Ten minute tea with Afternoon Tea. Spend ten minutes with Afternoon Tea. In the time it takes to boil one kettle, and let one cup of tea steep, we will have your daily art + music fix covered. Take your afternoon tea break with our Afternoon Tea curators. Need an extra lump of sugar? One more sip? If you have five minutes more, we have one more hit.
Today’s tea + soundtrack + visuals curated by APACALDA.
Melancholic, dreamy, enigmatic and hauntingly beautiful, Montreal’s APACALDA (also known as Cassandra Angheluta) is creating her own immersive world with a refreshed approach to indie, electronic pop which meets dream wave sounds.
Brand new single, “SSR,” is a nostalgic and acoustic inflected pop song which uses playfulness to communicate a sadness at its core. Cassandra wrote this song due to finding herself in an intimate relationship devoid of any profundity, which she was misled into.
Its lyrics reflect on the choice to embrace ignorance over the glaringly loud truth in front of us, when one is in too deep and cannot fathom cutting one’s losses.
The song’s music video portrays contrasts of emotion through the playfulness of the bright coloured field versus the spiraling darkness of the dungeon-like space. These images serve to depict the back and forth of wanting to believe something is what it is not, choosing to ignore reality to hold on to an idea that is better suited to our desires.
APACALDA, meaning warm water in her mother tongue of Romanian, is a reflection of Cassandra‘s means of movement through her art and life. A reminder to reconnect to the warm water that can calm and ground you, despite the chaos and unpredictability of outside circumstances.
Creating music has been a means of alchemising her residual emotional traumas from past and present experiences through the one medium that brings any resolve within her. She showcases a unique complexity between the realms of feeling and sound.
TEA: Oolong Tea steeped with fresh ginger. The moment I got to savour the deep comforting aroma and flavour of Oolong tea, I was hooked.
VISUAL: This photo evokes pure peace and tranquility. Taken by one of my favourite photographers, Hamza Abouelouafaa, it inspires me to believe that I’m not alone. That if I trip, the love around me will break my fall. I have an obsession with being submerged in water. I find it to be the most rooting, grounding act. It mimics the return to our starting point. The womb. Our mother. So, naturally, this photo speaks volumes to me. (no pun intended :P).
One more Lump:
SONG: Lovely Day – alt-J. I chose to pair this song with my cup of tea because this song really brings a calmness to the business of my every day. A classic song with a modern take. It reminds me that things are constantly changing but also stays the same. It reminds me to breathe and to take in the beauty of now. It reminds me to be grateful of my presence in that very moment.
Tea + Me 