The Ouroboros is an ancient symbol that is lost in the mists of time and that was already found in ancient Egypt and China. It takes the form of a snake biting its tail (this is the meaning of the word in Greek). An esoteric figure of a cyclical conception of the world and of life, it expresses at the same time the ideas of movement, of continuity, and of Eternal Return.
This figure spontaneously imposed itself on Usher and Chelsea to name this album of covers, each of them representing a stage of the constitutive journey of their identity. This is not a tribute or contract album, but rather an ancient desire that has finally come to fruition, a sort of puzzle mixing different spaces and temporalities that they have tried to reinvest. Norma Loy has always practiced the exercise of the cover, the most significant example being David Lynch’s “Heaven”, with multiple and very different versions, each one indicating in its own way the vision of the group in its evolution.
“OUROBOROS” reflects the diversity of Norma Loy’s influences, focusing on the early 80′s. “Night to Forget” by Factrix, for example, was already cited by the band as a reference in the first article published in New Wave in 1981. It gathers indifferently famous artists (Bowie, Cohen, Velvet Underground) and more underground formations (Tuxedomoon, Suicide, Coil, TG, etc.) in reappropriated versions. We also find a new reinterpretation of Romance, first track recorded by the band but dating back to the COIT BERGMAN (Usher/Chelsea) duo of 1978, and already appearing on other Norma Loy productions. This is a perfect example of the Ouroboros or Eternal Return, where the return to the point of origin integrates the path travelled. A careful listening reveals moreover within the covers, quotations of other titles of Bowie, Suicide, the Doors, Joy Division or Norma Loy themselves.
