Heartworms

Heartworms Artistfacts

  • 1998
  • Heartworms is Jojo Orme, an English post-punk musician who grew up in Cheltenham. Her mother is Chinese-Danish and her father Pakistani-Afghan. She grew up with the music her mother listened to: Hot Chocolate, Fleetwood Mac, Michael Jackson, Prince, and Arabic and Egyptian music. Orme only discovered post-punk at university. She started listening to The Cure and Siouxsie and The Banshees and fell in love with the gothic culture.
  • Orme grew up in a difficult home environment and spent time in foster care. By the age of 16, she was living independently. She helped pay her rent by busking with a repertoire that included First Aid Kit, Jeff Buckley, The Beatles and Oasis. "It was hard, because I had to pay the rent, but also be a child the same time," she told Mojo magazine.
  • Orme learned to play guitar by strumming tunes like "Hey There Delilah." She started writing her first songs while living in a hostel.
  • The heartworm is a parasitic worm infecting dogs. But Orme's project isn't named after that. She took it from a 2017 album by The Shins.
  • Orme is passionate about aviation and World War II military history, and volunteers at the Royal Air Force Museum in Hendon, London, assisting with aircraft upkeep.

    Spitfires are a special interest; she has incorporated parts of a downed Spitfire into her art and merchandise, and dedicated the track "Warplane" to a Spitfire pilot.
  • Orme frequently performs as Heartworms in vintage military attire, including army jackets and berets, making military imagery a key part of her identity.
  • Aside from World War II aviation, Orme also enjoys sketching and poetry. She has cited poets like John Keats and John Cooper Clarke as inspirations.

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