Dillon - Live at Haus Der Berliner Festspiele '2016

Tracks list

	Tracklist

01. Nowhere (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
02. From One to Six Hundred Kilometers (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
03. A Matter of Time (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
04. You Cover Me (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
05. You Are My Winter (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
06. Thirteen Thirtyfive (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
07. Your Flesh Against Mine (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
08. Tip Tapping (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
09. The Unknown (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
10. This Silence Kills (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
11. Don't Go (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
12. Lightning Sparked (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)
13. Abrupt Clarity (Live at Haus der Berliner Festspiele)


Born in Brazil, raised in Cologne and based in Berlin, Dominique Dillon de
Byington, aka Dillon, has always had a clear vision of her art. She already has
two albums under her belt, and she actually regards these as part of the same
work, since they tell a coherent story. This has always been apparent in her
live shows, which are carried by a magical interchange between the dark-melodic
songs of both albums. When the Berlin Foreign Affairs Festival asked her, in
2015, to develop a unique concert idea, she decided on a performance with a
six-piece women’s choir, which accompanied her and Tamer Fahri Özgönenc, her
collaborator and co-producer of her first two albums, in the live performance at
the Haus der Berliner Festspiele in July 2015. “I felt the need to work with
vocals and to create an additional layer that breathes in this space between the
electronic music and myself. I was very attracted to this idea, so Tamer and I
wrote and arranged the choir parts together,” Dillon explains. The choir
injects a new physical layer into her music, which is dominated by piano and
electronic sounds, and her own voice dances longingly in this space. The newly
released live recording of the concert reveals just how naturally this new
element slots into her dramatically minimal music. “When I started writing my
new album The Unknown I already knew it would be a continuation of This Silence
Kills in terms of both music and content. Now the two albums are being brought
together as a release, as well as in the live shows. For me, this album could be
called This Silence Kills The Unknown, the 28-year-old reveals. A film of the
concert at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele is being released alongside the live
album. And in 2017 this will be followed by a third studio album, this time
entirely separate from the works that came before, which Dillon herself
describes as an “album of love”.

First a roar steadily builds, then we hear the first piano tone of The Unknown -
along with the voice of Dominique Dillon de Byington. There it is again, the
unique timbre of the young Berlin-based artist who captivated the music press
and arts critics alike with her 2011 debut album on BPitch Control This Silence
Kills. With songs like “Tip Tapping”, “Thirteen Thirtyfive” and “You
Are My Winter” Dillon, originally from Brazil, left an impression on more than
just the indie scene. This Silence Kills was sweet and enticing enough to
establish itself as a pop record with singer-songwriter passion and experimental
enough to be taken seriously as an art project. It was described as chanson-pop,
sensuous electronic music featuring a voice comparable to Feist, Björk or
Joanna Newsom. There followed two sold-out tours and numerous festival gigs all
over the world – a life on the road. For Dillon this was completely unexplored
territory.

“The Unknown” is not only the first song she wrote for her eponymous second
album, it is how Dillon evokes that thing in life that has no name, no
description no boundaries. The Unknown can be anything: longing, love, loss,
transience, fear or desire. In keeping with the cover art for The Unknown the
twelve new tracks have a more direct, natural and candid feel: “The lyrics are
a lot more abstract and open, although they are just as personal and
introverted,” says Dillon about the songs she wrote between May and November
2013. Tracks like “In Silence” and “4ever” are sometimes pensive, they
exude this profound contemplation which must not always be characterised as
melancholy.

Whereas the majority of the debut album, with all its melodies and arrangements,
had been written before it was recorded, The Unknown came about more as a
conceptual work. Yet despite the new approach, it should still be understood as
a sequel to The Silence Kills. The foundation for album number two was laid
within three weeks at the same studio and even in the same room of Clouds Hill
Recordings in Hamburg. Once more she worked with Thies Mynther (Phantom/Ghost)
and Tamer Fahri Özgönenc (MIT): “I didn't see any sense in working with
someone else. Back then we began a dialogue that, in my eyes, was never
concluded.”

The result of these creative exchanges is a narrative gem that is eager to
retain some malaise around the edges. From the ballad-like lead single “A
Matter of Time” to the chamber music style “Forward” – Dillon's
impressive voice comes even more to the fore on The Unknown. The piano is not
only present on almost every song, it also conveys an incredible depth that
complements the playful naivety of the debut album. Although the bass drum makes
its presence felt as a silhouette on “Into The Deep” and the club-infused
“Nowhere” develops this electronic substructure further, The Unknown is more
puristic, more enigmatic and certainly not a dance album.

“I wrote poems. For me these are all poems I'm singing. The album is more like
a book of spoken words and pictures than an album in the classical sense,” the
25-year-old says about The Unknown. It can all be so simple: a piano, a voice
and a story – these elements alone suffice for Dillon to spread her magic. A
magic that can create drama as well as lament, that can confidently put personal
scars and doubting thoughts on display. The Unknown is a dense, compact work
from an extraordinary artist whose journey has only just begun. Or, as Antoine
De Saint-Exupery once said: Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing
more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. 

Related artists