{"id":46889,"date":"2022-08-19T12:45:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-19T16:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/?p=46889"},"modified":"2022-08-23T18:48:13","modified_gmt":"2022-08-23T22:48:13","slug":"playing-seattle-leeni-violet-lp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/playing-seattle-leeni-violet-lp\/","title":{"rendered":"Leeni Enters a Dazzling New Phase with Violet LP"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"863\" src=\"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-46895\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1-324x280.jpg 324w, https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1-416x359.jpg 416w, https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1-300x259.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1-768x663.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>When Seattle-based synth-pop artist Leeni shops for synthesizers, she finds herself looking at them and asking herself, &#8220;Are there songs in there?&#8221; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sometimes, like magic, the instrument answers. Just a little play with a patch or a twist of the controls and suddenly, the instrument transports you into a new sonic realm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That&#8217;s how it worked for Leeni&#8217;s new full-length, <em>Violet<\/em>, which dropped last Thursday. Her tenth release, <em>Violet<\/em> is a study of her new, expressive Prophet Rev2 synth, and a vivid portrait of the personal transformation she underwent during the pandemic isolation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><iframe style=\"border: 0; width: 400px; height: 472px;\" src=\"https:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/album=4201329151\/size=large\/bgcol=ffffff\/linkcol=0687f5\/artwork=small\/transparent=true\/\" seamless=\"\"><a href=\"https:\/\/leeni.bandcamp.com\/album\/violet\">Violet by Leeni<\/a><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Leeni is the solo project of artist Celene &#8220;Leeni&#8221; Ramadan. Ramadan made her first-ever Leeni record on acoustic guitar in 2005, and then began teaching herself gameboy chip tune, a style of electronic music created through programming vintage video game consoles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Leeni eventually became one of the only gameboy chip tune producers in the Seattle area, and it led her to eventually explore other types of synthesized music-making.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;I remember&#8230; buying a bunch of vintage drum machines and playing around with them and learning how to sequence and just kind of doing it by like trial and error because there wasn&#8217;t a lot of guidance,&#8221; she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After releasing a lot of chip tune work, including the 2007 full-length album  <em>8-Bit Heart<\/em>, Ramadan pivoted to her moody, &#8217;60s pop-inspired band <a href=\"http:\/\/promqueenband.bandcamp.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Prom Queen<\/a>, where her focus remained for many years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then the pandemic hit. Isolated from her bandmates, returning to therapy after a long hiatus, and learning new production techniques in her new job for Prime video, Ramadan began pouring her emotions and newfound synth know-how into solo synth-pop. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;I had a studio and I would go there everyday and just work on whatever. I didn&#8217;t know what the hell was going on in the world, I just wanted to make something with whatever time I had,&#8221; recalls Ramadan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In time, through the lens her new Prophet Rev2 synth, <em>Violet<\/em> was born. A dynamic and thrilling collection of expressive and skillfully-produced electropop songs, <em>Violet<\/em> explores Leeni&#8217;s renewed confidence in herself as an artist and producer, growing pains she&#8217;s experienced personally in the last couple years, and the beginning of a new phase in her life\u2014an era she defines with the color violet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-youtube wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed-handler wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"LEENI: &quot;VIOLET&quot; (Full Visual Album)\" width=\"980\" height=\"551\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/AVkmTUp0eCU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>On the album&#8217;s opening track, &#8220;Earthquakes<em>,&#8221;<\/em> Leeni&#8217;s lyrics explore this desire to escape the &#8220;little earthquakes&#8221; that arise in life\u2014in her case, it&#8217;s a nod to Tori Amos&#8217; first album, and to unhealthy mental patterns exacerbated by isolation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;It also expresses a feeling that I was having at the time,&#8221; says Ramadan. &#8220;You think someone&#8217;s going to save you or like that if x happens I&#8217;ll be okay, but when you have these unaddressed patterns, the earthquake&#8217;s going to come.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Likewise, on &#8220;Horizon,&#8221; a haunting track co-written and produced by Erik Blood, Leeni explores familiar feelings of distance, disconnect, and longing. &#8220;It touches on ideas about the exhaustion of prolonged hope without tangible gain,&#8221; she explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Aside from having used the album to help move through the difficult emotions of the pandemic era, the process of making (and sitting on) <em>Violet <\/em>helped Ramadan also better understand and embrace her creative process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;I took so much time with these songs. I let them breathe. I wasn&#8217;t going to settle,&#8221; she says. &#8220;Sharing music is so vulnerable. I just really wanted to take as much time as [I needed] to build it right and to me all of that is confidence boosting. It is knowing that I could stand behind this work and say I absolutely cosign what I did on this record and can&#8217;t wait to share it.&#8221; She hopes to tour with <em>Violet <\/em>in the spring of 2023. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Through the emotional ups and downs of the album, there&#8217;s a real feeling of overcoming as <em>Violet <\/em>ends on its triumphant eponymous track.<em> <\/em>We&#8217;ve made it through something together\u2014and for Leeni, who tends to demarcate phases of her life with colors, this record is a new beginning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t have synesthesia entirely but&#8230; I have phases of my life that are different colors,&#8221; she says. &#8220;This [album] is a step into the phase of violet. It&#8217;s very harmonious, it&#8217;s regal, it&#8217;s dazzling, and to me it&#8217;s just grounded in harmony.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Follow Leeni on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/leenimusic\">Facebook<\/a> for ongoing updates.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Seattle-based synth-pop artist Leeni shops for synthesizers, she finds herself looking at them and asking herself, &#8220;Are there songs in there?&#8221; Sometimes, like magic, the instrument answers. Just a little play with a patch or a twist of the controls and suddenly, the instrument transports you into a new sonic realm. That&#8217;s how it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":46895,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8233],"tags":[8292,2599,990],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_1853-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46889"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46889"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46889\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46918,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46889\/revisions\/46918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audiofemme.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}