Stories Beyond the Dancefloor: Five Rituals Interview

Lithuanian duo Five Rituals discuss their debut LP of experimental low-end music, giving in to the present moment and eco friendly vinyl

Let’s begin by repurposing a 1971 children’s book as an acid house story. It’s not too much of a stretch, for surely Mr Happy is nothing if not the embodiment of the smiley face – that’s pretty much all he is in fact. Anyway, one day he finds a door in a tree and, making his way down the steps into the ground, eventually arrives at another door. Behind that door is a room and in that room is an inverted version of himself, as miserable as he is joyful. It’s akin to tumbling down the rabbit hole only to discover yourself on the other side; because no-one occupies a single state of being all of the time. Enabled by the music of Five Rituals, the dancefloor offers such an access point – to a place where shifting moods are triggered by genre slips and dreams look like reality.

You climb inside Five Ritual’s debut LP V Rituals rather than just listen to it. The Lithuanian duo go from industrial strength breaks (for dancefloor oblivion) to narcotic downtempo soundscapes (for home immersion), yet the two states exist together in perfect (dis)harmony. Their experimental low-end music combines the inquisitiveness of rave with the decayed machine music of Warp’s Artificial Intelligence compilations.

I spoke to Five Rituals about their world and how to get there.

Please introduce yourselves. What distinct musical interests do each of you bring to Five Rituals?

Andrius: I make music under the alias Auren. I would describe it as a mixture of a wide ambience and emotional grooves. I love ambient music, downtempo, breaks and the darker side of disco. My taste is heavily influenced by living in the UK and listening to Burial and other artists that bring emotions and deeper, darker styles to tell stories beyond the dancefloor.

Deividas: Nice to meet everyone. I make music under aliases Jaroška and Karkasas mainly. I am influenced by a lot of different genres and styles of music. I am amazed by the timbre and extreme distortion of metal and noise music as well as improvisation and thought-provoking jazz music. 80s wave and post-industrial is also a big thing for me. I love artists who change and combine genres to create that hardly fits a box. Combined with Andrius, we merge everything in the most natural way.

The beginning of 2021 seemed particularly tough – as if everything 2020 had thrown at us was never going to end – but things are starting to look more hopeful I think. Would you agree? How are you feeling about everything at the moment?

We are calm and we try to use this time to create and foster positive emotions by dealing with everything that arises. We wish there was as little suffering as possible on everyone. We wish humanity to take a moment to breathe and reconnect with nature and invite the planet and its ecosystem to collaborate before it’s not too late.

In what ways has Covid impacted you creatively?

Before the lockdown, the world was fast-paced, and you didn’t have time to question what you really wanted. It was easy to give in to the vortex of energy explosions, clubbing and things just coming our way. So, this period has let us get in touch with our true selves. We both started tuning in to what we actually want to express and learned to listen. It was transformative in the most positive way. We detached from influences that we found forced upon us by the other. We reconnected to our inspirations that came from the inner child filled with curiosity. So, our music explored styles beyond club music and let us create purely without pressure.

How would you describe the sound of Five Rituals and what do you hope listeners take away from the experience?

We naturally operate in the uncharted area of experimental music that yet feels very inviting and reminds you of the nostalgic moments. We give in to the moment of creation. The result is ever-morphing detailed, carefully sculptured sound movies that play with the souls of those open to the more surreal, low-end heavy side of electronic music. We are implementing sounds recorded by award-winning instrumentalists, so the journey can lead to unexpected sonic palettes too!

Your V Rituals album cannot be easily labelled under a single genre. It’s experimental low-end music that utilises breaks, soundscapes and dub. Was this an intentional approach or did it happen organically? How important to you is it to incorporate different sounds into your music?

We could say it came quite naturally by inviting the present moment to take place and give in to what is happening. We really planned the framework and when the collaborators arrived. In the end, we allow them to reshape the outcome to their creative flow. I think it is just a fusion of our tastes and influences that came in the natural phase. For us, it is important to push the limit of creativity. The only sin for us is to do something mediocre.

It might seem an odd comparison, but I was listening to a Floating Points album the other day and thought of Five Rituals. Although your sounds are completely different, there’s a parallel approach in that you each explore different genres across the scope of an album while always sounding like yourselves. Releases on Livity Sound or Beatrice Dillon’s Workaround album might be more natural points of comparison in terms of sound, however. Do you think that genre is an increasingly fluid concept? Are there any contemporary artists that you feel an affinity with?

It is very nice to hear us mentioned in the same sentence as labels and artists that shaped our tastes. We are huge fans of Floating Points, Livity and Beatrice’s output. We can also add that Objekt, M.E.S.H., Nicolas Jaar, Aphex Twin amongst influences that could be compared with the mentioned before. These people are genre-hoppers, and they have an inventive take on every style they touch. We want to push it even more by creating a space for multi-discipline art to join with music.

What artists have been an influence on Five Rituals?

All of the above plus Burial, DJ Koze, Muslimgauze, TOMOKO HOJO, Antye Greie-Ripatti to name a few.

Can you talk about the concepts behind the album?

We hope that what we do conceptually will work in all settings and transcend genres. The theme is to stay open to a wide range of sound. The album establishes vivid audio-images of experience and memory. We faced a lot of hard realisations about the dark side of ourselves, we fell in love, we fought our demons and we felt that our planet is crying for help. We wanted to invite people to feel what they want. Another thing was to utilise a selection of field recordings from now destroyed places. Covid-forced isolation allowed us to make connections in a moment and recreating memories of the past and really think deeply about this. TL:DR: Concept is a cinematic journey.

Describe your approach to production. Is there a ritual aspect to your music-making?

That is a good question. For us, playing and giving into the present moment is the ritual in itself. We tap into our creative psyche by letting go of thoughts and our ego. We always found if we come with an agenda of the ego, or a need to prove something, we just go into this cycle of suffering. We want to avoid that. We create our rituals to get back into the state of an empty mind. We have a set of practices on how we get into the zone. For example, long walks before jamming or meditation before finishing the song. Breathwork and ecstatic dance and humming before the live show. This is a ritual itself.

We try to implement four elements and use them when we create or play live. We light a candle, touch the ground, drink some water and breathe that air in the present to really be with it in the moment. The fifth element is our soul. We let it take control of us. We all share this soul. In the process, we connect into one awareness. That is where the whole hypnotic beauty of us making a sound [comes from].

On the stage, it evolves even into a higher ecstatic ritual that invites the listener and dancer to give into. We usually try to have 5 of us performing on stage. Two dancers, one VJ and we all connect into a ritual of going into the flow of creativity and we improvise a lot. The collective mind takes control of the flow and the whole Five Rituals magic happens. Now we realise how much we miss concerts, raves and festivals. ;(

What’s the scene like in Lithuania?

We find our scene really exciting. Now it has a big surge of new, young and brave voices getting influenced by major communities in the electronic underground. We have some bold daredevils that even go beyond local influences and create something odd and unfamiliar in a good way. Those aliens will shape the future, we are sure. The crowd in general are open to the new and welcome every single DJ and live act as we have. Also, a lot of promoters are pushing the scene forward with a big supply of parties and concerts. We are small and close like a big family. We are Lithuanians and we value humbleness, but now, new fresh energy of radical freedom is taking over slowly. A post-covid scene should be interesting to spectate.

Jaroska has slowly enrolled himself into composers/neo-classical scene by having his debut concert with Orchestre. We can say that this will open more collaborations with musicians in that field. The alternative scene is experimenting with sounds that we see more crossover acts emerging. To start, check: Fume Musik, NULIS:S:S (Girnų Giesmės), Twenty Fingers Duo, MELLOW YELLOW DAFFODIL, Sheep Got Waxed and Abudu – just to name a few. Explore and always drop us a message we can share some interesting things to check out. I don’t want to write a huge list of places and artist you should dig into here.

The vinyl copies of the album are 100% eco friendly. I imagine this was quite challenging to make a reality? What are your views on vinyl and/or digital in terms of art and sustainability?

We all know that some argue that vinyl is creating a lot of waste and it also is bad for our health. We still love the format, but we feel guilty that it creates some problems globally. The best we can do is to set an example that we can make it at least from recycled materials. This a fair compromise for us personally. We care about the planet and we try to do our best. The project has some obstacles. The budget is way bigger, you are not free to do everything your way on presentation. You have to work with what you have, but it is also very fun to know that you minimised the impact on the climate in the best way you can and hopefully inspired someone to join. Our views are not radical, but we want to take things into consideration when we are making art.

Tell me about the live show you are working on?

We want to make dance theatre for a night club for a bigger venue with live visuals and a strong cinematic journey. Also, to film it with Antidote Community to have a digital version of the result. On the side, we want to create a live [show] that can be improvised in any setting we get into, sleepy concert or sweaty club. Everything builds to improvise or playback and live to remix our tracks with ease. The invitation to the present moment will be our theme in general. We hope to tour around Europe at least and coming to the UK for a live show is the biggest dream, to be honest. Let’s see if we manage to pull it off and attract a cosy crowd.

What does the future hold for Five Rituals?

Two EPs at least, a tour, and a second album for now.

Five Rituals V Rituals is out now on Ledomat Musique (vinyl & digital) 

Buy at Ledotmat Musique Bandcamp