A Musical Evolution
Music can be powerful, music can be sensual, music can be simple or complicated, and sometimes music is all those and more. Over the past few years, Ché Aimee Dorval has produced albums that have folk, electronica and rock influences. Dorval has worked with many Canadian songwriters and musicians over the last decade or so including Devin Townsend on the 2014 album Casualties of Cool, and producer Bob Rock, who helped produce this project, until the COVID Pandemic made that difficult in nature. Once isolation hit, Dorval was a solo creative once again, making this album a very personal endeavor.
The album opens with a strong chorale backing up Dorval as she belts out the chorus. Quickly the beat comes in slow and steady, pulsing in order to prepare the listeners for the whole album. The first song is “The Crowned,” the title track. Speaking on the song herself, Dorval described the inspiration behind it: “we’re taught that there’s not enough of anything to go around, so you better fight to hold on to your piece. ‘The Crowned’ is about fighting to share the same space.” Throughout the song she recalls the ways we all scramble to get to the top, through the loopholes, weak spots and cheap tricks to claim what everyone believes belongs to themselves. As the music rises Dorval ascends from the ground to the crowned to share the spotlight and the power.
“Falling Under” describes the tragedy of watching a lover fall to drugs. Watching someone choose an addictive harmful substance over yourself. It is learning that no matter how hard you try, you are inevitably the second choice, or how Dorval puts it “first to lose.” It is a hopeless feeling and Dorval calls herself a fool while watching them fall under the spell of addiction. The follow-up song “Loveless” maintains the feeling of lost love. Someone who cannot reciprocate for whatever reason. It begins softly, with an ethereal echo across the music, wind chimes, an occasional strumming of the guitar and arpeggiating synthesizers as Dorval sings her aching heart. Dorval described it as a song about loving someone with nothing to give in return.
As the album continues into the second half, Dorval’s expression as a songwriter expands with each track, culminating in the final track, “What is Enough? (Desired or Adored).” The song is much brighter than what came before, with a groovy funk beat pulsating as the layers of sound overlap in a collage of psychedelic and electronic music. By the end of the piece the music whips around like the wind whirling past the microphone, only to go suddenly silent. A true end to a great album, that Dorval hopes to take the year by storm.
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