Before she became Lady Lazarus, the last time Melissa Ann Sweat sang in public was in her junior high production of “Oliver.” But three years ago, Sweat assumed that artistic pseudonym and began creating her own music.
Today the UCLA alumna released her first LP, “Mantic,” a compilation of her characteristically simple and quiet music.
According to Sweat, she took her pseudonym from Sylvia Plath’s poem “Lady Lazarus,” because of her strong identification with the title character and theme of the poem.
“I really identified with the idea of Lady Lazarus,” Sweat said. “It’s about a woman, not unlike Sylvia, who has attempted suicide, … and yet there’s this falling action in the poem with the intent to commit suicide or of death, and yet there’s the rise back up again.”
Sweat is a beginner to the music world ““ as an American literature and culture student while at UCLA, she had absolutely no musical training prior to her arrival in the industry.
Her story as a musician began when Sweat decided to begin learning to play music.
“I just wanted to teach myself an instrument,” Sweat said. “That’s how I started, picking up the keyboard and teaching myself. It’ll be three years ago that I really started playing.”
Sweat has since experimented with a wide arrange of instruments, including the keyboard, piano, harmonica, accordion and the mbira, an African thumb piano she picked up from her roommate. And yet despite the seemingly haphazard selection of instruments, Sweat’s music is stylistically simple.
Brian Howe, contributor to Pitchfork.com and a reviewer of Sweat’s music, noted Sweat’s uncomplicated approach to her songwriting. Howe was introduced to Lady Lazarus through an e-mail sent by Sweat’s brother, yet Howe said the simply stated correspondence was all it took to peak his interest.
“I get a lot of e-mails like that everyday, … and I honestly ignore (most of) them,” Howe said. “I checked out (her Myspace) and it appealed to me right away. All she had at the time was a bunch of demos, … one of which was “˜The Eye in the Eye of the Storm.’
“It’s so simple, … right away I found it really striking and graspable.”
That same simplicity is what drew visual artist Katharina Lackner to Sweat’s music as well. The two corresponded over the Internet to create the beginnings of a music video for Sweat’s song, “The Eye in the Eye of the Storm.”
Like Sweat, Lackner is approaching the video with an experimental take.
“It’s very simple, and she has a fantastic voice,” Lackner said. “She gave me freehand how to do it. For me, it’s great to experiment this way. … When she wrote to me I was listening to her Myspace site. … “˜The Eye in the Eye of the Storm,’ … it made my mind run and get a really strong visual impression.”
According to Howe, the most complicated part about Lady Lazarus’ music is defining her minimalist style.
“The fact that it’s so simple makes it a little difficult to classify. … I use the term shadowy dream pop, kind of shorthand for her style, … it’s almost like ambient folk,” Howe said.
“I’m avalanched with music that is so heavily mediated by PR agencies and by the musicians themselves. … As a Pitchfork writer, I don’t really want to hear albums designed for Pitchfork writers, and Melissa’s music was refreshingly outside of all that,” Howe said.
Sweat said her musical career began from nothing more than a desire to learn music.
“I like that there’s room to breathe and feel,” Sweat said. “Because I’m self-taught, I think it sounds slightly experimental, but I think it’s pretty accessible at the same time.
“I hope (my story) would inspire someone to pick up an instrument and say, “˜Hey, maybe I can do this,’ … because that’s really where I came from.”