Today, Blood Lotus, the project of Hannah Wu, releases her debut album Middle Of The Night, out independently via CONTENT.NET.AU (Teether, BAYANG tha Bushranger). LISTEN ON SPOTIFY HERE + APPLE MUSIC HERE + MORE HERE.

With musical nods to FKA twigs, Kelela, and Arca, Middle Of The Night is a borderless record that fuses experimental electronic music, alternative R&B, avant-garde pop, and traditional Chinese instrumentation. Pushing beyond conventional genre parameters, the record is shaped by Blood Lotus’ interest in the concept of Asia-futurism: a creative framework that reinterprets ancient musical histories through contemporary electronic music. Drawing on her studies of traditional pentatonic scales from musical traditions across Asia (particularly within Sino-linguistic regions) alongside her practice as a guzheng player and intimate vocal delivery, Blood Lotus reimagines these musical systems by translating them into a whole new sonic world.

A breakup album at heart, Middle Of The Night traces the aftermath of a relationship ending and documents the process of rebuilding identity. Examining the transformative process of loss, memory, and its lasting effects, the album is a force of self-reconstruction. “I always think about the etymology of the word, emotion; how e-motions are a form of (e)nergy in motion,” Blood Lotus shares. “The word ’emotion’ is derived from the Latin word, emovere, which means ‘to move, move out, and move through’. Perhaps this describes the album perfectly, as it is fundamentally about vulnerability and e(motion) in this way; how our feelings are always in a constantly shifting state of flux, flow, movement, and change.”

Produced in collaboration with Kuya Neil and Voidhood, Middle Of The Night was written between Melbourne and Taipei, emerging almost entirely in the middle of the night through the process of voice notes containing lyrics and melodies assembled in bedrooms, hotel rooms, recording studios, on long walks, during late-night phone calls, and on public transport throughout several summers spent between the two cities. Bound by her strengths as a creative, the album layers intimate vocals, synths, strings, intricate rhythms, and textural production together to detail the complexity of transition and human emotion.

WATCH: Middle Of The Night

Across Middle Of The Night, Blood Lotus expands on the sonic palette introduced by singles ‘Nightfall‘ featuring Heart Armour and ‘I Assume‘ (premiered by Mixmag Australia), while building on the previously released ‘Motions‘, ‘Dragonfruit‘ and ‘Corpus‘ with four brand new tracks that underscore her ability to spread wide as an artist. Alongside the album’s release, she also shares an accompanying video for the title track, directed by David Tse and shot in Taiwan. It marks another throughline of the project that involves a series of videos to showcase the transportative nature of the album, guided by the landscape of Taipei.

With her debut album Middle Of The Night, Blood Lotus captures the complexity of grief and desire with the experience of loss and letting go all at once. With a live reputation that includes performances at Phoenix Central Park, Dark Mofo, Strawberry Fields Festival, and more, she will be celebrating the album with a launch at Mission to Seafarers Victoria on Sat Sep 26 before heading on an east coast CONTENT.NET.AU tour this October.