The Artist Dania: Listless – Intimate Experimental Pop Inspired by Medical Late-Night Work
In addition to crafting atmospheric electronic compositions, this Iraqi-born, Barcelona-based musician Dania also works night shifts as an emergency physician. These nocturnal shifts serve as the inspiration for her latest album Listless: all seven songs were written and recorded after midnight, and the cover features the spindly flower of the Trichosanthes cucumerina, a species that only blooms at night. But, you won't find much of the turmoil of her late-night schedule here: rather, the record exudes a serene peacefulness that is at times euphoric, occasionally uncanny.
Converging somewhere amid trip-hop, shoegaze and ambient, and a hint of pop, the layered tracks slink along dreamily, propelled by washes of synths and, as a new element, percussion. A new addition to the artist's usual setup, they add a gentle downtempo rhythm to a number of the tracks. Its shuffling, murky beat in Personal Assistant evokes the late-90s groups one group and another, while the song Car Crash Premonition is the closest things get to urgent. Composed after an disturbing cab ride to her workspace late one evening, it is both contemplative and dizzying, ideal for a movie scene.
Other songs, including I Know That and Write My Name, are closer in style of Dania’s past work: stripped back and amorphous. The final song, named A Hunger, possesses a subaquatic quality, with gurgling and pinging sounds that resemble hospital monitors, blended with altered answerphone-style vocals.
The artist's gentle, murmuring voice is featured through almost the entirety of the album. Its words are hardly discernible as her vocals are floating, repeated, stacked, at points almost absent entirely. Having been raised in a household where singing was discouraged, she has stated that it is something she has consistently considered personal. Yet it’s also an inspired choice, augmenting the dream-like haze on the gorgeous, intimate album.
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