Instructions for Construction Paper Cut Outs
It is a complete pleasure to share my fourth full-length, self-released toychestral electronic pop album, Instructions for Construction Paper Cut Outs, along with an accompanying activity zine that provides construction paper animals to cut out and bring to sanctuary.
Instructions for Construction Paper Cut Outs is very much an album about crafting and the self-empowerment that goes hand-in-hand with the act of making, whether it be a paper animal sanctuary, a meal, a sound, a garment, a tool, or a decision.
A surgical album of deft lyrical incisions, Instructions for Construction Paper Cut Outs presents authority in the female voice where deference is typical. Submissive conditioning and heteronormative power dynamics are crossed out, cut up, swapped and re-glued in order to craft a space that accommodates a woman’s right to agency over herself. Directives made by soaring vocals find weight in dense electronic soundscapes. Assertions are punctuated by melodies on toy piano, desk bells, typatune, toy organ, toy glockenspiel, toy chimes, kalimba, thunder tube, vintage noisemaker, and theremini. Self-released, composed, recorded, and performed by Alexa Dexa. Mixed by Melanie Balderas, whose ears and insights I value immensely. Mastering by Michael Hammond of Big Ship Audio. Album art by Jodi Lynn Burton, whose doodles I adore.
For anyone who’s devoted endless hours to making unnumbered inward incisions for the sake of self preservation: redirect your scissors.
