Light Asylum

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Light Asylum is an electronic music project led by Shannon Funchess. She grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and later based herself in Portland, Oregon. The music blends post-punk, synthpop and darkwave, with strong 1980s influences. The Guardian compared the project to Nine Inch Nails and Depeche Mode.

Funchess started Light Asylum in 2007 and invited Bruno Coviello to join as a keyboard player after hearing him play guitar. They released the four-track EP In Tension in 2010, which Mexican Summer reissued in 2011. Their self-titled debut album arrived in May 2012 and received positive reviews from Pitchfork, Fact, Mixmag, NME, XLR8R and The Quietus. Coviello left the project later in 2012 to pursue other things.

Funchess has sung with TV on the Radio, !!! and Telepathe, and she collaborated with The Knife on "Stay Out Here" from Shaking the Habitual (2013). Light Asylum’s track "Dark Allies" was used as the theme song for the 2019 podcast The Ballad of Billy Balls. In 2022, Light Asylum performed at the Cold Waves festival in Chicago, playing two new songs, and Funchess promised new music soon.