Photographing Acopia meant walking into Schubas already suspended in its own atmosphere, their stage saturated in red light and shadows, fog drifting slowly through the air until the whole space felt softened as if the edges of everything had been blurred.
The setting was perfect for the artists as they appeared under the guise of something corporeal.
At the center of it all was Kate Durman, her breathy vocals moving through the room with a dream pop pull that the crowd followed instinctively. You could feel the audience settle into the same rhythm as the band, swaying together as those patient drum beats traced slow circles beneath the music.
Nothing hurried and definitely measured, their songs unfolding gradually, until everyone there shared a steady, common pulse.
There was a strong melancholic vibe to the performance, but never anything heavy or sad. The feeling lived somewhere closer to the calm of a late night city, when the noise has faded and everything breathed a little slower, their sole guitar washy across the trip hop rhythms in hazy layers.
Moments like this linger in the same corner of my mind where some of my favorite dream pop and shoegaze live, where the atmosphere carried the memory as much as Kate's calming melodies, as artists like the Cocteau Twins or Portishead before them. Being behind the lens didn't keep me from falling under their spell either. I worked slowly and methodically, hypnotically, in lighting conditions that would usually make me anxious.
Acopia is the first in a series of artists I'm hoping to photograph through 2026, bands I'm still discovering, reminders of that fresh feeling that comes with hearing an artist for the first time.