Digital Dissonance: JG Thirlwell Discusses New Album HALT
Transmission 318: Interview with Foetus
JG Thirlwell began the Foetus project in 1981, creating a vessel for a sound that moved through industrial noise, noir-jazz, and orchestral dissonance. Since relocating from London to New York in 1983, his output has tracked the technological shift from the physical constraints of 8-track tape and vinyl to the open architecture of digital sampling and surround sound. His career occupies a dense map of aliases—including Steroid Maximus, Manorexia, Xordox, and Wiseblood—running parallel to long-term scoring tenures for television series like The Venture Bros. and Archer.
Artist: Foetus
Release Date: 2025-12-25
Genres: Avant-garde, Electronica, Experimental Music, Industrial Music, No Wave, Noise Rock
Label: Ectopic Ents
Description: JG Thirlwell discusses the end of the Foetus project, the influence of NYC, and the technical evolution behind his final album, HALT.
The release of HALT brings the Foetus arc to a formal conclusion. Developed over an eight-year period, the record functions as a repository for Thirlwell’s observations on the 24-hour media cycle, geopolitical conflict, and the psychological friction of a decentralized New York. While Thirlwell continues to operate within the spheres of contemporary classical composition and sound installation, this album represents the final bow on a forty-year internal dialogue.
Featured image: Daniel Efram
Related article: The Radical Sound of JG Thirlwell
You said that HALT completes an arc started in 1981. What is the specific DNA that connects the debut to this final chapter?
Well, it’s the DNA in me, I guess. It’s been like an ongoing dialogue with myself, with the outside world, and with the culture and society. That’s the connecting tissue.
Having worked on this record for eight years, how has its message changed since you first began?
I don’t think it did change. The world has changed since it began, but I don’t think the message changed. I had more subject matter to work with, but things were unfolding and the inspiration was unfolding as I went. One of the reasons it took so long to do was because I was also scoring for Archer and The Venture Brothers. A lot of things took longer because those shows took up so much of my time. When those shows stopped being produced, I was able to concentrate on it more. I am still someone who believes in the album format. That’s gone through several different evolutions since I started making records. When I started, we were restricted to vinyl. When CDs came along, I breathed a sigh of relief because I didn’t feel constricted to the confines of side A and side B. You have a limited amount of time to push onto the grooves; you have to consider how side A concludes and how side B starts.
There are a lot of different criteria in making vinyl, whereas I found the CD format much more freeing because you could go for 60, 55, or 45 minutes without loss of quality. Technology has changed a lot since my first album, and my music has always been reflective of the technology I’ve used—starting in eight-track studios, multi-tracking by myself, then working up to 24-track studios, and then the introduction of digital technology, sampling, and being able to have my own studio. All of those elements are reflected in the music I make. Also, if you look at the difference between my first album and Halt!, I’ve had 45 years of experience. Particularly with my 20 years nonstop of scoring for TV, I just have created such a huge amount of work and I’ve worked so much that it can’t help but improve your craft and allow you to translate more effectively what I have in my head to what’s coming out of the speakers. Regarding the album format, I believe in there being a holistic element where the sequencing is really important and there’s a connective thread between the songs and the subject matter. There are a lot of ways that I approach it; I’ve learned a lot of tricks.
It’s been like an ongoing dialogue with myself, with the outside world, and with the culture and society. That’s the connecting tissue.”
Why did the current state of US politics make the Foetus moniker the right vehicle for this record rather more than an abstract project?
I think a lot of people think this album is purely about the state of US politics when it actually isn’t. Part of it is, but people hear in it what they want to hear. The subject matter I’m talking about is kind of universal. If you go back 15 years to the previous album, Hide, there are things in there inspired by a culture of fear as well. If I released that today, people would probably think that was about US politics today too. Particularly the first track on the album, Succulence, I think people are thinking that’s the case. Whereas when I wrote it, it was inspired by Russia invading Ukraine and Ukraine’s response to that. But also the idea that we consume war, politics, and conflict through the lens of a 24-hour media cycle and social media. Politics has become entertainment, and that’s a lot of the props. I left it open-ended enough that it could mean a lot of things to different people. If it had been written 50 years ago, people would probably think it was about Vietnam.
Beyond music, which contemporary filmmakers or painters influenced the cinematic side of the album?
I don’t think there’s any direct influence from any one source. I consume a lot of culture; I’m omnivorous. I seek out new music all the time and I’m really interested in what people are doing now. I listen to music that’s coming out or that’s new much more than I listen to older stuff. I go to a lot of concerts—this week I’m going to six of them. I can’t say there’s any one thing because they’re all poured into me. One way I keep track of it is by publishing a playlist every month on Tumblr of things that have resonated with me. Otherwise, it’s just a morass of stuff. Music from soundtracks has always filtered into my work, even from the very early stuff. There are references to Ennio Morricone, and I’ve thought a lot about soundtrack composition. I’ve actually taught film composing at a university, so I can’t help but do that. Even last week I had a sound installation open—a collaboration with an artist,
Ann Senstad, who I’ve done about nine pieces with over the years. I did the audio element of her installation, and even with installation work, I approach it like a soundtrack because I want there to be a dramatic arc and theme. When you hear it, you’re transported and taken through a journey. When I am in the middle of an album creating a body of work, there’s a certain point where I have to start sequencing it, standing back, and saying, “Okay, I hear what I’ve got, but what’s missing?” When I was listening to Halt!, what was missing was bangers. That’s when I started to dip my toe into some more guitar-oriented stuff. I didn’t want to play guitar, so I had other people play it. Those couple of songs felt like the missing piece of the puzzle. I wouldn’t say there’s any one artist I could pinpoint. I’m like a whale that devours plankton, and the thing that comes out is this morass of everything I’ve consumed, gone through the filter of my brain.
Politics has become entertainment… I’m like a whale that devours plankton, and the thing that comes out is this morass of everything I’ve consumed, gone through the filter of my brain.”
You have lived through several versions of New York. How much of the current gentrified or post-pandemic New York City is audible in the new record?
New York is audible in all of my records ever since I moved here. Like most cities, New York has mutated and changed a lot. When I moved here in ’83, it was very centralized geographically. Most things I was interested in culturally and the people I knew lived in the East Village, which was constricted to between Houston Street and 14th Street—14 blocks north and south and three or four blocks wide. I liked that stark contrast to London, which is so sprawling. New York is not like that anymore; it’s much more decentralized. I moved to Brooklyn in 1986 or ’87, and then a lot more cultural things moved there, but it spreads and spreads. It’s the same march in most major cities: artists move in, the area becomes gentrified, the artist gets pushed out further, and the chain stores move in. Cities grow and then die. I still think New York is the cultural capital of the world in terms of the volume of culture you can consume.
There are hundreds of art galleries and museums. It has the most vibrant new music and contemporary classical scene of any city in the world. There are very few cities where there are permanent venues whose programming is exclusively improv, experimental, and contemporary classical music, but we have a bunch of those. The community of experimental musicians and contemporary classical chamber ensembles is enormous. It’s a really big resource to draw from for inspiration and collaboration. It’s very vibrant and exciting.
I still think New York is the cultural capital of the world in terms of the volume of culture you can consume… Cities grow and then die.”
Does finishing FOETUS feel like clearing a path for a totally different creative identity?
I don’t really feel like I had to stop doing Foetus to create another identity because I’ve always done that concurrently. I had Steroid Maximus, Xordox, Wiseblood, and Manorexia. I didn’t feel like I had to cease doing Foetus. It was more the march of time where I’m feeling more of a sense of my own mortality. I have a lot of things I want to do and statements I want to make. I want to be able to look at that project, put a bow on it, and write the conclusion. I still have a large volume of unreleased material which will end up in the companion album in a couple of years, then anthologies, and then I’m reissuing stuff. I didn’t really start releasing stuff under the name JG Thirlwell until about 10 years ago, so there’s plenty I can do under that name too. If I feel compelled that there is something under the Foetus umbrella that I have an unquenchable urge to express, then I will address that when I come to it. I don’t know if there will ever be a Foetus 2.0.
When a melody comes to you, how do you know it’s for Foetus rather than Manorexia or Steroid Maximus?
Ideas often come to me fully formed in my head. Before I even turn on the studio, I have an idea of what I’m doing. I don’t really sit around improvising and then find a home for it, because usually it’s got a conceptual core from the get-go. There are pieces of music that have migrated from one project to another, but usually they stay in their lane. I can’t tell you how I know. I just do.
I’m feeling more of a sense of my own mortality. I have a lot of things I want to do and statements I want to make. I want to be able to look at that project, put a bow on it, and write the conclusion.”
Are you working on new material right now?
Right now I’m working on a remix for Soft Cell, which is a remix EP of the song Ghost Rider—a cover of a Suicide song which we performed together a long time ago. They resurrected that for the reissue of their second album, The Art of Falling Apart, and I put new vocals on it. When they played in New York a couple of years ago, I performed it with them again for the first time in 40 years. They released an EP of the version with the new vocals, and I offered to do some remixes because I thought if we’re closing the chapter on this, I want to have a final say. So we’re doing a remix EP; I’m going to have three versions of Ghost Rider on it. I’m designing the cover and we’ve got a video. I’m also working on an album of soundtracks from Archer. This is Volume 2, as Volume 1 is already out. After I’ve got Volume 2 in shape, there’s also going to be Volume 3, which will probably come out next year. Then I want to work on the Silver Mantis album. Silver Mantis is a project I’ve been doing live for about five years, and I’ve never made a recorded version. It’s a project in Surround Sound with a film I commissioned by Sten Backman. It has electronics, theremin, and a prepared piano. I’d like to make a document of that with the film and release it in Surround Sound and stereo. It’s not necessarily new material, but I’ll have to do a new version of it because it’s semi-improvised. I want to lock down the recorded version and keep doing it live. After that, I’m planning to record a new Xordox album and work on the Foetus companion album. As I said, I just did a piece for a Surround Sound exhibition that opened last week. That’s mainly what’s on my plate right now.
Will you tour this album?
I’m trying to figure out how I would do that. I wouldn’t “tour” with it because the way I want to play it live is with a 20-piece orchestra, and that’s not practical to tour with. But I am working on seeing if I can do isolated shows. There are discussions about doing it in Europe next year and possibly three shows in the States this year, but nothing’s nailed down. I’ve started working on arrangements. I have to take the material and rearrange it for that instrumentation: four strings, seven horns, guitar, bass, two keyboards, and percussion. It’s a big ensemble, similar to what I did with Steroid Maximus several times in the 2000s. If I do it in different cities, I’d be working with different musicians in each city and just working from scores.
Photos courtesy of JG Thirlwell
Matteo Damiani is an Italian photographer and author. Curator of the sites Retrofuturista.com; weirditaly.com; china-underground.com and others
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