Tan Cologne is the duo of Lauren Green and Marissa Macias based in Northern New Mexico. The two artists work in sonic and tactile modalities inspired by both Earthly and otherworldly landscapes. Tan Cologne released their debut album entitled Cave Vaults on the Moon in New Mexico on Labrador Records in 2020. Green and Macias write, perform, and record everything as the entity Tan Cologne. The duo cites an appreciation for Jessica Pratt, Amen Dunes, Bitchin’ Bajas and Sade, and are as likely to engage in conversation about UFOs as about recipes, plants, textiles, and wood sculpting.
Green and Macias began recording their second album in the summer of 2021 at their home, a relatively remote location. Swimming became an important daily ritual, as did gardening and visiting a nearby dry river bed. The rest of each day was spent writing and recording. Tan Cologne are an entirely self-contained unit, responsible for every sound on the record, sharing vocal, guitar, lap steel, synths and percussion duties, with Green adding drums, bass, autoharp, and melodica and Macias keyboards as well as bouzouki, not to mention the artwork’s photography. At all times, however, their proximity to nature and the ferocity of its elements made its own crucial contribution to the record’s development. With the likes of Mazzy Star and Grouper echoing across the plains, the ghosts of Cocteau Twins tracing patterns amid night-time stars and Verve’s oft-overlooked A Storm In Heaven drifting down dried riverbeds in the surrounding barren landscape, Earth Visions of Water Spaces is the perfect vessel for such lofty considerations.
Indie Sunset in Rome 