UCHE YARA – Bodyscanner
Today, Austrian-born, Berlin-based multi-instrumentalist UCHE YARA returns with the announcement of her debut album BODYSCANNER, out September 25 via goldendays FM.
Alongside the announcement, she shares the album’s title track, the song that sparked the entire project and introduced an entirely new artistic language. Accompanying the track is an electric music video directed by UCHE herself.
Two years ago, a spontaneous session in UCHE’s Berlin studio set everything in motion. Working alongside longtime friend and collaborator Alex The Flipper, fragments of demos, live drumming and samples collided to create the hypnotic “BODYSCANNER” loop in just twenty minutes.
Built around hypnotic repetition, electronic textures and a commanding vocal performance that evokes the cool authority of Grace Jones, “BODYSCANNER” exists in a space between surrender and control. Suspended somewhere between airport terminal and nightclub, the track invites listeners to willingly lose themselves inside its strange and seductive atmosphere.
“What I love most about the track is its ambiguity –– are you at an airport or in a club? The song guides you through spaces and pulls you into an entirely new world.” says UCHE. “It was also the first time I stepped into this kind of character and chose not to sing in the main vocal. There’s a constant tension between surrender and control, between being controlled and taking control yourself. The track thrives on that duality: dominant and threatening, yet warm and deeply groovy at the same time. It’s something you can ride, and willingly give yourself over to.”
BODYSCANNER is an album that began in the body long before it reached the mind.
Over the following two years since that initial studio session, UCHE followed instinct rather than analysis, creating a record that explores embodiment, self-perception, connection and belonging. Written and produced by UCHE herself, the album emerged from a process she describes simply: “I’ve written the album with my body, and now my mind knows it.” That idea became the foundation of the project. Through the making of BODYSCANNER, dance became less about performance and more about presence; less about being watched and more about listening to what the body was already trying to say.
Pulsing with electronic textures, hypnotic repetition and a newfound confidence in space and rhythm, BODYSCANNER feels like a club record viewed from an unexpected angle. For years, UCHE found herself disconnected from much of the club culture surrounding her in Berlin. The pressure to perform, consume, conform or escape often felt at odds with what she was searching for. Yet through conversations with friends and experiences within more diverse and queer spaces, she began to imagine something different. “My approach moves away from the digital, hyper-stimulated, show-off realm that chases one dopamine hit and one drop after another at high speed,” UCHE shares. “I’m much more interested in connection rather than consumption.”
Across the album, UCHE explores everything from collective numbness and the pressure to endlessly self-optimize, to the liberating possibilities of shared joy. If previous releases showcased the breadth of her imagination, BODYSCANNER represents something different: the moment those instincts crystallized into a singular vision.
#uy.sweetheart