Late last year, Linda Fox unleashed debut album Leopards Break Into My Heart. Today, we’re excited to premiere the first music video. If you can’t wait, scroll straight down – otherwise, stay and take the long route via a reality-distorting Q&A with collaborator Dave Biddle.
Q: What can you share with us about the making of this video?
A: The video started out as documentation for a guided meditation through Stanley Park. Clients were taken on individual motorcycle rides through the park at night in order to be cured of sleeplessness. At the end of each Journey a figure would emerge from out of the trees, transforming the space. The transformation was from a Real_Space to a Virtual_Space. The documentation that we set out to make quickly took on a life of its own. No sooner than we realised that there is a huge market for those in need of MotionActivatedSleepTherapy™ did we come into contact with Linda Fox, who was working on a song utilising sonic subliminal technologies to evoke restorative dreams. From there, we ended up with the most exciting infomercial this side of Y2K.
So – big cats, huh?! The flashy leopard motorcycle from your album cover makes an appearance here… is there any continuity between the leopards and the cougar? Do the leopards (that break into your heart) have a place in this story?
YES. Big cats represent the UNIQUE-ABILITY© for chaotic elements of reality to find their way into self-organised, contained systems of order. In other words, anything that makes sense (order) will be corrupted by nonsense (chaos), and there are two ways to handle this fact. One way is to boost security. Ensure that the boundaries around the sensible are impenetrable so that the non-sensible can’t get in, and if it does… it must be killed. The other way is to adapt to the non-sensible, to make it fit within the ordered system into which it’s found its way.
In Kafka’s ‘Leopards Aphorism’ [recited at the start of the video], the leopards, who continually break into the temple and drink all the sacrificial vessels, are eventually incorporated into the ritual. This represents the second of the two approaches above: instead of boosting security to keep the leopards out, the leopards are given meaning within the temple walls.
In Stanley Park’s ‘Cougar Story,’ the cougar, who continually breaks into the zoo to drink the blood of goats, is eventually hunted, killed, and put on display in the Stanley Park pavilion. This represents the first approach. Instead of allowing the cougar a place within the boundaries of the park, security measures are taken to maintain its established order.
The leopard print motorcycle is a means of transporting chaos through the boundaries of order, it brings forth change when stasis prevails.
When did you find out the story of Stanley Park’s last cougar?
I discovered this story after reading The Divine Invasion by Philip K. Dick, wherein two characters travel to an illusory universe (which is the exact one we are in now) and they go to Stanley Park in Vancouver, B.C. – “the most beautiful place on earth.” While there, they are so inspired by its beauty they attempt to release all the animals from the zoo. The first animal they release is a goat who turns out to be the Devil. After reading that I looked into the history of the park’s zoo, which brought me to the story of the cougar which haunted the caged animals of Stanley Park in 1911. I’d already been applying the leopards aphorism to all aspects of life as a way of examining the relationship between chaos and order, and so when I discovered the story of Stanley Park’s cougar it immediately revealed itself to be the alternative extreme in ChaosManagement™.
Your music always feels like something of a journey, to me, and this video really takes us on one. Is the experience here the one which you imagine/wish for folk listening to your music?
This album is absolute and perfect for so many reasons. One reason is that it corresponds exactly to the dynamic virtual landscape that was created by Lep-E Alternatives™. This virtual landscape is a place of harmony and surrender, where motion is constant and new obstacles arise to meet the precise needs of users in RealTime™. Essentially, what the music of Linda Fox attempts to achieve is an e-scape from the usual sleeplessness that plagues so many of us on a nightly basis; so this album mimics the sub-liminal structure of guided meditations in order to provide a sonic journey away from TheReal. The music of Linda Fox is a journey into TheVirtual.
What will happen if I actually email your booking address [given in the video description] for one of these journeys?
You will quickly find yourself immersed in a process of SelfTransformation™ that will free you from the shackles of TheReal. In other words, “you will be virtually content.”
The video was directed by David Biddle and David Ehrenreich, with cinematography by David Ehrenreich. Check out more of Ehrenreich’s work via Vimeo or Instagram. Choreography and dance by collaborator Olivia Shaffer. Dana Zamzul is the participant.
“When Leopards Break Into My Heart ®™ they introduce chaos where there was once only peace, and so I’m forced to adapt to their presence and find a place for them in my spirit” – Linda Fox
