SDH
Barcelona-based synthwave/industrial music duo SDH (Semiotics Department of Heteronyms) is comprised of Andrea P. Latorre and Sergi Algiz. In this interview, Andrea discusses the importance of language to their music, the ways in which they explore fictional characters and identities in their lyrics, how SDH differs from their other project Wind Atlas, and more.
Interview by Michele Simcox
Your band name has interesting connotations that directly relate to the overall theme of your music; more specifically your lyrics, aesthetics, and iconography. Semiotics is defined as “the study of signs and symbols as elements of communicative behavior; the analysis of systems of communication, as language, gestures, or clothing.” Heteronyms are “words that are spelled the same but have a different sound and meaning.” In what way does your name relate to your creative process when coming up with a song?
SDH explores some fictional figures — and this doesn't mean that they are false or less real — that interest us as musicians and as people. The name is born from the idea of embodying other types of characters that, in my case, I like to invent and that I like to play. Those characters that I invent always end up transforming me artistically and personally. It’s related with the idea of thinking about how we behave and explore the concept of fiction as something authentic and legitimate.
Ultimately, SDH has also helped me to explore and build all those people that I am, or that I can become, but socially I have not been allowed to be. In this sense, understanding my own representation of sexuality in front of others has been fundamental for the creation of this character/person that, today, is still being built. Regarding the creative process, heteronyms are masks that I put on and through which I can invent fictions that end up feeling as real or as mine or that end up transforming me in any way. Things that I don’t how to say from the persona I have built.
In your song “I Mean,” you say “I’m the house of all these signs/I look for correspondence between all these signs and the thing.” What are the signs and thing that you refer to, especially in terms of the theme that seems to be shared amongst the rest of your discography?
Language, the inability to say things themselves and the limitations of representation have always interested and obsessed me. I think that, in the end, everything I say and create artistically is a detour to try to express something that I intuit and that I cannot say without losing meaning. When I speak of signs, I speak of words, gestures, representation. The thing that is unspeakable and intangible that I cannot access. I can get close to it but never manifests itself.
On your first [self-titled] album you featured the Argentinian artist, Camila Dunster, and her collage work. Collage is a collection or combination of various materials or items that are used to make a piece of art. In relation to your music, it’s fitting to feature an art that is adapted from already existing things and give them new meaning. Were you conscious of the symbolisms of collage work when picking your first album’s cover? Did you know that you wanted collage right of the bat? And what made you chose Camila versus other possible collage artists?
We met Camila Dunster at an exhibition at La Cova, a DIY space hosted by our friend Guillem, from the band Una Bèstia Incontrolable. She would present her collages there along with other artists and her work caught our attention. We especially liked that collage, which we ended up buying. When we started to think about the design of the album, we wanted to somehow represent an emptiness or a non-sense, but we also wanted the representation of a body as a mask, and Camila's collage represented that very well. As you say, using a collage made perfect sense, and, furthermore, we were interested that it was the work of a woman artist that we liked. I guess everything fell into place and that symbiosis was generated between her art and ours.
Semiotics Department of Heteronyms, 2018, Avant! Records
You’re a band from Barcelona, you record at an Italian record label (Avant!) and you (Andrea) sing in English. Has language ever been an issue in your creative process? Is there any translation done beforehand when you’re writing your lyrics? If so, does that influence or impede the intended message of your music? Or was singing in English something that you wanted from the beginning, in order to reach broader audiences?
It's the big question I always ask myself. It is an issue that generates big identity problems for me. In the case of SDH, English clearly serves as a mask for me; it allows me to embody other voices very different from my voice in Spanish. With my other band Wind Atlas I do use my mother tongue and glossolalia, but they are songs and lyrics that have more to do with my roots, with my grandmother, with the land and the rivers and with the poets that I have read in Spanish. I suppose there are certain things I only know how to say in Spanish and certain things that I only know how to say in English.
Avant! Records is dedicated to promoting and representing the postpunk genre and those that fall under its broad label. What made you choose them as your recording company? Does the fact that they are based in Italy have any influence on your creative process in terms of translation, location, and audience?
Avant! Records always has supported us and the connection was absolute from the beginning. It is a label that we followed and that we had always liked, so we were very happy that they offered to release our first record. We have played many times in Italy and the Italian scene is wonderful. Being a Mediterranean country, culturally, we have many things in common, in addition, politically we also have a similar past. I think Italian groups have always been heard a lot in Spain and vice versa, although I don't know if that is something that influences the band or our relationship with the label.
Against Strong Thinking, 2020, Avant! Records
You two come from the post-industrial electronic band Wind Atlas. How does that project influence SDH? Did you carry anything over that helped when forming SDH?
It helped us not to try to make Wind Atlas something it wasn't. SDH allowed us to diversify the sound. With SDH we wanted to investigate another way of composing and playing music. We wanted to be able to dance and play more easily. Wind Atlas has another way; it is something else.
SDH’s overall theme is very analytical of the unpredictable, lulling, sometimes cold, sometimes comforting process of thought. Thought in relation to how we perceive our own personal realities within the world and how we react to them. It’s allegorical of the everyday struggle of internal feelings and thoughts versus external elements that impact the psyche. Would you say that this is something you two struggle with yourselves? If yes, what made you choose this theme as the main message that morphs throughout each song? And are you targeting a particular audience with this message?
I am not addressing a particular audience. I would say that I am addressing myself. Writing and singing helps me to ask new questions. Really, what I am looking for are never closed answers; I am not interested in that. I am interested in the potentiality and the ability to create from a non-figurative place. I like heterodox languages that slip away and cannot be compartmentalized, and diluted meanings. I don't know if I succeed, but it could be said that it is one of my unattainable goals when I create something. I live in doubt and that generates a lot of anxiety, but it also allows me to get away from the orthodox, the unique and the immovable.
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Michele Simcox has a BA in Art History, with a focus in Studio Art, from the University of Houston. She has worked in private art galleries, has been an art teacher, and she has worked as a photographer for Shutterfly. She would like you to know that climate change is a very serious issue and that you should read Hyperworlds, Underworlds by Jason Louv.
