As the tick-tock beats and murmuring strains of "How’s That" faded out, FKA twigs’ eyes bulged wide. Twigs (nee Tahliah Barnett) gasped as a pair of hands grabbed her waist and hoisted her six feet above the ground in one swift movement. Bodies contorted below her; she was above them, ascendant and prone, holding her pose effortlessly. She was in control. She’s always in control.
This past Saturday evening, the skyward lofting of Barnett was the last action of the final performance of Soundtrack 7, a 40-minute performance-theater piece commissioned by Manchester International Festival and staged at the old Granada Studios. The same scene had played out here days before, amid rehearsals. The atmosphere halted at its climax, though, as Barnett uncertainly called across to the bleachers. "Was that ok? Are you sure?" She looked concerned and gestured those on stage over to take a look at footage of the performance, which was choreographed by Aaron Sillis and Ukweli Roach. The room lapsed back into silence.
This was the final day of a week-long series of open rehearsals, where small audiences of 20—30 people witnessed half-hour snippets of Soundtrack 7’s development. I was lucky to see a full track run-through—others have seen light testing, warm ups, and occasionally nothing at all, according to a friend’s disgruntled text. Barnett’s move to open up her process is a bold one, a chance for the public to see errors or flaws in a work. It exposes the vulnerability of an artistic person that’s always been so visually on point as to seem otherworldly. "I want to present all of the dancers for the physical artists that they are in an athletic way, rather than what would be pleasing with a commercial aesthetic… flesh, sweat, feeling, muscle, and a live movement, no air-brushing, no frills," she said in a statement.
Even when dealing with Google, as Barnett did with #throughglass in February, she negotiated complete artistic freedom to create a jerking, de-linear video that showed a musician in complete kinship with technological acceleration. Her recent video for "Glass & Patron", meanwhile, was the most dazzling display of her vogue-influenced choreography yet. She appeared on a catwalk in a flurry of movement that seemed to re-map the physiology of the human body, against imagery where she caressed her apparently pregnant stomach; during a festival Q+A with famed curator/critic/historian Hans-Ulrich Obrist, she described this as an "exploration of female energy."
Soundtrack 7 also hinged on Barnett presenting different versions of herself, whether in rehearsals where she played both artist and director, switching seamlessly between roles, or in the final performance itself, where her music was played through the sound system rather than being performed live, which allowed her to melt into the tapestry of the production. In an all-access era, Barnett has an incredible ability to show only what she wants to.
Placed into the context of the rest of Soundtrack 7, the graceful closing passage of "How’s That" turned out to be the most cohesive section of choreography in the whole set. Just prior, the movement on stage had been tight and claustrophobic, dancers moving in tight flurries packed with punchy movements. Coming through the soundsystem, Barnett’s voice recited the Thomas Wyatt poem, "I Find No Peace", which provided a prologue. Lines such as "I fly above the wind/ Yet can I not arise" set the tone of conflict and anxiety that was to come. The performance worked with isolation. There was often an odd number of dancers on stage, so that one inevitably ended up left alone, in keeping with Barnett's own sense of insularity—she admitted to Obrist that she’s not a "people person."
The performance frequently took a predatory, animalistic tone, although who came out on top was hard to distinguish. At one point, a male dancer crawled across the stage, Gollum-like, while elsewhere a fight broke out, a man shoved to the floor and tossed towards his lover, only to be thrown back and attacked following a tender kiss. This was a visual highlight, soundtracked by the twigs-produced "Ouch Ouch", featuring Lucki Eck$: The victim jumped and was held in stasis by the angry mob before the beating continued apace. Another choice moment came earlier on, when a female dancer was approached by several would-be male suitors, all dressed in white; she gradually eliminated them as they scurried and writhed to be with her on the stage. Perhaps the theme was love and its consequences. A red jacket was constantly passed between performers, transferring power: From a man who towered above another man who knelt at his feet, to twigs herself as she strode around another chaotic scene.
There were so many sub-plots, and such a feral sense of abandon, that the pace felt overwhelming, the threads of narrative going cold. The music’s deep industrial throb cluttered the senses further (although the volume could have been louder). As a result, the seven tracks played here were ultimately eclipsed by what was going on onstage, familiar songs like "Closer" and new track "Mothercreep" settling into a portentous rumble behind the dancers. This wasn’t simply about twigs’ music though; to describe her simply as a musician severs her from her artistic whole. More than Jamie xx or Damon Albarn, who were also challenged to create multi-disciplinary works over the festival's duration, twigs’ MIF appearances felt incredibly natural, the work of an artist comfortably working within her depth. As accomplished as Barnett is, there’s still the sense that she could take the FKA twigs project in any direction she wants, a mark of her comfort with control.