Producers shrouded behind reptilian pseudonyms, snake-skin-like patterns etched onto album artworks and a tonally cool yet euphoric sound, Amniote Editions is a label with a remarkable aesthetic. Termed ‘capsules’, releases refer to the closed-off spaces of wombs carrying amniotes inside of them. At the same time, the label itself is a not-so-restricted venture and establishes a growing global creative network. We spoke to label heads Mama Snake and Tanya Akinola.
Having recently revealed a blistering two-part, 42-track collaborative release with Berlin-based event collective Mala Junta (a release that is, in the label’s words ‘a celebration and tribute to the [collective’s] impact on Berlin’s vibrant contemporary queer scene’), we sat down with Sara Svanholm (Mama Snake) and Tanya Akinola (T-N) to discuss the origins, intentions and future direction of the Amniote Editions world.
Amniote’s latest release is a collaborative project with Berlin collective and party organisers Mala Junta; one of the city’s favourite queer collectives consisting of D.Dan, DJ Tool, Hyperaktivist, Yazzus and Nayme. How do you approach such a collaboration? How do these projects relate to and reinforce each other?
Sara: Running the label is a constant process of bouncing ideas back and forth, as well as collaborations. We’ve also previously worked with UTE Records in Norway. These collaborative efforts are stimulating and inspiring because of the new inputs. There’s something special about working together and reaching a shared end result. It’s not always what you imagined it would be to begin with, which is fun, too. There’s also something special about working with people you have a personal connection to and who have projects that you feel aligned with. For instance, we have known D.Dan, DJ Tool and Hyperaktivist for many years. The aim of the release was to make the capsule about Mala Junta.
Tanya: The Mala Junta crew has been involved with the whole process. We all met up in Copenhagen last year in November and sat down with the design team. Here, we were able to just talk about the release for a couple of hours, really fleshing out what it would look like, what it would feel like, who to invite, and how we could involve different people. It feels like one of the more personable projects we’ve done. Even just sitting with the mastering engineer, Joel, and being able to all do that together is truly special. I hadn't been involved with an Amniote release in this capacity before, so it was really nice being this involved. It was also special to be able to raise funds through the compilations for the I Love Venezuela Foundation and the African Queer Youth Initiative.
Like all other releases, this collab release is framed as a ‘capsule’. Can you tell us more about this term?
Sara: Amniote was born out of an Asia trip with our designer, Rose Marie Johansen, who is a childhood friend of mine. Rose has done a lot of art direction and creative work within the fashion, film and music industry. I think this term came from the idea of the capsule collection within the fashion industry. These are projects that don’t fit neatly into spring, summer, fall, and winter, but are the collections that come out in between. We spent a lot of time brainstorming other explanations of ‘capsule’ and liked the idea that capsules are enclosed spaces. We thought, what's also an enclosed space? A womb. What is in wombs? Amniotes: mammal embryos which form in a membrane. This led me to draw on the language from my medical background. We thought it would be fun to give the catalogue numbers genetic names or names referencing medical terms. The first few releases are titled ‘Hox’; these are the genes that determine arms and legs, so obviously, with snakes that’s determining that you don’t have any arms or legs. The hox genes are also involved in the regrowth of reptiles that shed their tail as a defence tactic.
We continued formulating the idea when we were travelling, chatting, eating good food, and drinking. When the trip was over and I returned to Copenhagen and Rose to LA, we thought: let’s do this and create a label. For me, conceptualising stuff isn’t to be pretentious; it’s just a way to stimulate creativity. Working with ideas is easier when you place yourself in some kind of restraint, sitting with a concept. That being said, nothing is fixed in this project; we can constantly change it if we want to.
How does the Amniote and Mala Junta sound connect up?
Sara: Mala Junta has been running for five years now and has such an eclectic sound. They have several floors at their parties, usually focused on house, techno, tech-house, electro, and breakbeat. So for this release, the whole curation of this release hasn’t just been Amniote; it’s been a super collaborative effort. Our main take on it was to put the residents of the collective on the vinyl EP, but besides that there are artists that have been involved with Mala Junta in the past. It’s nice to see this versatile sound palette reflected on the compilation while still fitting Amniote!
I wanted to find out if we could actually succeed if we removed the person behind everything
On previous Amniote releases, artists get their own moniker, such as on the Refraction of Light VA from June this year. What’s the story behind these reptilian pseudonyms? Are they designed to unlock another aspect of the artists’ sound?
Sara: We ask all artists to find an alias that has a reptilian origin. This can be many things. Some people have chosen a genetic name that is a gene of a specific reptile from the country where they are born, or the name of a native reptile in the country they live in, or even a reptilian god. That's kind of just how it started for us; as a way of fuelling creativity. For some artists, it’s the extension of a sound they’ve already created; for others, it’s a chance to explore a different side of their sound. For instance, they lean into a more psychedelic or ambient side of their music.
I was also a bit fed up at that moment with how important the personality cult of everything was becoming: the idea that you needed a big press photo of the artist to sell a track, with a lot of focus on people already being well-known. I became frustrated with this because I was used to buying vinyl on Discogs, where you have no clue what anyone looks like. This means you buy music based on hearing a nice track or being drawn to the artwork in a record shop. I wanted to find out if we could actually succeed if we removed the person behind everything and let it be about the visuals and the music, just like before.
And did you succeed (whatever that means)?
Sara: In all honesty, it made selling the records more difficult for sure. But I think for Tanya, Rose and I, it is way more fun and meaningful to work with people who aren't necessarily super established. We are still a very niche label, and we won't make much money out of this. That was never our interest. But if we can create a platform for people doing a release with us, maybe it can be the stepping stone for a larger label with way more reach and funds to pick them up. This has ended up happening a bit.
The Amniote’s visual aesthetic is an important aspect of the label. How did you form the aesthetic and how do you work on this collaboratively?
Sara: We want everyone we work with to have as much creative freedom as possible. It's also not a money project, so the people we have involved want to be involved for the right reasons. If we were to sit here and dictate the creative direction, telling the visual artists exactly how to do it, that's going to suck. There’s input and feedback from us to some extent, but the core project has, from the get-go, been about offering as much creative freedom as possible for everyone. This also goes for the artists making the tracks. I have never done a lot of art direction with them. It’s your track, your decisions.
The same goes for the artworks. Usually, we ask producers to send some photos they like, which we try to incorporate somehow by relating the colours. Often, some parts of the photos turn out totally distorted to create the backdrop of the cover.
Let’s take a closer look at the Amniote sound, which has always struck us as being future-facing. Often, the releases rest in the interzone between experimental ambient and club-appropriate tracks. What draws you to this intersection of sound?
Sara: I’m so glad you think of the label in this way. I feel like we moved into an exciting sound when Tanya joined Amniote around three years ago. She curated the Reflection of Light release with Australian artists; artists who, at the time, weren’t showcased much in Europe. It was an insane release. There were many genres on it, but they all fit so well together. Until this point, we’d mainly been focusing on techno and ambient and not much else in between, so this was quite boundary-pushing for Amniote. This release brought our sound more into focus.
Tanya: It’s been really fun to explore the label’s curation from other standpoints. It doesn’t have to be driven by a certain sound necessarily, but it can also be the way in which an artist is involved with their community or their approach to production. It’s also been exciting asking artists who you maybe wouldn't expect to release on Amniote and to see their take on our sound. We’re entering kind of a new era and it's been fun exploring other ways the project can expand musically and visually as well.
The Amniote’s visual aesthetic is an important aspect of the label. How did you form the aesthetic and how do you work on this collaboratively?
Sara: We want everyone we work with to have as much creative freedom as possible. It's also not a money project, so the people we have involved want to be involved for the right reasons. If we were to sit here and dictate the creative direction, telling the visual artists exactly how to do it, that's going to suck. There’s input and feedback from us to some extent, but the core project has, from the get-go, been about offering as much creative freedom as possible for everyone. This also goes for the artists making the tracks. I have never done a lot of art direction with them. It’s your track, your decisions.
The same goes for the artworks. Usually, we ask producers to send some photos they like, which we try to incorporate somehow by relating the colours. Often, some parts of the photos turn out totally distorted to create the backdrop of the cover.
Let’s take a closer look at the Amniote sound, which has always struck us as being future-facing. Often, the releases rest in the interzone between experimental ambient and club-appropriate tracks. What draws you to this intersection of sound?
Sara: I’m so glad you think of the label in this way. I feel like we moved into an exciting sound when Tanya joined Amniote around three years ago. She curated the Reflection of Light release with Australian artists; artists who, at the time, weren’t showcased much in Europe. It was an insane release. There were many genres on it, but they all fit so well together. Until this point, we’d mainly been focusing on techno and ambient and not much else in between, so this was quite boundary-pushing for Amniote. This release brought our sound more into focus.
Tanya: It’s been really fun to explore the label’s curation from other standpoints. It doesn’t have to be driven by a certain sound necessarily, but it can also be the way in which an artist is involved with their community or their approach to production. It’s also been exciting asking artists who you maybe wouldn't expect to release on Amniote and to see their take on our sound. We’re entering kind of a new era and it's been fun exploring other ways the project can expand musically and visually as well.
The international scale of Amniote is really interesting. You’re finding artists from seemingly separate scenes, yet there’s this clear aesthetic link. How did the worldwide orientation come to life?
Sara: At one point, all of a sudden there was all this focus on ‘Copenhagen's fast techno’. No matter what you do, you are ‘Copenhagen's fast techno’ when you're from Copenhagen. From travelling a lot, I've always felt quite connected to many places around the world, especially Australia. I have so many friends there and it’s a place I deeply cherish for the music scene and the approach to making music. When music is so non-geographically specific, you can hear music from all parts of the world, wherever you are. Given the fact that we live across three continents, it would be quite weird to be stuck in one geographical place.
Like you say, Sara, the Australian scene is producing something quite special. Tanya, could you tell us more about what it’s like to be such an intimate part of what’s going on in Australia right now? And also, how do you find working on a project that has an international scale?
Tanya: I started working in music in London. I was living there for two years and that's where I started engaging more with club culture and electronic music. I moved back to Melbourne, my home country, only two months before the pandemic. It took me a bit longer to acclimatise and engage with the music community there. It happened very slowly and very beautifully. It was nice being based and settled in a community again and being back in my hometown, seeing just how much things have grown. That’s probably been the most incredible thing. But even in Melbourne, I was still working with people based in Europe, the UK and all over the world, so I'm quite used to that way of working.
When I was in my late teens and early twenties, club culture in Melbourne was dominated by cis, hetero, white men. Coming back to living and being in London and seeing the other ways things could be and how here club culture engaged with so many different types of communities and identities, I was scared to go back home to Melbourne and not have that. But it was a pleasant surprise to see how much the community had grown whilst I had been away and seeing new faces doing incredible things. And like Sarah said, the opportunities for having a flourishing career when you are so geographically far away from everyone is quite hard, so it is inspiring seeing people do it just for the love of it and not because they’re going to get widespread notoriety or financial gain out of it. Equally, the artists that do move to Europe are still incredibly supportive and vocal about what’s happening back home. The link isn't lost just because people have left the city, which is really sweet.
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I was finally at that crossroad where it was the time not to have two full-time professions
It seems as though opening things up to an international scale encourages a flow of inspiration between places. Next to managing a label that operates internationally, you also work as a full-time DJ, Sara. In a previous interview, you mentioned that you were, at one point, working as an orthopaedic surgeon alongside music. Is this balance between music and other aspects of life something that’s fluid and always changing for you?
Sara: Well, I was still in medical school when I did that interview. Combining music and studying was only possible because I grew up in Denmark, where you don't pay tuition as you actually get a government allowance to go to university, meaning that you can work quite a little on the side while getting a good education. Obviously, that removes a lot of stress.
Since that interview, I have graduated from med school and worked full-time for more than two years as a doctor. And just to make clear: I am not a fully trained orthopaedic surgeon, I am very early on in that profession. I am conflicted about it, because I also really love the medical profession. But, I'm older and time is precious. I had a few months after COVID where I was still working full-time in the hospital and starting to tour a bit more and it was too much. When you're working full-time in the hospital, that's the number one priority. You can’t show up and be tired, I would never jeopardise my work in the hospital because I had a busy weekend touring. I was finally at that crossroad where it was the time not to have two full-time professions. Especially if you also want to see your friends.
I realised you can’t move away from the music scene for a few years and then just think you can come back, but I can do that with my medical career; no one can ever take away my degree. That still creates a lot of balance for me. The music scene also has more inclusion, more diversity, more acceptance of various ways of living your life, of various sexualities and gender identities, which I find very old school within the medical profession, even though it's people who are working with other people's health and life. So, when I do want to move back into working in medicine, maybe working within sexual health or psychiatry would be more my vibe at that time, given what I've been exposed to in my music world.
Tanya, how is this for you? Next to working for Amniote, you also DJ as T-N and work on other musical projects such as Black Artist Database. Do you feel like you must also seek a certain balance, combining all the projects and a day job?
Tanya: It can be a lot. I think I probably struggle most with the time zone differences and switching off. Being based in Melbourne can be quite difficult because I want to be reliable, so I don't want the time difference to get in the way of any work. But I just kind of found a way to make it work. And I'm lucky that everyone I’ve worked with, like Black Artist Database, is so incredibly understanding. It's just about having those open communication lines, and I’m lucky that everyone I work with supports a healthy work-life balance.
What’s next for the two of you and Amniote?
Sara: For me, it’s continuously trying to build a balance between work and life somehow. I learned some hard lessons from being too busy last year that I've tried to engage with this year. Also, I hope to continue working on where my place is in the scene and staying true to myself in a world where social media takes up a lot of space because of the constant videos and photos of yourself. I’m trying to navigate that. It's an ongoing struggle for me, to be honest. It was very confronting this summer during the festival season. Everything’s out in the open and there are lots of cameras in your face, which I dislike.
With Tanya, I hope to continue to work out where we want to go with Amniote. I'm grateful for all the people I work with. I feel like I've gone through a lot of hardship the last six months where I feel I wouldn't be in such a good place right now if it wasn't for all the lovely, lovely, lovely people I've met through music, and being involved in projects that are inspiring, that are doing things in a way that I totally respect and believe in.
Tanya: My focus is on settling back into work in Melbourne and focusing on upcoming projects with Amniote and Black Artist Database. I’m excited about celebrating the five years anniversary of the label and seeing how we can grow over the next year. I’m also looking forward to seeing the other ways I can learn and grow within the music industry while still keeping in line with my values and ethos. In terms of DJing I'm quite content with where I am now.
Sara: In 2024, there will also be a lot more label nights in Europe and hopefully Australia, too. We kicked things off with a night in Copenhagen this summer in a new, really nice venue. We have some in the pipeline in Australia in the late summer, and then, hopefully, we can get Tanya over to Europe again next year. I think that's the big goal for 2024: to do more of that.
We have some releases planned and more people we would like to ask to collaborate with. I hope we can do another compilation from Australia, for instance. There will also be special projects around our anniversary next year. But I won’t reveal too much about that right now!
Tanya: There will be projects that celebrate the history of the label and some of the incredible artists that have helped shape Amniote. We’re looking at returning to work with them too, which is exciting.
As our conversation with the Amniote crew draws to a close, we are left to anticipate their upcoming releases and future projects, subtly hinted at by Sara and Tanya, unfold. In the meantime, stay up to date with all things Amniote Editions here – we cannot wait to see what 2024 holds for this amorphous, reptilian label.
