Formed in 2022, prismatiqk are pop production and songwriting duo Steven Horry and Monaz Parry. Their debut song, "Swimming Lessons," is the first in a set of single releases from their upcoming EP, Refractions, and was the first song the pair wrote together.
Infusing darkly atmospheric synthesizers and a dreamy, understated guitar intro, "Swimming Lessons" is a slice of shimmering, mellow electro-pop that tells the tale of a protagonist who is garnering inner strength upon leaving a bad relationship. As singer Monaz Parry explains, "The lyrics for 'Swimming Lessons' were inspired by similar stories from a few different people I know. In each case, although it started well, their partners unfortunately turned out to be incredibly toxic. Ultimately, they were all way better off without them and were capable of finding the power to save themselves from the situation."
Steven and Monaz met through having children in the same class at school and eventually both realized they had a similar music listening history, making the journey from chart pop kids to obscure indie teens and back to all things pop shortly after. prismatiqk was born out of an idea to write and produce pop songs in collaboration with other artists, but somewhere along the way the pair realized they actually quite liked performing the tracks themselves too.
Formerly fronting 586 and The 18 Carat Love Affair, Steven has an NME single of the week under his belt, and his compositions have been heard on the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and more. He recently co-wrote an upcoming single with 80's pop icon Tiffany, which was recorded at the iconic Konk studios, with Monaz on backing vocals. Aside from being a vocalist, songwriter and producer, Monaz is a cookery journalist, artist and photographer, and has worked at some of the biggest selling lifestyle magazines in the UK.
Thinking back to the origins of "Swimming Lessons," Steven recalls, "I'd been going nuts in my studio during lockdown, recording instrumentals on my own all night, every night. Once that was all over, I was itching to work with actual real-life people again. I knew Monaz could sing thanks to a couple of karaoke nights, and I knew we both loved pop music, but I didn't know if she'd be up for doing anything. Being all angsty, I repeatedly bottled asking her and got my wife to do it instead. I sent her the first instrumental and she then wrote the lyrics and melody within a few days but sat on it for two months because she got all angsty about whether I'd like it."
After eventually recording "Swimming Lessons," Monaz passed the demo back to Steven. "It sparked off a glorious writing and recording spree, and alongside that, we started to do a couple of super-fun open mic nights at our local record shop for LOLs," Steven recalls. "We realized how much we liked performing the tracks too, so what was supposed to be a studio project basically escalated."
While we await more new music from prismatiqk, check out the official lyric video for "Swimming Lessons," created by Monaz and Gareth Parry.
For more information on prismatiqk, follow the band on social media (Instagram, Facebook, YouTube) and stream their music on SoundCloud, Spotify and Apple Music.
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