Photo by Carl Solomon
In 2008, the Russo-Georgian War over South Ossetia led to Russian advances into Georgia, intensifying geopolitical tensions. This conflict resulted in many displacements and some Russians moving to Tbilisi. Despite being Georgia’s capital, Tbilisi faces internal conflicts over its pro-Russian government stance, contrasting with many citizens who oppose Russian influence and advocate for greater national independence and alignment with Western policies. This dynamic fuels ongoing political and social challenges.
Now, UK avant-pop artist Nick Hudson delves into the complex geopolitical landscape of the Russo-Georgian conflict in his album Kanda Teenage Honey. This expansive 16-track collection was recorded in a vast former Soviet movie studio in Georgia, under the looming presence of the Ukraine war. Hudson’s album emerges from a blend of geographical and musical explorations, venturing into territories rarely explored in music, reflecting a deep, resonant response to the tumultuous backdrop.
Kanda Teenage Honey was recorded at Leno Studio and Sano Studio in Tbilisi, working alongside Ilya Lukashev, and mastered to analogue tape by Paul Pascoe (Barry Adamson, Sleaford Mods) at Church Road Studios in Hove. In crafting this project, Hudson not only teamed up with remarkable Georgian musicians but also with his friend Seva, a Russian dissident and former associate of Navalny, who escaped the clutches of the FSB.
Kanda Teenage Honey delves into themes of protecting what is sacred from the corrupting grip of church and state, both spiritually and materially. Throughout the album, Hudson articulates a storyline that challenges kleptocratic power structures. He provides insightful reflections on several tracks, unraveling the stories embedded within his music.
“He contributes a poem narrating his thoughts on exile, through which I’ve layered field recordings of the recent Tbilisi and Paris protests, where many of us got tear-gassed,” Hudson remembers. “This geopolitical tension has inevitably made its way into the lyrical and musical texture of the record via the songs Hollow Man and Sky Burial While Alive. It also contains oligarch-hexing magic realism and a tribute to that vastly-neglected demographic – the old-school homosexual….Musically it encompasses art rock, black metal, ambient music, agitprop folk, charred goth rock, symphonic vastness and piano ballads -all infused with the energies and landscape of Georgia.”
“(Kanda Teenage Honey) itself refers to a very real preservation of innocence derived from a story I heard of a local villager whose teenage son was shot and killed,” says Hudson. “The father had his son’s body preserved in honey. As such, there are secular hymns for peace and lucid stillness, tales of saints de-martyring themselves and falling in love free of judgement from anachronistic scrutiny – a thinly veiled parable of queer love.”
“Two very close friends died within six months of each other during my first year in Georgia – there are requiems in the songs Archipelago and Bardo, plus an acappella tribute to the Siberian husky that helped me grieve them during a retreat to the sublime mountainous region of Khevsureti by the Chechen border, where despite being an ostensibly Orthodox country, pagan traditions are still passionately observed. I dreamed eighty-percent of ‘Bardo’ in the energised serenity of this beautiful region while mourning my friend Jesse. Patrick, honoured in ‘Archipelago’, was one of my earliest mentors and a dynamically brilliant pianist. They are much missed,” explains Nick Hudson.
“Ortolan references the summer of 2021, when I fled to the same Isle Of Wight monastery at which Scott Walker had sought refuge in the sixties, as my mental and physical health hit a nadir and I was forced to leave the city I’d called home for twenty years. This Heat refers to a return journey from a plague necropolis at the Chechen border, where giddily drunken park rangers piloting a 4X4 hurtled us passengers down a treacherous mountain pass and I briefly thought it might be the last song I’d ever write. Since then, I’ve come to learn that Georgians are some of the virtuosic drivers in the world, even drunk, and I need not have feared.”
Kanda Teenage Honey is out now, available everywhere, along with his new book The Land Exists So The Seas Don’t Argue, showcasing a decade of lyrical output in five albums, plus ephemera with a foreword by renowned Scottish author Chris Kelso.
Order the album here
Mixed by Toby Driver of Kayo Dot, who also features on the album, this record boasts an impressive lineup of guest artists. These include Stuart Braithwaite (Mogwai), Stuart Dahlquist of Asva, Burning Witch, and Sunn O))), Lizzy Carey (Bat For Lashes), Robert Wyatt’s collaborator Alfreda Benge, legendary German performer Christopher Nell (known for his work with theatre visionary Robert Wilson), and soprano prodigy Poppy Efemey.
In 2021, Nick Hudson released his album Font Of Human Fractures and the K69996ROMA: EP. A year earlier, his band The Academy of Sun dropped The Quiet Earth. Throughout his career, Hudson has worked with icons like Wayne Hussey of The Mission, Matthew Seligman (David Bowie, Tori Amos), Shara Nelson (Massive Attack), and queercore pioneer GB Jones. Beyond music, Hudson’s creative scope extends to painting, filmmaking, and novel writing.
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Photos by Carl Solomon
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