Dania: Her Album Listless – Personal Experimental Pop Inspired by Hospital Night Shifts
In addition to producing evocative digital pieces, this Baghdad-born, Barcelona-based artist Dania also works night shifts as an critical care physician. Those nocturnal shifts serve as the inspiration behind her latest release Listless: each of the 7 tracks were composed and recorded after midnight, and the cover features the slender blossom of the Trichosanthes cucumerina, a plant that only blooms at night. But, there is little trace of the turmoil of her overnight routine in this music: instead, the album embodies a quiet peacefulness that is at times euphoric, occasionally eerie.
Meeting at a point amid trip-hop, ethereal rock and atmospheric, with a touch of pop, the textured songs glide hypnotically, driven by waves of synths and, as a new element, percussion. An innovative feature to Dania’s usual arrangement, these drums add a soft downtempo kick to a number of the tracks. Its shuffling, hazy rhythm in the track Personal Assistant evokes the late-90s bands one group and another, while the song Car Crash Premonition is the nearest things get to intense. Composed after an unnerving taxi journey to her studio late one evening, it is both contemplative and woozy, ideal for a movie scene.
Other songs, including I Know That and Write My Name, are more reminiscent of the artist's previous output: minimalist and formless. The final song, A Hunger, possesses a subaquatic feel, with gurgling and beeping electronics that resemble medical equipment, blended with altered answerphone-style singing.
Dania’s soft, whispering voice is present through nearly the whole of the record. Its words are almost imperceptible as her vocals are floating, looped, layered, sometimes almost absent entirely. Having been raised in a household where singing was discouraged, she’s said it’s an activity she has always felt private about. Yet it’s additionally an brilliant choice, enhancing the surreal atmosphere on this beautiful, intimate album.
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