Ameokama is Aki McCullough's vision of twisted divine femininity. Distressed and destructive, a powerhouse of harsh sounds structured in songwriting remeniscent of her metal roots, but rejecting of the genre confines that limit sound and form. Wallow in the intense barrage for yourself on the last leg of her September US tour:9/23 in NOLA @ Siberia9/24 in Athens, GA @ Flicker Theatre9/25 in Raleigh, NC @ Kings9/27 in Baltimore, MD @ Wax Atlas9/28 in Philadelphia, PA @ Nikki LopezAlso sound engineer and co-owner of Nu House Studios, a recording, mixing, and mastering studio based in Aki's previous home in New England that has been dedicated to providing dignity and skilled work for the DIY and independent heavy music of the area and beyond. Especially extending resources to underepresented musicians through the studio's trans musician fund. She also touches on her past in the band Dreamwell, as well as her paused but continual involvement in the band A Constant Knowledge of Death, the ongoing transitional period of her life moving from New England to her new home in Illinois, her beginnings in music, and some of the spiritual essence that drives in great part what she does.Foto by: @bardicroots on IG

The creative expression of furries is very much the lifeblood of our experience as a community. Without visual artists, the characters that represent a part of ourselves (our sonas) and our fandom itself would be faceless, lacking its distinctiveness that immediately comes to mind when nearly anyone thinks of “furry.” Without writers, our comics, text-adventures, and books would falter to explore worlds and stories that express the distilled essence of our experiences. Without musicians and DJs, there would be no force behind our raves and no medium that gives us a bodily feeling for celebration, mourning, love, aggression. Without costume makers there would be no masks, hoods, and fursuits that shape our bodies to exuberantly match a sense of self. Without poets, drag performers, sculptors, printmakers, designers, or organizers and curators we alone cannot reach a deepened sense of self.

J McClendon – also of indie rock band, Glass Beach – who’s eponymic project j clashes bedroom pop with experimental and music concrete. Her more conventional musical elements bleed into a field of mundane sounds that are scattered across the human experience of consumer electronics and civil infrastructure. Effortlessly tricking listeners into a lulled acceptance of bittersweet melodies overtaken by walls of sound and vice versa. Aching a story of losing a sense of reality. Though the root of that disorientation may sometimes be things slowly righting themselves, finding belonging.

Tactical therian footwork producer and drummer Bea embodies the monstrous potential of dance that is best honored by a sweaty danceroom, air thick with body heat and ignored fatigue. Its music as Lycandope is spread over a host of EPs, singles, and several full-lengths each with that punishing nature. A beast of impressive rhythmic sequencing backed with the use of samples and synthlines that often give the overblown feeling as much as the use of saturation. With this, ravers and club-goers find a way to get in touch with their bodies and the people they dance and connect with, as violent beats rip across the dancefloor. Through speakers hooked up to generators setup under bridges or into the mains of a venue reappropriated – at least for the night – by transsexuals and pariahs in pup hoods and wide-cut pants.

Xandra Metcalfe of Uboa, a veteran of death-industrial and harsh noise. Known for building gut-wrenching, densely layered textures that are at times forcefully stacked, and other times gently falling into place. Though, notably the one person in the discussion who does not explicitly call herself a furry, there are many ways in which Xandra’s music and presence as an artist has common ground with furry and therian tendencies. It’s not a surprise that her projects are deeply embraced by our communities. When, through Uboa, she demonstrates a rejection of the supposed limitations that our existence – in the bodies we’re born into and in the mindsets that enforce those limitations – are simply what we must accept.

This discussion, mediated by Women of Noise mod Daisy, was wrought to make a sincere contribution to the classification of furry and therian noise. Also as an explication of how noise both made by furries and by those whose sensibilities align with the furry community, is a growth of our artforms into new and purposeful directions.

Women of Noise lead admin Leperwitch talks to Margaret Chardiet AKA Pharmakon about the themes explored in Maggot Mass, the meaning of artistry in trying times, getting the most out of the gear you use, and...Buc-ee's swimsuits?!