It was on a hot, lazy spring afternoon in Nashville that Makena Brown (a.k.a wasp eater) told her friend Olive Klug about removing invasive species from a local park – the green peril in question was honeysuckle, which caused the surprised Klug to suggest that the deception of the plant was akin to the deception they’d experienced in past relationships. And with this flash of insight, a song was born. It’s a light and seemingly humorous take on what’s really a serious subject – how to get someone you don’t love anymore to take the hint, which can be difficult even when spelt out in the classic words of one syllable.
Olive Klug’s bio is a relatively straightforward one: Olive graduated with a liberal arts degree shortly before the 2020 pandemic derailed their plans of pursuing a career in social work. Though they’d recorded and self-released the 2019 EP “Fire Alarm” from a childhood friend’s bedroom, up until early 2021, Olive categorised their music as either a hobby or a pipe dream, depending on who was asking. However, after being laid off from a teaching job in late 2020, Olive started working as a barista and decided to commit all of their extra energy to an ever-growing community of fans online.
By contrast, wasp eater is somewhat more whimsical and less revealing of what might pass for facts, but is willing to share that they currently operate out of Nashville, although there have been multiple credible reports that the entity itself prefers to inhabit the liminal spaces between waking and dreaming. Other sources, while finding themselves near cave entrances or mountain tops, have linked auditory hallucinations to the wasp eater, many claiming to have heard what has been described as beautiful, ambient folk music emanating from these locations. Warm and intuitive songs appear through a haze of white noise, inviting the listener to visit their past through unforgettable melodies and a new, profound sense of empathy. There are two leading theories when it comes to the static behind the music: those who have experienced the phenomenon hypothesise it is either the amplified background radiation of the universe or that the wasp eater records its music directly to cassette.
