YL HOOI YL Hooi is the project of Valya Ying-Li Hooi, inhabiting a subtle and mysterious realm of furtive, dubbed-out song, sparse electronic percussion, and distant winds. Active in the Melbourne underground scene since 2017, Hooi is a member of Kallista Kult (with Sam Karmel and Tarquin Manek) and has recorded and performed with artists including Jonnine Standish (HTRK), Jarrod Zlatic (Fabulous Diamonds) and Rohan Rebeiro (My Disco). Her debut album Untitled (first released on cassette by Altered States Tapes in 2019 and reissued on LP by Efficient Space in 2021) was widely praised, finding a spot on many year end lists including the number 1 spot on Boomkat’s Discoveries l ist and being described by Boomkat as ‘an immaculately frayed conception of dubwise dream-pop’. Moving seamlessly from angelic song to gritty tape gunk, Hooi’s work opens onto a multitude of genres and directions while retaining a distinctly personal stamp through her obsessively zoned-out dub production tactics. ‘These are songs that seem to emerge in plumes of smoke, magician’s tricks conjured from the ether’ (World of Echo).

Both live and in the studio, Hooi’s work is produced in close collaboration with Tarquin Manek (known for his eponymous solo work on Blackest Ever Black, as well as a swathe of aliases including LST and Static Cleaner Lost Reward, and membership of groups including Kallista Kult and F ingers). In the live setting, the pair use voice, trumpet, bass clarinet, guitar, bass, drum machines and synths to reimagine the carefully produced studio material anew for each performance, keenly aware of improvisational possibilities and the vicissitudes of audience, venue, and acoustic space. Touching on the fringes of many genres and traditions – post-punk, minimal synth, dub, krautrock – Hooi’s protean music is haunted and seductive, her voice trailing off into an echoed infinity anchored to body-shaking foundations.

-- SILZEDREK Tarquin Manek is an artist based in Melbourne whose current solo projects include Tarquin Manek, Silzedrek, Static Cleaner Lost Reward, LST and M Quake. ‘Disturbed and enchanted environmnents’, ‘deep spatial dynamics’, and ‘higher dub logic’ are all phrases used to describe Manek’s work. It’s revealed in a way that spurs on the attentive listener through live settings and in his production - the details so detailed and calling to be heard multiple times for an exercise in a choose your own story-song. Manek’s ability to weave between the characters of his aliases through 21st century avant folk jazz improvisation, dream(pop) (post) punk, dubbed in and out clarinet, syncopated syco rhythm and beyond, displays a certain lunacy and obsession that only someone of his calibre could possess.

Lauded by Resident Advisor as Blackest Ever Black’s MPV, Manek has several releases on the now defunct label, as well as a slew of other releases and tracks on A Colourful Storm, Chapter Music, Purely Physical and Kashual Plastik; with upcoming releases on Low Company, 5 Gate Temple, and A Colourful Storm.

Access Guide and Tickets for Personal Assistants

You can view/download The Glad Cafe's Access Guide here. If you require a ticket for a Personal Assistant/Gig Buddy (at no extra cost), please contact kim@thegladcafe.co.uk.