Lucid Letters (real name Caryl Archer) is a singer, songwriter, and producer from Fleetwood, Lancashire, a small fishing town in the north of England.
She has been writing original songs for more than 20 years, and has been producing her own music for almost as long, using whatever software and equipment she could get her hands on.
Early Music Career
Caryl began taking music lessons at the age of 5 starting with learning how to play the keyboard, but her desire to begin writing and recording her own material pushed her to pick up the guitar also, and later bass.
At the age of 18 she recorded her first self-titled album, alone in the attic space of her family home using a broken headset microphone, her brother’s desktop computer, free open source multitrack recording software, and some drum loops scoured from various early audio sample websites. It was by no means a professional release, but she managed to write and record 11 original tracks that she burned to CDr and sold for £5 each to friends, family, and members of her local church.
She went on study music at degree level and came out of UCLan with a first class degree in Music Practice (BA).
The Birth of Lucid Letters
In 2018 her song If That Isn’t Love was played on BBC Introducing Lancashire. This was her first ever radio air play and it confirmed her choice of direction as a self-produced artist. However, by the close of that year and the release of her mini-album, Defiantly Delicate, she began to feel dissatisfied with her sound, image, and branding. This would be hear last release under her given name.
In 2019 she made the decision to release no music and instead worked on rebranding under a new artist name. Her first song as Lucid Letters, PORTMANTEAU, was released to the world in the form of a DIY music video on YouTube. This song would be a departure from her earlier work, featuring rap vocals for the first time on a solo release (she had previously dabbled with this kind of vocal style in her work as one half of electronic music duo, Glitter Punch back in 2012). From here she worked on and released two new EPs, PORTMANTEAU (June 2020) and We Are Now (August 2020), as well as collaborations with Lola Menthol, W0lfpak and Third Development.
Finding Her Stride
Towards the end of 2021 she was rewarded for her hard work when her song Delighted was played several times on the BBC Introducing Lancashire show, and she was interviewed by host, Sean McGinty. She was also invited to be interviewed live on the BBC Radio Lancashire lunch time show with Sharon Hartley.
Since then she been working on material for her first full length album as Lucid Letters, while continuing to collaborate with other independent musicians as featuring artist or producer.