For their second album ‘Infinite Wellness’, the Berlin-based Nordic twosome ULTRAFLEX have got naughty.
Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir first came together in 2020 for a sexy sport and fitness inspired debut long player entitled ‘Visions Of Ultraflex’.
Compared to their debut, the approach to ‘Infinite Wellness’ feature more variations in style while being pop and more experimental simultaneously. There is more of a Mediterranean feel but there are inflections of funk, soul and even jazz, but it is all pushed passed through the ULTRAFLEX filter.
With a dose of ingles, opening song ‘Relax’ is a crystalline and gently funky. salute to Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response. ‘Baby’ though the song is about romantic endeavours although it is also all about ULTRAFLEX’s creative chemistry; the end result is a bright and breezy romp with a solid electro-disco backbone.
With jazzier cocktail grooves and “Mascara down your cheeks, Bacardi in your drinks”, ‘Rhodos’ celebrates those favourite sunny destinations such as Mallorca, Ibiza and Rhodes, inspired by their own experiences of avoiding sunburn, binge drinking and laughing at pasty boys with beer bellies.
With a fluent flirtation of body language, ‘Mi Vuoi’ featuring Italian performance artist Kuntessa places steel drums and sax chatter over a clubby trance house setting to display their faux innocence and devious charm. With a more R ’n’ B slant and inspired by Usher’s ‘Climax’, the soulful and moody ‘Melting Away’ is less boisterous and adds ULTRAFLEX’s girly club rap.
With chilled sea air vibes, ‘Ultrasex’ is a provocative play on the duo’s name with the resulting groove, saxophone and ‘wah-wah’ recalling a vintage erotica soundtrack. Meanwhile ‘Under The Spell’ begins with nonchalant spoken words but sparkles as our heroines get seduced.
Closing with the gorgeous sweetness of ‘Run’, the laidback cuteness gets its point across in just 2 minutes.
Balancing out their electronic template with more live elements like drums, saxophone and guitar, ‘Infinite Wellness’ shows development in the ULTRAFLEX sound while continuing with the coy playfulness that made their first album so appealing.
Nordic duo Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir had made music under their respective solo monikers of FARAO and SPECIAL-K but felt the need to move away from their more arty introspection.
Coming together as ULTRAFLEX in 2020, the Berlin-based twosome released a sexy sport and fitness inspired debut long player ‘Visions Of Ultraflex’. With their kitsch conceptual weirdness and ambiguously sexy overtones, it was groovy escapism set to an electro-disco beat.
ULTRAFLEX have described their new album ‘Infinite Wellness’ as “naughty”, with the saucy duo teasing their faux innocence on a record that features more live elements such as drums, guitar, bells and saxophone compared with its predecessor, although the high concept kitsch and coy playfulness are maintained.
If ‘Visions Of Ultraflex’ was their Berlin album, then ‘Infinite Wellness’ is the Mediterranean one. Their new single ‘Under The Spell’ is an expression of girly hedonism with a breathy seductive charm. ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK had a quick chat with ULTRAFLEX about their development from visions to wellness.
How would you describe the approach to ‘Infinite Wellness’ compared with ‘Visions of Ultraflex’?
More time, more attention to detail, more variations in style, more pop and more experimental at the same time. More is more ❤️
‘Infinite Wellness’ has much more of a Mediterranean feel, it’s very Italo disco, funk, soul even jazz?
Yes, our sources of inspiration for this album have been quite varied – during the recording process we listened to a lot of International Music System, Alessandro Alessandroni, Usher, Deniece Williams, Lijadu Sisters, Christine Lewin… we took our favourite elements from all of these different genres and pushed it through the ULTRAFLEX filter.
There appears to be more use of naturalistic sounds and guitar this time round rather than synthetic ones?
We wanted to balance out the electronic elements a bit and ended up hiring our favourite drummer Maggi from Iceland who recorded percussion for most of the beats on the album. Also, our friend Tumi came over and recorded some sweet saxophone and another friend Bjarní played guitar on a couple of tracks, channelling Enrique Iglesias.
‘Relax’ is a salute to Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, how did you discover this dose of tingles and how has it improved your wellness?
We’ve been aware of the phenomenon for a while, although none of us had really gotten into it until we discovered these soap cutting videos on Instagram (especially hypnotising when hung over). The visual form of ASMR caught our interest and we really wanted to incorporate it into a music video as it perfectly captures the fine line between gratifying and gross – just as we want to do with our music.
‘Rhodos’ celebrates those favourite sunny destinations such as Mallorca, Ibiza and of course Rhodes, what is your favourite holiday of this type?
The only experience we have with this kind of holiday is when Kari went to Lanzarote when she was 16. She partied the whole time, stocked the fridge with litres of Bacardi Razz and Sprite, hung out on the beach with pink British people and absolutely in no way, shape or form tried to experience the local culture nor show respect to the people who actually live there. She had a good time but can’t really remember any of it.
You had a holiday romance and produced a ‘Baby!’, but what was this song actually about?
Although the song is about romantic endeavours, we realised afterwards that it is also about our artistic collaboration. It emphasises the importance of taking risks (otherwise “you’ve already lost”) and indicates that whatever happens tomorrow, we’ve got each other right now, and that’s what counts – the power of the moment is worth whatever the future brings, whether it’s happy-ever-after or heartbreak.
So what is the best way to flirt on the dancefloor?
It’s all about eye contact obviously.
‘Mi Vuoi’ means “you want me” in Italian, but have you ever become romantically involved with someone whose language you couldn’t speak, and they unable to speak yours?
Well, we’ve always been fluent in body language, so it has never been a problem 😉
‘Melting Away’ is very soulful, were there any artists you had in mind when producing this sound?
The song started out as a cover of Usher’s ‘Climax’, but it soon developed into a club rap version of the short story ‘The Husband Stitch’ by Carmen Maria Machado, wrapped up into a mashup between Spice Girls’ ‘2 Become 1’ and Madonna’s ‘Live To Tell’.
‘Ultrasex’ is a play on your name but also a quite provocative song?
Beyond the title, the song is innocent enough if you ask us. No lyrics and no moans, just pretty sweet, classy melodies. However the groove of it, the emotional saxophone and the ‘wah-wah’ effect on the guitar can remind people a bit of a 70s porn soundtrack.
‘Run’ has this gorgeous sweetness about it, how did it come together in recording and why is it only 2 minutes?
This was a difficult song to find the right production for as we kept trying to make it work with a pretty intense Italo beat – it took a while before we were able to leave that idea behind. By the end of the recording process, Kari made a new beat that was way more laidback and cute to fit the vocals. So much is happening in the chord progression and the vocals so we felt like 2 minutes was enough.
Your first shows centred around fitness, so how will songs from ‘Infinite Wellness’ be presented live?
We have a few tricks up our sleeves, you’ll have to come to our show to see!
What is next for ULTRAFLEX?
‘Melting Away’ is being released late September, with an ambitious video, and then the whole album in the beginning of October. We’ll be playing this fall / winter in Vienna, Paris, Hamburg, Trondheim, Reykjavík, Berlin and more to be announced!
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to ULTRAFLEX
The delightful Berlin based Nordic duo ULTRAFLEX are back and this time, they want you to ‘Relax’!
Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir had made music under their respective solo monikers of FARAO and SPECIAL-K. But they came together as ULTRAFLEX in 2020 for a sexy sport and fitness inspired disco debut ‘Visions Of Ultraflex’ as they felt “the need to stop being miserable and do something fun for a change.”
For their glittering new single ‘Relax’, the playful pair turn to Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (or ASMR) for inspiration. During the worldwide pandemic and its prolonged confinement, the need to unwind was a given. Oddly satisfying videos of makeovers, making ramen, zit popping and playing with slime became popular as they triggered a tingling sensation on the scalp before moving down the back of the neck, providing calmness and relaxation in a number of viewers.
“Get your dose of tingles” say ULTRAFLEX about their ASMR inspired video for ‘Relax’, made in collaboration with nail-artist Lisa Mård, jewellery designer Margrét Unnur Guðmundsdóttir, make-up artist Jana Kalgajeva and cinematographer Ingrid Loftsgården.
For ULTRAFLEX, the audio and visual aspects to their art cannot be separated; they said to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK in 2020 that “We felt like the music wasn’t complete without a visual universe surrounding it”.
So as ULTRAFLEX continue from where they left off, “Throw on a G-string and some high heels, find a bottle of body lotion and lather up whilst listening to the sound of bells, chimes, shimmery synths and authoritarian command / creepy psychiatrist order to take it easy”.
‘Relax’ is released by Street Pulse Records and available on the usual online platforms
While the work of FARAO and SPECIAL-K can be more artful, considered and melancholic to most ears, the two ladies respectfully behind those projects, Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir, provide a bit of sunshine in these stranger times by having some cheeky fun as ULTRAFLEX.
Originally commissioned as a live concept, Jahnsen and Andrésdóttir have combined Olympic Nordic skiing, Soviet fitness videos and electronic disco to come up with a pop group that fashionista Lotta Volkova would surely have manufactured had she wanted to become a music Svengali. Perhaps unusually for a band, the pair met when Andrésdóttir’s father dated Jahnsen’s mother. ULTRAFLEX have described their debut album as “an ode to exercise, loaded with sex metaphors badly disguised as sports descriptions”. It is fair to say that the duo have an appetite for seduction.
It all begins with an electro-sexy declaration to ‘Get Fit’, but the girls state that “the message is for you to interpret, is it a critique on the societal pressure to be fit – or a motivational anthem, or perhaps both?”
Asking listeners to “1-2-3-BREATHE!”, ‘Work Out Tonight’ plays with some funky energetic synthbass and disco machine rhythms with lashings of cowbell before climaxing with a saucy dialogue between a man Jae Tyler and a woman as he accidental wanders into her dressing room…
Pitch shifting their vocals for effect and adding slinky sax from Tumi Árnason, the primarily instrumental ‘Papaya’ possesses a sun-kissed groove. Meanwhile ‘Never Forget My Baby’ is more laid back, sitting on a hypnotic off-beat with a gorgeous dual vocal expressing desire as a vintage digital slapped bass solo occupies the middle eight. The digital slapped bass returns on ‘Man U Sheets’ which then get switched to a squelchier variant as the girls get all breathy and sweaty like a Nordic MARSHEAUX gone electro jazz funk with all the vibey trimmings.
Inspired by TV sports montages, ‘Olympic Sweat’ was ULTRAFLEX’s calling card and remains as exquisite as when it premiered in the summer, a dreamy instrumental blend of PET SHOP BOYS, NEW ORDER and SIN COS TAN.
Coming over like Australian duo CONFIDENCE MAN’s ‘Try Your Luck’, the self-explanatory ‘Full of Lust’ is all girly come-ons and amorous panting, playfully raising temperatures while Jahnsen and Andrésdóttir go all LISA LISA & CULT JAM in the catchy chorus. The very Japanese Citypop soundscape betrays the song’s origins which ULTRAFLEX told ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK “started when we made an electro version of our favourite Norwegian children’s song ‘Sure Sivert’ by Maj Britt Andersen. With her permission, we were allowed to use the melody from the original song as a synth solo that now comes in at the end”.
Closing with ‘Secret Lover’ by spinning off percussively into another funky synthbass backdrop recalling MANTRONIX, ULTRAFLEX said of their creative dynamic: “We are both workaholics who appreciate a good laugh and a lot of sarcasm. Kari is the beatmaker and synth master while Katrin delivers the poetic sass and visual excellence. Together we make the synthiverse and melodic framework. With our common goal being to have as much fun as possible, we’ve succeeded from day one. Yes, we both felt the need to stop being miserable and do something fun for a change.”
The debut ULTRAFLEX album is a wonderfully joyous listening experience which proves a lot of amusement can be had while still maintaining an artistic integrity.
Deliciously coy with naughty exercise double entendres, the partnership of Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir cannot help but draw smiles. It is just the tonic needed right now as a very strange and tense 2020 draws to a conclusion.
ULTRAFLEX are the lush musical union of Kari Jahnsen and Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir.
Two artists living in Berlin who developed mutual artistic crushes on each other, they set on the road to produce a brand of optimistic electronic pop inspired by Soviet fitness videos and other eclectic interests.
Norwegian Kari Jahnsen usually works under the moniker of FARAO with two albums ‘Till It’s All Forgotten’ and ‘Pure-O’ to her name while she has also produced ‘Ardent Spring’, the recently released debut album by the Danish-based German songstress GRETA.
Meanwhile Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir was a member of the all-female Icelandic hip-hop band REYKJAVÍKURDÆTUR and dreampop trio KRIKI before evolving into the art pop alien known as SPECIAL K.
Occasionally self-referencing their name in their music, the duo’s debut album is called ‘Visions of ULTRAFLEX’. Their opportunity to collaborate came when they were commissioned to perform a live set of newly composed original material for the Scandinavian electronic music festivals ‘Insomnia’ and ‘Extreme Chill’ in 2019.
After writing sessions in the remote Westfjords of Iceland, the arctic cultural hub of in Tromsø and their beloved Berlin, Jahnsen and Andrésdóttir conceived a sound and an image, one that was beat laden and funky, sexy and mischievous but above all, light-hearted and fun. ULTRAFLEX chatted about their various visions.
Creatively as a duo, what are your similarities and contrasts, how do they work within ULTRAFLEX?
We are both workaholics who appreciate a good laugh and a lot of sarcasm. Kari is the beatmaker and synth master while Katrin delivers the poetic sass and visual excellence. Together we make the synthiverse and melodic framework. With our common goal being to have as much fun as possible, we’ve succeeded from day one.
ULTRAFLEX is joyous and optimistic, proof that you can have fun and show it while being artistic. Did you feel the need to do something a bit lighter after your most recent works as SPECIAL-K and FARAO?
Yes, we both felt the need to stop being miserable and do something fun for a change.
Was it important that ULTRAFLEX was conceived to be visual as well as musical?
Branding is everything. We felt like the music wasn’t complete without a visual universe surrounding it.
The ‘Olympic Sweat’ video did look like a Valentina Tereshkova exercise video if she had made one…
Thank you!
While you have mentioned a significant Soviet disco influence on the album, the sound of vintage US electro is very prominent as well, so it really is East Meets West?
Our mood board was quite varied, it stretched from legendary Norwegian teenage stars like STIFFI and FITTS FOR FIGHT, through a lot of US electro like MASTER C&J, INTERNATIONAL MUSIC SYSTEM and Larry Heard-related projects, we had a dip into Italo for example Antonio Arena and UK new age artist Clifford White for a bit of dreamy inspiration, all the way to power ballads by Celine Dion and Cher and much much more.
The first track on the album is called ‘Get Fit’, is that the message? What are your own favourite sports and exercises?
We like cross country skiing the most, it’s a sexy and triumphant sport – and the inspiration behind Olympic Sweat. The message is for you to interpret, is it a critique on the societal pressure to be fit – or a motivational anthem, or perhaps both?
On the ‘Never Forget My Baby’ video, you are pretty in pink but is it safe to balance your new Moog Grandmother synth on your bed while you are bouncing around? ?
Safety third.
‘Work Out Tonight’ is more song based with a funky groove, but the video concept was quite suggestive, do you enjoy being mischievous?
Of course, we are in our element when we know something you don’t, when we have a secret that we aren’t telling you. That way, laughter always bubbles underneath the surface and it keeps things exciting.
Were you both “hairbrushes as microphones” girls when you were younger? Who did you pretend to be?
Kari liked JANNICKE, FLAVA TO DA BONE, ADDIS BLACK WIDOW, SALT’N’PEPA, TLC, GINA G, you name it, she has been singing it all in front of her mirror.
Katrín used to imagine going on talk shows all the time. Still does actually. Whenever someone greatly influences her, she fantasises about what she would say about them in a thank you speech for an award or something. She’s done that as long as she can remember.
You throw in the surprise of a prominent saxophone in amongst the synths on ‘Papaya’ and ‘Man U Sheets’, where did the idea to include some jazzier flavours come from?
The question is, why didn’t we put MORE saxophone on there?
‘Full of Lust’ is like a cross between CONFIDENCE MAN and early MADONNA? How did this song come together?
We don’t know CONFIDENCE MAN but if it sounds like ‘Full of Lust’, it’s probably good. This song had the longest and most laborious birth. We changed the chorus melody and lyrics numerous times, and the attitude of the vocals went from punk to rap to overly seductive. The idea for this song actually started when we made an electro version of our favourite Norwegian children’s song ‘Sure Sivert’ by Maj Britt Andersen. With her permission, we were allowed to use the melody from the original song as a synth solo that now comes in at the end.
Do you each have a ‘Secret Lover’?
Only each other.
ULTRAFLEX began as a live project, so once things have become safe again, will it be your intention to take your vision out on the road again?
We came up with the idea to do synchronised aerobics on stage along with our visuals, to force exercise into our lives. With Covid, we’ve grown lazy and out of shape, so we can’t wait to get back on the road.
What is next for you, will ULTRAFLEX return for a second album?
Oh yes. We are actually making a new commissioned piece for a festival in Norway in February 2021 which will be the foundation for our second album. We are also going to Japan on a City Pop research trip, so expect some new flavours coming soon.
ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to ULTRAFLEX
Special thanks to Frankie Davison at Stereo Sanctity
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