Listen to an exclusive album stream from our coverstar's new album, 'Visions'
Dazed's April issue introduces 21st century girl Grimes, photographed by Hedi Slimane, newly-crowned creative director of Yves Saint Laurent, and styled by Dazed senior fashion editor Robbie Spencer. Currently melting down messageboards and stirring-up cyber-obsession with her latest video Oblivion, Claire Boucher is the 23-year-old musician taking threads of new jack swing, k-pop, industrial and glitch to forge her own technicolour sound. Spending a weekend in Vancouver with Boucher, Dazed's Ruth Saxelby got the inside track on Grimes' new album 'Visions', and the sleepless nights and scientific experiments that went into it. And you can now be the first to hear this album in full, with this exclusive stream here on Dazed Digital!
Elsewhere, we cast strong, enduring models Frankie Rayder, Bette Franke and Vlada in shoots by Theo Wenner, Richard Burbridge and Jeff Bark; meet foul-mouthed rapper Iggy Azalea; and present an exclusive Louis Vuitton archive shoot with insight from Marc Jacobs himself and superstylist Katie Grand. Plus Throbbing Gristle's Cosey Fanni Tutti and Factory Floor's Nik Void; veteran documentary-maker Albert Maysles; Hunger Games star Isabelle Fuhrman; dealers and dreadlocks in Christiania; and all the latest in fashion, music, film, art and beyond. While we're waiting for the issue to drop next week, here's Ruth Saxelby's account of her meeting with Grimes:
Vancouver, where Claire Boucher aka new era popstar Grimes grew up and is currently based, is a ten-hour flight from London. Despite the kind of schedule that would make even a workaholic wince, Claire had agreed to have me tag along with her for the weekend for Dazed’s April cover feature. On the plane over the sun went down and rose again as it traveled through time zones. As we drew closer the ground below began to resemble Claire’s artwork for Grimes: black and white repeating patterns peeping through the clouds.
We did the first part of the interview in a funny little secret garden in the middle of my hotel, wrapped up against the cold. It got dark while we talked and a guy wearing a tuxedo made us laugh. He couldn’t see us through the window and was using it as a mirror, preening himself.
Later that night we went to a local venue to see her friend Mike aka Blood Diamonds play. One of the bouncers got shirty with Claire because Mike had given her an artist sticker. “She’s singing with me,” he lied to the bouncer. “Oh yeah?” says the bouncer. And so she did, just like that.
The whole weekend flowed like that, not least because Claire is just so exhilarating to be around – warm, open and forever running off on tangents. “Have you read The Foundation Trilogy?” she asked at one point. “In it the human race is so worried about being destroyed so they’re building this library. There is this planet of people and everyone is working to collect all the knowledge that humans have ever come up and write it down in this encyclopaedia. And that’s what the internet is. We’ll be destroyed and die and someone will probably stumble across it in 20 million years and be like, what the fuck? Time is not an issue for the universe; it’s just an issue for us.”
Photography Hedi Slimane
Styling Robbie Spencer
Grimes is wearing Givenchy Haute Couture by Riccardo Tisci
Dazed & Confused's April issue is out Thursday March 15, 2012
Get your new issue HERE. Dazed & Confused Archive: The entire 20-year history of Dazed & Confused is now available on Exact Editions.
