Tiny Vipers

Tiny Vipers

Laughter

Ba Da Bing!

Since the release of her sophomore album Life On Earth, Seattle-based musician Jesy Fortino has become a civil engineer. While studying at University of Washington to pursue a wholly new life direction, she wrote and recorded Tiny Viper’s Laughter. Although it seems like a deviation from the singer-songwriter albums Fortino released on Sub Pop, it continues early works such as Empire Prism, and later instrumentals such as her 2015 contribution to the Ambience series (Box Bedroom Rebels) and her collaborations with Rafael Anton Irisarri and Liz Harris (Mirroring / Grouper). Though previous works like Hands Across the Void and Life On Earth are collections of songs, just underneath their façade simmers a raw emotional expression that goes beyond words. Laughter is the result of experiments deconstructing pop tropes. Fortino takes inspiration from early electronic pioneers like Florian Fricke of Popol Vuh, as well as the raw experimentation of ’80s proto-industrial tape culture. Additionally, she carries the seemingly disparate influences of Slava Tsukerman’s Liquid Sky soundtrack and Meredith Monk’s exercise in turning the human voice into a spectral instrument. The apprehension that comes along with attempting something new and challenging is captured in the fragile structure of these compositions, which threaten to fall apart almost as soon as they come together.

Tiny Vipers

Illusionz Vol. 1 (1997-2004)

Tiny Vipers

***Jesy Fortino has been releasing experimental folk music under the name Tiny Vipers since the late 1990s. She established herself early on with two full-length records released by Sub Pop. She would follow these with a number of experimental releases, a collaboration with Grouper’s Liz Harris as Mirrorring, and her most recent full-length Laughter. While in the process of writing and recording her upcoming full-length record of new material, Fortino has decided to unearth and revisit her earliest material that would form the foundation of her artistic identity. It is this material that comprises Illusionz Vol. 1.Illusionz is a collection of demo material that shines a light into the past, illuminating Fortino’s musical roots. All of the songs on Illusionz were recorded between 1997 and 2004 on a variety of equipment: a boombox in a dilapidated house that was sinking into a swamp, an ADAT deck in an illegal punk squat, and multi-track cassette recorders in various run-down apartments of Seattle. Each selection documents a piece of growth, revealing all of the steps, stumbles, sketches and raw ideas that merged into her ultimate artistic vision and approach.The songs on Illusionz range from seething social critiques (see “Billboards and Dumpsters” and “Out For Lunch,” for example) to the dirgelike poiesis of “Tired Horses”. Fidelities and structures evolve as Fortino stakes her identity in fin-de-siecle Seattle. Album climax “Watch My Body Die” fully bridges the gap between the past and present of Tiny Vipers, with its haunting complexities promising furtherance on her...

Tiny Vipers

Tormentor

Tiny Vipers

***Jesy Fortino has created folk music under the moniker Tiny Vipers since the 2000s. Those familiar with her music are aware of its artistic weight, with now-classic records like Life On Earth and Laughter establishing Fortino as an artist outside of and beyond her age. Tiny Vipers’ music is known for its crushing emotional gravity as much as it is for its hushed stillness, with an awareness of an indefinable beyond that is only accessible through her work. 2025 will bring a new album to Fortino’s canon, entitled Tormentor.The years between releases have found Fortino’s life in a state of significant change. Tormentor, with its nine tracks, meditates on her experience: whether speaking directly from her soul in the title track, or observing the horrors of sensory awareness on “Breakfast,” Fortino establishes herself as a participant, observer and mediator of the paradoxes inherent in human experience. Her subtle, often near-silent guitar work hints at a vast and spectral presence. Her melodics and instrumentation place Fortino in conversation with the American folk tradition, while her singular song structures and enigmatic lyrics are effortlessly avant-garde. Album centerpiece “Rainfalls” encapsulates this dynamic perfectly, with its obviously beautiful lyrics and melody sitting within a piece as daring as it is astonishing. The result is nothing short of astounding.Jesy Fortino has recently acquired the rights to all of her recorded work and will be releasing Tormentor herself, without the assistance from any outside entity. Fortino’s work has been compared to John Fahey, Joni Mitchell and...