INTRODUCING: 100%WET

Credit: Lucas Kober

Meet 100%WET.

They’re a duo from Copenhagen with a unique sound that they’ve coined ‘hypergaze’.

What on earth is hypergaze? Imagine taking the dreamy effects-drenched guitars and vocals of shoegaze and combining them with the frenetic percussion of breakbeat, drum and bass and acid house.

The duo have recently dropped their self-titled debut album via Crunchy Frog Recording. It consists of nine exhilarating songs that deploy a variety of different effects, instruments and vocalists (Eir, Polly and Frederik Fog Bruun all contribute guest performances to the album). There are more textures in each track than a coral reef.  Adding to the thrills are the various twists and turns in these tracks including the euphoric chord progression that comes in half-way through ‘Lost Myself’, the woozy detuned outro of ‘Over Me’ and the sudden key change at the end of ‘Leave It’. 

Dive into 100%WET’s debut below to experience it for yourself.

You can check out my interview with Jakob Birch and Casper Munns of 100%WET below in which we discuss pizza, the weather… and a bit of music too.

If 100%WET was a pizza what toppings would it have?

Seaweed.

How has your summer been in Copenhagen? 100% wet, or 100% dry like here in the UK?

It’s been a good mix of wet and dry actually. We’ve been playing some concerts, most notably supporting Primal Scream, and also playing and preparing different setups ranging from trio format, to having two lead singers, live drums and a guesting DJ.

How did you both meet and what made you decide to form of 100%WET?

We met at RMC where Jakob presented some process work to Casper’s class. We soon started working together where Casper was mixing Jakob’s band at the ‘The Lost Weekend’, but it evolved into a more creative and collaborate process, under a theme of breaking out of the usual band format and methods. We didn’t actually set out to make a new band, but the material that came out of those early sessions were just too much fun to not do it.

There is A LOT of shoegaze out there right now, but your ‘hypergaze’ sound feels truly unique. I love the incorporation of other genres like breakbeat and vaporwave. Who were some of your biggest musical influences going into this album?

We actually find a lot of new inspiration in each other although that can sound cheesy. But we really try and take the song as far as it can go, and on a more subtle level we also challenge each other - in a good way... so the intention when we met was just to push ourselves into something new.

But we also quickly bonded over having a lot of common ground in terms of musical preference and upbringing, such as OGs like Primal Scream’s Screamadelica and everything MBV and Boards of Canada. Casper introduced me to George Clanton which was also eye-opening (Jakob).

The alternate tunings used by Sonic Youth and MBV has been an approach we both integrated into our guitar playing before we met, and in that sense those bands have been an inspiration in approaching the guitar from a new angle. Sometimes one of us comes up with a great new tuning or and we end up working in each other’s tunings, which is also one way to inspire each other.

How did you create the textures in these songs? Do you go into each song knowing how you want it to sound, or do you experiment with effects until you discover something that sounds cool?

Good question. In general, we play a lot with creating atmospheres and vibes using texture and timbre and I think without ever having talked so much about it, it’s an important component for us that each of the puzzle pieces in the productions have an identity or ‘vibe’ of their own.

It can vary from song to song. Sometimes there is a long effect chain or sampling method that makes a guitar, voice or sample sound completely otherworldly, which then becomes something to build on top of.

So sometimes a sound itself is a starting point and a result of random experimentation, other times its a beat, chord progression or riff which is the main idea, and the song starts from there. We give a lot of feedback on each other’s ideas also early in the process, and overall I think we’re pretty good at allowing space for each other to unfold ideas if one has a clear vision about a direction for a song, or if not then letting the other part continue working on the idea.

Best stuff often happens when we each have something already ‘cooked up from home’, and then the ideas match up and become something different but better.

Quite a range of instruments are played on this album from balafons to sitars. What were your favourite instruments to record with?

It was fun for me (Jakob) to play sitar on Warmblooded - I hadn’t been playing that for years, and Casper also really enjoyed recording the electric bass for that song as well, although he more often records guitar or is programming beats. I do however always enjoy finding a really nice guitar tone and layering guitar tracks in the studio.

What music have you been listening to recently?

We both been crushing a bit on metal and more heavy genres lately. Casper has been listening a lot to the band Death, and I’ve been revisiting Deftones often recently after seeing a great show on Roskilde festival. Have also been fascinated with black metal bands like Mayhem and Burzum (however controversial Burzum may be, the sound is just pretty unique).

In the more chill end of the spectrum, I listened a lot to Snuggle, and also enjoying Erika de Casier’s latest album.

What is the Copenhagen music scene like? Any artists you recommend right now?

It feels like there a lot of different experimentation and output right now - which is inspiring to see, especially because a lot of these musicians are friends or friends of friends. You meet a lot of people through RMC.

I already mentioned Snuggle. I think their songwriting is solid; strong melodies, that happy-sad harmonic vibe and tasteful indie production.

I also think GB’s album is worth checking out.

We both listened quite a bit to ML Buch early on.

Collider is very cool stuff. And our close friends at MIAW also have a bit of drum’n’gaze vibes going which we love.

Tettix Hexer is also an inspiration and he actually coined the genre hypergaze, so we owe him a lot!

We’re about half-way through the 2020s. What’s your favourite album of the decade so far?

Hmm that’s a tough one, not sure we can agree on that one either.

100%WET by 100%WET haha.

We both bonded a lot over George Clanton’s Ooh Rap I Ya or Mount Kimbie’s The Sunset Violet.

What does the future hold for 100%WET?

Right now, we’re just making new songs and well underway in the process of album no. 2. We’re eager to really have the time to get back into the studio, as we’ve been spending a lot of time rehearsing and playing live recently. We’re trying out new live setups, and later this week we’ll be performing at Alive festival with both Sanna Heinsted and Amalie Hannibal Petri who are the two main singers on the album – which will be a first.

We’ll also play concerts with a great live drummer Remy Gouffault in the fall, which will be fun, and we’re going to London and Oslo in September, so we’re excited to play more outside DK.

Hopefully next year will hold more concerts abroad, festivals and plenty of new music recorded and released – we’re not done experimenting and expanding the boundaries of 100%WET.

Follow 100%WET on Instagram at 100pwet and Facebook here at @100%Wet.