangements. Liu told Wonderland Magazine that “Immersive video-games you can lose yourself in and books/films that haunt you years after you’ve let them into your life have been really influential for me,” and this album has a similar transportive effect of bringing you into its own distinct world. You can stream it below.
To celebrate the release of nothing or something to die for, Liu broke the album track-by-track for us. Read her commentary below.
TRACK-BY-TRACK BREAKDOWN OF MUI ZYU’S NOTHING OR SOMETHING TO DIE FOR
“satan marriage”
this is an intro portal to the record, a transition from one world to another, trying to conjure a more gentle version of the time travel sequence from Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. i really wanted the record to start with strings and Lucci (Luciano Rossi who I made the album with), arranged these. i liked the idea of them being interrupted with a playful drum machine that kind of trivializes the more ‘serious’ palette. that mix of ‘serious’ and ‘absurd’ is basically the tone of the whole record, in this case poking fun at ideas of traditions by marrying satan / making a deal with the devil bb 🙂 the strings throughout the record are performed by Coco Inman (violin), Jenny Lau (violin) and Deni Teo (cello).
“the mould”
a song about mould, in all its varying glory – the good, the bad and the mouldy. playing with ideas of trying to differentiate between the rot and the fermented in our lives. also trying to think about how we observe the past, and misremember things – as though our memories get mouldy depending on our current state of mind. Danny Grant made the video (and all the videos/visualisers for the record) and in this vignette has a doppelganger ‘mui zyu’ wandering through different worlds of mould.
“everything to die for”
a kind of realist’s love song, the first time i’ve tried to write a more ‘classic’ :/ song. it’s about how easy it is to hurt the people we care about the most, and show them our true colours which are multi-faceted and at times not so nice. i love reaching for chromaticism in melodies, and in this case wanted it to be there as both hopeful and tragic.
“donna likes parasites”
this is a warning to your future self to not look back with regret for trying to have ‘perfected’ everything. you can’t escape all the germs of life, and if you can find peace with many, you’ll hopefully be happier. i wanted there to be little candy instrumental moments, like the daydreams you have for yourself where you exist honestly – even for a short moment. the ending is supposed to be like a triumphant anime outro, and having it in 7 is supposed to represent ‘being yourself’ which may be different to other people’s expectations of who you’re supposed to be.
“the rules of what an earthling can be”
diving deeper into ideas of ‘who you should be’ and rejecting conformity via tradition. it’s a criticism of the misogyny and pressure on women and talks about the Chinese concept of ‘leftover women’ (women who are unmarried) and ‘bare branches’ (men who are not having children and adding to the family tree) – all framed through an alien looking at earthlings and trying to make sense of the harmful rulebooks humans force on each other.
“please be ok” (featuring Miss Grit)
an absurdist look at what it means to be ‘ok’ when the world is melting… a nod to the Chinese folklore God ‘Yi’ who shot 9 of the 10 suns as the earth was burning, but now ‘we’ have destroyed the last sun. i LOVE Miss Grit’s music, our last albums came out on the same day last year. i felt like the spirit of this song would hopefully be something they’d connect with and i was so happy they were up for getting inside it with me. they reworked the song, and recorded/produced remotely and brought all their amazing magic to it. the ending is supposed to feel like you are screaming at the top of the last volcano, but it’s too late.
“telephone congee i”
this is a palette cleanser, kind of like you’ve paused the game, or you’ve gone back to the main menu, or you’ve entered an elevator with no buttons – taking you to a new floor.
“speak up, sponge”
one of my favourites from the record, which no one thought could be a single (see ‘whole tone scale’ and ‘free time verses’ hehe). i am dyslexic and my words turn to ‘moosh’ if i’m even a tiny bit flustered – and this song is kind of supposed to encourage people to speak up and use their voice even if it’s hard. there’s also a little nod to my sleep paralysis, and the demon who sits on my chest – i tried to write the whole song in the whole tone scale but it sounded terrible, so it wanders in and out of diatonic and whole tone instead, and the end is supposed to feel softly empowering, and an escape from the bad dreams.
“what’s the password baby bird?”
an open letter to whoever has the cheat codes for life. observing simple happinesses (which are usually the best kind), never letting go of your inner-child despite time rushing by. the endless beat throughout the song is supposed to be a heartbeat of passing time and a reminder we are all moving together.
“hopefulness, hopefulness”
a celebration of ‘being alone’ and knowing that it is entirely different from ‘being lonely’ with a side of remembering crying is brilliant and important, and being grateful for the tears when they come.
“telephone congee ii”
hold music to catch our breath in the waiting room for the rest of the record..
“sparky” (featuring lei , e)
thinking about the dog ‘Sparky’ from David Lynch’s Blue Velvet and how happy it is chomping the water from the hose held by their dead owner – a sort of absurd look at what happiness can be. it has been a dream come true getting to know Emma (lei , e – formerly Emmy The Great). i have been a huge fan of her music for years and look up to her open heart and kind spirit. as this is a song about what happiness can look like, i asked Emma to sing it with me as i aspire to be as peacefully engaged in happiness as she is.
“in the dot” (featuring Pickle Darling)
a vignette about how insignificant we are, and a reminder to care about the right things alongside good people. i met label-cousin Lukas (aka Pickle Darling) at a festival last year and we became great friends, life-long i am sure – founded on a love of Stardew Valley. i was so happy they were up for being involved in this little song about being tiny dots in the garden of the universe.
“cool as a cucumber”
a song about trying to be grateful and kind to yourself, and encouraging you to be honest with yourself and others. i wanted to have a song with more a Canto-pop ballad chord progression, but like the idea of juxtaposing with something plasticy and contemporary (the heavy autotuned bridge). i also love Coco’s violin playing in this song, a strange duet of organic and robotic. the final section is supposed to be like a kind of exit through the gift shop outro.
“扮豬食老虎”
this is a landing pad that reflects on the absurdity of everything. the translation is literally ‘play the pig to eat the tiger’ and it’s my mum speaking it throughout. my family have appeared on all my records (including with Dama Scout) and i’m really happy to commit their voice-notes to the recordings. i wrote this simple melody, and Lucci arranged these strings that reharmonise it, from kind of beautiful, to kind of jarring, which feels like a parallel of the whole record that plays with ideas of seeing the same things differently – the serious and the absurd.
mui zyu has shows coming up in Europe and the UK, and you can see all dates below.
MUI ZYU: 2024 TOUR DATES
May 23 – Aarhus, DK @ Turkis (SPOR festival)
June 14 – Ipswich, UK @ Brighten the Corners
July 27 – Suffolk, UK @ Latitude Festival
Aug 30 – Dorset, UK @ End of the Road Festival
Aug 31 – Manchester, UK @ Manchester Psych Fest
Sep 13 – Oslo, NO @ Holmlia Kulturhavn (Ultima 2024)
Oct 11 – Rotterdam, NL @ Roodkapje
Oct 12 – Paris, FR @ L’Archipel
Oct 23 – Birmingham, UK @ Sunflower Lounge
Oct 24 – Glasgow, UK @ The Glad Cafe
Oct 25 – Newcastle, UK @ The Lubber Fiend
Oct 26 – Leeds, UK @ Headrow House
Oct 28 – Bristol @ Rough Trade
Oct 31 – London, UK @ King’s Place H2
Nov 13-15 – Brussels, BE @ Fifty Lab