Katie Von Schleicher releases her new full-length Consummation, on May 22nd via Ba Da Bing. Ahead of the release, Von Schleicher has shared the album single and Matt Strickland directed video for “Caged Sleep.” “While the rest of the songs were being mixed, I had a vivid dream with a snake the color of lapis lazuli,” says Von Schleicher. “That became ‘Caged Sleep,’ an ode to a dream that ended a period of my life. Some people hate dream stories, so for those humans: I have included saxophones, synthesizers and claps to court your attention.”

Consummation is, in part, inspired by an alternate interpretation of Hitchcock’s Vertigo. In 2018, Von Schleicher rewatched the seminal film and was struck by its largely unanalyzed subtext of abuse. She knew immediately that this hidden narrative, which spoke to her personal experience, would be the basis of her next album.

While writing and engineering the record, she found sanctuary in the words of other women: namely, Carmen Maria Machado’s Her Body and Other Parties, Rachel Cusk’s Outline trilogy, and Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost. The latter proved particularly influential; soon after revisiting Vertigo, Von Schleicher stumbled upon Solnit’s lacerating take on the film. Solnit describes the “wandering, stalking, haunting” of romantic pursuit that it depicts as “consummation,” while “real communion”—understanding and mutual respect between two lovers—is, to the men in the film, “unimaginable.” The consequence is a fundamental failure of communication. At its core, Consummation evokes the pain of being unable to bridge that vast psychic distance between oneself and another.

Katie Von Schleicher
Consummation
Tracklist

1. You Remind Me
2. Wheel
3. Nowhere
4. Caged Sleep
5. Messenger
6. Loud
7. Strangest Thing
8. Can You Help
9. Brutality
10. Hammer
11. Power
12. Gross
13. Nothing Lasts

Pre-order Consummation Here