Album Notes

Knowledge Scars, Unwoman's debut album, crosses many genre lines but presents a unified dark electronic collection. Self-produced and self-engineered, the album is a tribute to her diverse influences and DIY philosophy. Ranging from cello-laced synth-pop and trip-hop, to experimental industrial, to ethereal ambient vocal-piano excursions, describing Unwoman's music necessitates many hyphens.

www.starvox.net, Matthew Heilman:
Knowledge Scars is an impressive debut release from Erica Mulkey, an independent solo artist from California that under the appellation Unwoman has released a darkly erotic and thought-provoking collection of songs. Erica expresses her instrumental prowess as an accomplished vocalist, cellist, and keyboardist. Her style ranges from a kind of experimental trip hop to swirling darkwave atmosphere with just enough static and noise to give it that extra technical punch. [...]

Outburn Magazine (Issue 18), Octavia:
[...]Knowledge Scars is an unpredictable and surprisingly likeable debut.

Rik MacLean, in The Violet Collection:
"Knowledge Scars is a remarkable work, showing a confidence and surety in all aspects of songwriting and performance, as well as showing a skill and a finesse that would leave most other artists in the dust. [...] The songs collected here are a fantastic testimony to the beauty of synthesis, featuring Erica's beautiful vocals firmly entrenched in a constantly shifting array of sound and noise. [...] Her work follows a very angular, razor sharp form that emphasizes the strength of her lyrical skills. [...] Erica's skills are equally apparent in her cover versions, particularly her take on "The Drowning Man" by The Cure. Bare and minimal, this is one of the best interpretations of a song I've heard in ages, truly capturing the spirit of the piece and the desperation therein in a nightmare soundscape of desolation and torment that adds to the original. [...] Erica Mulkey is brilliant."

Unwoman's music is exceptionally hard to define or categorize. Her musical and literary influences include such diverse artists as Joan Baez, Joy Division, Black Tape for a Blue Girl, Crass, Anais Nin, Margaret Atwood, Anne Sexton, Tori Amos, Arnold Schoenberg, Skinny Puppy, Coil, and the Swans, to name a few. Her music has been compared to Diamanda Galas, Battery, Death In June, Meredith Monk, Download, Arvo Paert, Kate Bush, and others. She likes to describe herself as some combination of electro, noise, abstract art music, and pure girly music. You can read more about her at http://www.unmediated.net/un-bio.html and download songs at http://www.mp3.com/ericamulkey .

About Knowledge Scars:
Many of these are remixes or reworkings of songs previously recorded acoustically. All of the songs on this album are electronic or manipulated electronically. All are written by Unwoman except as noted, and performed by Unwoman, with d.compose (Bret Truchan, or the artist fromerly known as clone45a-6) on "Freedom From Religion," "In Gilead," and "Sentiment."

Album Credits: Produced and engineered by Erica Mulkey. Digitally mastered by Da5id Din at Corrosive Audio. Artwork/photos/manipulation by Kat Mulkey, Simon Sutherland, Emma Simcock, and Erica Mulkey. Layout by Erica Mulkey.