credit: Katja Ruge
Phew and Danielle de Picciotto, two singular voices from the avant-garde, have shared a new track from their first collaboration, Paper Masks, set for release on February 20, 2026 via Mute.
On “Sugar Sprinkles” Phew and Danielle de Picciotto’s voices are manipulated and transformed, arriving like corrupted transmissions while minimal ambient strands drift in and out of view.
Developing quietly over nearly five years, what began as an experiment between friends gradually evolved into a full-length album that fuses Phew’s electronics and vocals with Danielle de Picciotto’s poetry and voice. Phew composed and arranged the music at her studio in Japan, weaving the vocals that Danielle sent from Berlin.
Phew explains, “I made tracks without looking at the lyrics, just listening to her voice. I believe that the role of art is to evoke the power to imagine the unspoken, the unheard sounds. I don't know if it worked. I made this album in the hope that it would create a butterfly effect in the world.”
Danielle de Picciotto goes on to say, “I started writing poetry at a very early age, I love language, stretching and kneading words into new shapes, especially as I grew up tri-lingial . Phew does this with sound, and the thought of having my spoken word radically distorted was an invitation I could not refuse.”
Elsewhere on the album, de Picciotto’s German spoken-word pieces intertwine with Phew’s vocals across immense sound worlds that speak of communication and dislocation. On tracks like “Der Verpasste Kaffee,” minimal passages give way to fierce electronic bursts, while on “Amnesie” Phew and Danielle’s spoken and sung voices orbit one another, occasionally colliding with what feel like overheard transmissions. The processed voices on “Sugar Sprinkles” disorientate as untethered vocals and electronics impact.
The resulting album is mesmerizing, an exploratory work of intimate dialogue across distance, language, and sound, and a compelling addition to both these heavyweight artist’s catalogues.
Described by Pitchfork as “a Japanese underground legend,” Phew started out with Osaka post-punk band, Aunt Sally, before she embarked on a solo career that has spanned several decades. She’s collaborated with artists as diverse as Ana da Silva, Jim O’Rouke, Oren Ambarchi, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Seiichi Yamamoto, Holger Czukay, Jaki Liebezeit, Conny Plank, Alexander Hacke and Chrislo Haas, amongst others.
American-born-Berlin-based musician, artist and author, Danielle de Picciotto, co-founded the Berlin Love Parade in 1989, has released several solo albums and books, including her memoir, The Beauty of Transgression and performed with Crime & the City Solution, Gudrun Gut, Space Cowboys, Die Haut and with Alexander Hacke (Einstürzende Neubauten) in hackedepicciotto.
DANIELLE DE PICCIOTTO LIVE DATES:
1/17/2026 – Berlin (DE), Neurotitan – solo show
3/28/2026 - Terneuzen Festival (NL) - hackedepicciotto
5/15/2026 - Theaterwerkstatt (DE), Quackenbrück - hackedepicciotto
5/17/2026 - Karlsruhe (DE), Kohi - hackedepicciotto
5/25/2026 - Leipzig (DE), Wave Gothic - hackedepicciotto
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