If you were to have stepped foot in Elephant and Castle’s Corsica Studios in the early part of 2024, you’ll have been greeted with a curious sight: a side room tucked away from the intoxicating noise where a funeral for a human-sized, furry yeti was taking place. Fast-forward six months and take a hop across the river to London’s ICA, where more strange scenes were afoot; a giant spectral moth hovering over a stage decorated with papier-mâché bones. In other venues, at other times, there have been demon dogs with mechanical jaws and oversized, haunted faces peering quietly over a crowd that has steadily escalated as word of this unusual band has spread. This is the world of Mary In The Junkyard: south London’s most creative young trio, and a group increasingly charming the art world as much as the music one.
Formed of vocalist, guitarist and chief prop-maker Clari Freeman-Taylor, bassist and cellist Saya Barbaglia, and drummer David Addison, Mary In The Junkyard make the kind of fantastical, textural music that builds worlds. More than that, however, the trio have spent time translating these stories into something tangible around them. 'Having tactile, handmade art – things people can really touch and connect with – feels important to a show experience when quite a lot of things right now are trying to be really cool and clean and minimalist,' says Barbaglia.
'It expands the scope of the music,' Addison agrees. 'Having the visual side deepens the experience.'
It’s an innately exploratory mindset that, recently, has led the band into a high-profile new circle. Heading out to New York to work on their forthcoming debut album, Role Model Hermit, to be released in July, the group found themselves talking to film producer and virtual reality artist Todd Eckert after he attended one of their gigs. With the band having nowhere to stay in the city, Eckert – a fan – offered them a place to crash and a studio space to work from in the home he shares with his partner, Marina Abramović. Later in the week, the trio played a private gig for Eckert, Abramović and a group of their peers. 'Marina said I should get a Britney mic because the microphone was too obstructive,' notes Freeman-Taylor of the unlikely evening.
‘Marina was like, “Oh, there are three of you, what do we do in the divorce? I’m a communist, I can’t share, so I’m going to have to cut you in half”’
Cari Freeman-Taylor, Mary In The Junkyard
Though Abramović’s name still brings up a certain amount of reverie ('She’s amazing, I love her work,' the vocalist smiles), the group have now become firm friends with the legendary performance artist. 'Todd and Marina are like our New York parents,' Barbaglia says. Freeman-Taylor laughs as she remembers one interaction: ‘Marina was like, “Oh, there are three of you, what do we do in the divorce? I’m a communist, I can’t share, so I’m going to have to cut you in half.”’
You can understand why Abramović and Eckert might have taken a shine to Mary In The Junkyard. In a musical landscape dominated by conversations around nepotism and privilege, the trio are resolutely DIY-spirited and have crafted their entire vision themselves. 'It’s an amazing feeling to have something in your head and to be able to make it exist an actual thing that’s real,’ says Freeman-Taylor.
None of the band are trained artists but they’ve turned their inner circle into its own makeshift art school. The three band members all live within a couple of doors of each other, and their communal rooftop has become a hub for creativity and play. Here, you’ll find the trio and their friends building creatures for their shows, and testing out all manner of new hobbies – pole dancing, martial arts, breakdancing – that often end up in the overall Mary mix too. 'We’re very curious people and that comes into the visual world as well,' says Barbaglia. Freeman-Taylor nods: 'We’re very playful together, and that comes into our songwriting but also the things on stage with us.'
In the video for their crepuscular single ‘New Muscles’, this spirit is out in full force. The plot resurrects the ‘beetroot heart’ of the aforementioned yeti, turning it into a symbol of strength and fortitude that Addison digs up from the ground as his two bandmates grapple in a convincing bout of boxing. It’s unsettling and strangely beautiful; a world away from the classic trope of skinny jean-clad indie bands standing against a wall, looking aloof. But that’s a large part of the point. 'Rock music and indie music are in a bit of a weird period. The first part of the 2020s had its own sound and its own vibe, whereas now, there’s lots of room to play around with the idea of what a rock band should be,' suggests Addison.
Freeman-Taylor is the dreamy, imaginative lynchpin of the Junkyard’s hyper-creative universe. When pressed, she can summon up a few core influences to her artistry – Paul Klee’s hand puppets, and the 'magical landscapes' of Leonora Carrington’s paintings. But the vocalist mainly talks about 'instinct' and how the characters and visuals of Mary In The Junkyard are more like a bridge between fantasy and reality.
For their previous releases, she’s painted all the artwork – a wild, wind-whipped woman for 2025 single ‘Midori’ or a swirling vortex of moths and lanterns for the year before’s ‘Ghost’. For the Role Model Hermit album, however, the photograph was a collaboration with creative director Daisy Ayscough and features the singer in full prosthetics, decked out to embody the character in the song ‘Mouse’. 'I was remembering a past life that I had when I was a fisherman and my best friend was a mouse. The song’s about meeting the mouse now when we’ve both been reincarnated into people,' she says. 'I think about past lives all the time. Imagination just comes from instinct; everything that I imagine is more just my instinct of what I know is true.'
‘We’re very playful together, and that comes into our songwriting but also the things on stage with us’
Clari Freeman-Taylor, Mary In The Junkyard
It’s a statement that seems core to Mary In The Junkyard’s outlook as a whole. There’s a remarkable lack of cynicism that comes through in everything they say, from the gut feeling that ‘things would figure themselves out’ in New York (they did) to the way they talk about clothes and dressing for the stage as a 'free, non-judgemental space'. 'You’re there playing music, you’re not there walking a fashion show, so whatever you wear – whether it’s weird or cool – it doesn’t really matter because it can all just feed into the performance,' says Barbaglia. 'You can wear literally anything.' One time, she remembers with a laugh, buying moon costumes to wear for their show in El Paso. 'I had white-face and I looked more like an anaemic banana,' she deadpans.
In a world of TikTok trends and doing anything for the dopamine hit of Instagram acceptance, seeing a young band cast that external gaze aside and follow the path of fun feels like rebellion. When they talk about the way that the world of Mary In The Junkyard could expand, there’s a limitlessness to their imagination that seems only tempered by cash flow (and pesky health and safety rules). 'I’m excited about projections and using light. And, because we’re so interested in movement-based art, that’ll probably be something that’ll find its way into our shows,' Freeman-Taylor enthuses before addressing Barbaglia: 'We could have ropes that lift us into the air. Imagine if we both had Britney mics and we were both hanging from the ceiling?!' With Mary In The Junkyard, then, the sky truly is the limit.