“I find K‑pop like drugs”: backstage with Mechatok and Isabella Lovestory at C2C Festival

There’s an unexpectedly large contingent of vampires in Turin tonight. Weaving through the crowd, capes flowing behind them, they chug vodka Red Bulls and twerk to the neoperreo blasting from C2C Festival​’s Stone Island stage. On the large circular platform, Isabella Lovestory is performing her new album Vanity in a tiny Cinderella-themed two piece.

Yes, it’s Halloween and the crowd is buzzing. Furious bouncing and shaking from the reggaeton artist – plus those vodka Red Bulls – has loosened them up and, by the time the Montreal-raised Honduran’s on-stage unicorn mascot joins the crowd during Puchica, the energy is high, setting the scene perfectly for Mechatok, the 27-year-old German classical guitarist-turned-producer whose set is up next.

Before that, though, we catch our breath with a half-pint of negroni and a quick dash to the smoking area outside the massive former Fiat factory – the setting for the annual festival of edgy avant-pop and electronic music. Wearing sunglasses and plenty of black mesh, crowds of stylish Italians pull on rollies that form clouds in the late October air. A few lethal orange sips later, we’re back on the dancefloor, smiling to a playful DJ set from Mechatok that propels the sea of hands from fakemink to Daft Punk. When he plays She’s a Director – his sleek, Y2K-flavoured collab with Isabella – she bounds back on stage to cheers, tempting Mechatok out from behind the decks to have a dance.

It’s been a big year for both artists. Each released albums in the summer (Mechatok’s Wide Awake came out six weeks after Vanity) and both are currently on tour. But for all their connections – and friendship – each has their own distinct sound. On Vanity, the follow up to 2022’s Amor Hardcore, Isabella, 31, focuses on the darker side of fantasy and the heady allure of always wanting more, themes delivered via catchy synth tracks and reggaeton bangers. Several of the tracks are accompanied by maximalist music videos that hark back to the heyday of early aughts MTV.

On Wide Awake, Mechatok’s debut album, he works with underground heavy hitters Bladee, Ecco2k and Tohji to skilfully craft a dance-pop album that manages to blend nostalgic synth-pop with cutting edge hyperpop, and even a touch of ambient, to create a record that feels distinctly contemporary.

As deeply online young people, Isabella and Mechatok first met in the comment section, Isabella as a 20-year-old musician in Montreal and Mechatok as a teen in Munich. ​“I was always just watching her content on YouTube,” he says, backstage, in a soft German accent. ​“It was really genius, good shit.” Eventually, they met in London through Kamixlo, Isabella’s boyfriend, who is currently on tour with her as her DJ – tonight, that’s him in the green alien bodysuit.

We’re chatting post-show in Mechatok’s brightly lit dressing room. Sharing a black leather loveseat, both are sipping tequila from paper cups and there’s a palpable warmth between the collaborators and long-time friends as they gush over each other’s tastes – mainly, it transpires, their shared passion for K‑pop.

You met online and then later in person. What drew you towards each other?

I: We both love K‑pop.

M: There’s not a lot of people that like that shit in our world.

There are definitely a lot of people in the alternative electronic world that criticise it for feeling too manufactured or pop‑y. What do you say to that?

M: Making a sculpture is the most manufactured thing you can possibly do. So how is that an issue? It’s music. I hate [the concept of] authenticity. That’s fake to me. I find K‑pop almost like drugs. The music is very stimulating in an undeniable way. You might find it a bit nauseating the first few times but after you listen to it a few more times, you might just get hooked. To me, that’s how K‑pop works.

What are your views on the K‑pop industry?

M: I think the American industry that everyone celebrates is exploitative and mean, it’s just more secretive about how and why. Whereas K‑pop is quite upfront about how the factory works. As artists we like that. In America, they always want to sell you this ​“authentic” story of this kid that’s a good songwriter, [for example:] ​“I found him on YouTube, and now he’s famous.” Like, no – there’s a billion people involved that wrote songs for this person. It’s the same factory.

I: I also think that in the [western] music scene, there’s an aversion to hyper-femininity. They see it as fake. But there’s so much beauty in it, in the fakeness of it. And K‑pop groups have genius creative direction. I really appreciate the perfection and the extremity of the concepts. New Jeans is our favourite.

M: Min Hee-Jin [New Jeans’ creative director] is my idol. Isabella and I are both control freaks, and that’s a control freak ass industry!

Did you bring some of that energy to your new albums?

M: I think we did. To me, Gorillaz is the same shit as K‑pop. One guy invented four characters and instead of forcing four girls to train for 10 years and be those characters, he fabricated them. That was the way I looked at my record: like an imaginary group. And funnily enough, it just ended up being my friends. [People] like Isabella, who’s not credited as a singer on three or four songs where she did the vocals.

I: We also both love a really strong and bold phrase. We really love repetition, slogans, advertising. And when we were working on these albums, we were both building a caricature that represents the album. That’s also a K‑pop thing.

How did She’s A Director come about?

I: Mechatok sent me the instrumental and I worked on it remotely in New York with [Vanity producer] Chicken. I’m super visual in my lyrics, everything in my head is like a movie, so I wanted it to be about me being a director.

Why that phrase in particular?

I: In the video I’m both acting and directing the video. I wanted it to be tongue-in-cheek. [2001 girl group film] Josie and the Pussycats was on the moodboard. Both are about the exploitative aspect of being on set, being a pop star and being a control freak at the same time – which is often how I feel.

M: There’s this dumb Kanye quote: ​“I don’t make lyrics, I make T – shirts”. That’s something I wanted to do on my album. The lyrics, the titles, they need to look good on the screen, like a logo.

You made your albums around the same time. What are at the cores of Vanity and Wide Awake?

M: Isabella told me about the concept for Vanity way before I had mine. That title isn’t just flexing, it’s also about self-doubt and anxiety. To me, you wouldn’t call an album that if you actually were a self-obsessed person, so there’s a level of reflection in there. I was like, damn, that is such a precise theme for a 13-song album. So then I thought, I need to find a way to describe the state that I’m in. [So] for me it was mostly about mania, not sleeping and brain-rotting on Instagram.

I: Oh my God, the way that this guy sends me the same reel every week!

M: I was trying to describe that state of insomnia. Even if you’re asleep, you have a dream in which you’re working or stressing out. And the break you take is consuming more content. So I thought: let me make a record that [represents this feeling that] things loop infinitely then stop. And then bleak, harsh breaks happen and your mood is all over the place. Isabella really inspired me to determine and describe what I’m trying to express. Electronic musicians, especially guys, don’t always need to face their issues. They don’t need to face the reality of telling their audience what they’re trying to tell them in the songs.

Were you going through a particularly intense period of sleeplessness?

M: I had just moved to London, and London is already a more sleepless place than Berlin. Berlin is a going-out city but I stayed more at home. But London weekends were the most manic thing ever. I was in the studio every day and if I wasn’t in the studio I’d be DJing or at someone else’s night. If you want to rave and do drugs, you can do that in Berlin five days in a row. But if you’re trying to make a project then London is a restless place. To me, London is an innovation city.

Oh, finally, sorry, forgot to say: Happy Halloween! What are you dressed as?

Mechatok: Nothing but I look like a small-time weed dealer, like the ones who don’t do it for a living but to be cool.

Isabella: I’m a corrupted Cinderella!

If you want to hear Vanity live, Isabella Lovestory plays XOYO in London tonight and Mechatok’s debut album Wide Awake is out now via Young. He’s touring across Europe this November with 2hollis. (Tour dates here).