photo credit: Miwah Lee
L.A.-based singer/songwriter/producer Mia Carucci has released their latest self-produced single, the hypnotic slow-burn “Pomba Gira,” along with an accompanying video.
The track begins with a sparse but insistent Afro-Latin drum rhythm, regularly punctuated by an echoing “whoop!” that effectively creates an atmosphere of both unease and anticipation, before Carucci’s breathy, siren-like vocals inquire “what is your reflection in the ever-firing mirror of this life,” subtly referencing the titular Pomba Gira, a central figure of the Afro-Indigenous religion of Quimbanda, who represents the many and different facets of the feminine, including those who have freed themselves from the confines of sexual identity.
Meanwhile, the video amps up the mystical aspects only hinted at in the track. It begins with Carucci, dressed only in a chainmail bikini, seductively dancing amid rows of votive candles in the dark, balancing themself on a rock in the middle of a roiling ocean, and performing devotional worship to Pomba Gira (played here—complete with devil horns— by previous DELI artist Star Amerasu). Throw in a python coiled around a belly-dancing Carucci toward the later parts of the video, and you have a perfect spooky-seductive track and visual to be played in the background at an upcoming Halloween party.
Mia Carucci has an upcoming EP in the works, release date TBA. Gabe Hernandez