Alessi Laurent-Marke Issue #39

Ark de Triomphe

By Lindsay Trapnell
Published: March 1st, 2009 | 10:04am

When Alessi Laurent-Marke abandoned school to pursue her musical dreams at 16, her parents gave her a year to see how things would play out. The young musician spent that time making music in her bedroom, posting songs to MySpace, working on her fanzine Brain Bulletin, and playing occasional shows. The day before she turned 17, just as the final grains were passing through the hourglass, Laurent-Marke was signed to musical powerhouse EMI.

Such a fairytale ending is fitting since the songstress started her career as a classic storybook heroine: A 14-year-old Laurent-Marke first took the stage during a Halloween showcase, dressed as Alice in Wonderland. With her auburn locks, long dresses, and tales of asteroids colliding and hearts a-fluttering, the young musician continues to evoke storybook lore. She calls her songs “potions” and adorns her recordings with handmade art and packaging — sprinkling her creations with her own personal fairy dust.

Laurent-Marke, who plays acoustic guitar and records under the name Alessi’s Ark, recorded her debut full-length album, Notes From a Treehouse, with producing whiz Mike Mogis in Omaha, Nebraska. “It was really cozy,” she claims, despite the harsh winter she endured. “It had a kind of homemade feel because Mike’s family is so close. Everybody made me feel at ease.” The studio doors swung open for guests including instrumentalist-arranger Nate Wolcott (Bright Eyes), Jake Bellows (Neva Dinova), Maria Taylor, Clark Baechle (The Faint), and even the Omaha Symphony. The resulting sound is richly layered, well-arranged folk-pop perfect for curling up on the couch with a cup of tea.

“Each song is a bit like a letter, like some kind of note to a friend or from a friend,” she explains. Laurent-Marke delivers these letters with her distinctive voice, which has drawn comparisons to Joanna Newsom. She draws out syllables and turns phrases with playful and unexpected diction. “People sometimes tell me, ‘I don’t know what you’re saying,’ and sometimes I don’t want to correct them because they’ll come up with the most fantastic phrases. I hope that even if you don’t always understand what I’m saying, the words make you feel things.”

Laurent-Marke, a truly unique new voice, possesses a rare combination of youthful innocence and a wise maturity. During our interview from her home in Hammersmith, England, she calls out for her dad to ask him how to turn up the volume on the phone. When the question of age comes up, she charmingly puts things in perspective: “My hair will go silver one day and I will ache a lot more. In terms of heartache, I think my heart will get a bit stronger with age. You have to grow up at some point, but you don’t have to grow up in all aspects, you know?”