Made up of Winifred Tan (Wini) on drums and John Paul Kwan (JP) on bass, Altoduo have garnered plenty of praise for their dexterous technicality and sophisticated songcraft. Dubbed as “math-hop”, the instrumental pair’s intricately woven tapestry of math rock, new age and chillhop has thus far been innovatively applied on several EPs (2020’s Revival, 2023’s Jiak Simi (What Shall We Eat?)), 1 tremendous LP (2021’s What Nobody Asked For) and a handful of excellent singles.
As acclaimed and astonishing as their body of work has been over the past few years, their output in 2024 might be some of their finest yet. From the Dilla-inspired beats and feel-good melodies of ‘Sun-kissed (42 Degrees C)’, to the progressive rock energy of ‘We Are Here’, to the Oriental textures of ‘Plants and Sandals’ - listeners could tell that Altoduo were gearing up for something big. True enough, the latter 2 songs were a prelude to their new EP, Where Do We Go From Here?
Wherever it is, we’re willing to follow. So we caught up with Wini and JP to ask for directions.
Hi guys! Before talking about the future, let’s discuss some of your past release, for our readers who may be unfamiliar…
Each production has been a fun and always a collaborative one, we have been featuring musicians from all walks of life across our EPs. And even for now, we are trying to collaborate with artists from various other art forms for things like our live shows, encouraging introspection by exploring everyday elements like spaces and food that we often take for granted.
For What Nobody Asked For, we dove headfirst into lush pads and synths with that album, as well as exploring the ways we could approach math rock without one of its defining elements - the electric guitar. Whether that meant having the bass play lead lines reminiscent of math rock guitar lines like on ‘unwind’, or collaborating with a singer like on ‘longing’, it was a fun challenge to grapple with. This album revolves around the concept of mental health, problems we observe around us, hence the title.
For What Shall We Eat?, we learned a lot from our debut album, but also felt a compulsion to pull ourselves in a different direction coming out of it. If there’s an overarching direction for Jiak Simi, it would be nostalgia, food, and exploring space and “pocket” in our music. A lot of our sound here was informed by lo-fi music, and melding that with more math rock sensibilities. Finding a middle ground between both genres from song to song was a fun balancing act, and one that we look to continue exploring. Not to mention, a bit more vocals from Wini - (there was a bit of her backing vocals in ‘longing’) and she plucked up a bit more courage to try it in here on ‘muruku’ and ‘a happy meal’, together with JP who did some of the harmony vocals on the latter.
Then for some of the independent singles like ‘Sun-kissed (42 Degrees C)’ and ‘Desire Lines’, it was a mix of how we did the above 2 albums. ‘Sun-kissed’ was definitely more laid back because we wanted to also bring back some chillhop (more chill than math if at all), with even dialogue excerpts from 1938 movies. More vocals from Wini here, explorative phase!
How has what you’ve learned thus far shaped your new EP?
Time round, for Where Do We Go From Here?, we picked out the positive points we’ve learnt, such as one of us starting with a riff first (usually Wini has a lot of drum ideas), putting them down into Ableton, and then JP will follow with another. For a few times, it’s the other way. Then we build on from there - skeleton usually starts from drums and basses, then later, Wini will put in synths and keyboard stuff, JP will arrange a little of that, and add appropriate sounds and pads to fill the spaces. This EP focuses on the spaces we've inhabited, grew up with, or spaces that locals may feel strongly towards - reflecting on how we and the community may have overlooked them. Songs like ‘We Are Here’, ‘Rain Down on Chinatown’, ‘Underground’, ‘Dingy Malls’ and ‘Plants And Sandals’ invite listeners to reflect on their own experiences. Because of this underlying concept, we looked inwards and around our environment to record certain memorable sounds which were relevant to the songs. We’re gonna bring back some prog rock elements to this EP - keep a lookout for it.
We can definitely hear that on the lead single ‘We Are Here’…
Much of the ‘We Are Here’ goes back to our love for prog, yet we know we are still a math rock meets chillhop (“mathrhop”) duo so we do try to still incorporate sounds from the previous EPs so far, mashed up into what we hear today. Palatable, still drum and bass centric, still mathy, somewhat proggy, with synths that people can ASMR to.
This will be the final “closing” track of the EP that combines flowy odd-time bass intros with energetic, offbeat drums, setting the stage for an memorable listening experience.
What about your latest single ‘Plants and Sandals’?
‘Plants and Sandals’ offers an oriental feel with chillhop-inspired vocals and congas, reminiscent of ancient shrines - or at least that’s what some of our reviewers have said so far. It’s still mathy, maybe less prog-ish, in the middle a bit more chill-ish, bringing you for a ride that’s maybe not so much of a rollercoaster rather than an emotional curve. While doing this, we also added sound effects. Wini went back to her parents’ HDB to sample sounds walking with slippers along the corridors, spraying the plants outside the house, and then there’s this gate closing sound towards the end - that was Wini’s parents’ house gate. If we’re not wrong,Wini was the one who started putting in the drums first, it was really just a motif, an open-ended question for JP to see what he wanted or felt like doing. Got the oriental feel spot on. In fact, we wanted to call it ‘Forgotten Places’ at first, but we realised it felt closer to home, so why not ‘Plants and Sandals’. You’d probably hear more vocals here as we were trying to add another layer/timbre of sounds into the whole production.
You’ve mentioned that there will be a bunch of collaborations on the album. Who did you work with and why?
We worked with Daxa (vocals and guitar) from Haldi Honey, and Paul Harris (rhythmic bass) for ‘Rain Down on Chinatown’. Paul used to be based in Singapore, though he’s relocated to Thailand now. He’s JP’s good friend and we pretty much all clicked really well with memes and jokes. Daxa on the other hand, we instantly connected through the love for math rock, and we opened for Haldi Honey’s recent EP launch in July too!
We also worked with Pavethren for ‘Dingy Malls’, we knew him around 2 years back when he brought his crew to Anadigi Sound Lab to film and record some of his productions. Really cool, watched and learnt about his background, from modern music to even traditional South Indian music and all. He’s really good at what he does, so we’ve actually cordially invited him and asked if he was keen to put in Indian instruments and konnakol into ‘Dingy Malls’. Look what happened, magic.
How do you approach playing your material live?
We aim to create a deeply immersive and interactive experience for our audience. Our shows are centered around different concepts, such as “mental health”, “relatable words/emotions”, “spaces that matter”, “where do we go from here”, etc. For example in “where do we go from here”, we explored places with personal significance visually and musically, like childhood playgrounds or other meaningful locations. We want to connect with the audience on a personal level, inviting them to not just listen but actively participate.
In our performances, we use visual elements like background projection (previously we used a combination of our MV stills, and some spacy orbiting planetary backgrounds). We also engage the audience by inviting them to do some short singing segments with us, bouncing off energy from one another. These contributions become part of the show, inspiring an improvisational session where dancers, musicians, and other artists from the audience can join us on stage. We aim to blur the line between performer and audience, have it be a more interactive show (you know, like Snarky Puppy’s intimate sessions), creating a truly captivating and collective experience. Our goal is for every audience / participant to feel seen, heard, and inspired, leaving with a sense of having contributed to something special and unique, so audiences can take home something memorable too.
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So what live shows do you have planned related to this particular EP’s concept?
Where Do We Go From Here is a 2-part themed experience, consisting of firstly, a live performance and secondly, an interactive exhibition-workshop based on the songs from the EP.
The live show is held at the lobby of NLB’s Central Public Library at Bugis on 28 September from 7PM to 8.30PM. It’ll be free entry, but limited seats so others without tickets can stand around. Though we can’t charge for tickets, we hope to ask for support for our merchandise, where audiences can pay what they want above a minimum amount, so that it goes to support the next event.
As mentioned, this EP focuses on the spaces we've inhabited, grew up with, or spaces that locals may feel strongly towards, reflecting on how we and the community may have overlooked them. If you’ve seen our recent Instagram posts, we've been activating and using these spaces for our reels too.
Features include 2 35-40 minute sessions with intermission. The 1st session is mostly our own songs, while the last few songs - our new one - will feature our collaborators coming up with us to play. We will use the projector and cast "spaces that matters to us" in the background.
During intermission, we’ll get audiences to give us photos of spaces that matter to them, and words related to spaces (or emotions, actions, etc.) that they can think of, so that it can be used for the 2nd session. They can write on a board and pass it around.
The 2nd session is an improv and interactive session, where we will now get people on the ground from different art forms - like dancers, musicians, visual artists, poets and rappers to come on stage to improvise with our songs or create something new altogether. We will then start casting the audience's photos that they have sent us, and start randomly using the words they gave us during the break time, to incorporate into our improvisation.
What about the exhibition/workshop?
The workshop will be held at library@harbourfront and Central Public Library on 26 October. Register for free tickets here.
The exhibition, which runs from 14 to 31 October, will round up what it means to draw inspiration from spaces using various forms of arts such as dance, music, visual arts, etc. The workshop will invite participants from all walks of life (for free but limited slots) to come and try putting that concept of drawing inspiration from spaces they know, or they currently see around them, and put it in the form of an artwork, using the medium they prefer, with facilitators like us musicians, and our dance, visual arts and fashion friends. The works of the participants will then be displayed for another week at the exhibit space!
You can purchase Where Do We Go From Here? via this link.
