Harry's Music Blog

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Fav track: 100 Horses or Cobra. fuck I can't choose

Beirut-born singer Yasmin Hamdan returns with her first solo album since 2017, exploring a new and bold sonic direction, combining Lebanese and Arabic folk melodies and instruments with electronica and 90s trip-hop that would sound right at home on Portishead’s Third or Massive Attack’s Mezzanine. The album explores questions of identity, culture, belonging, and memory, reflecting on personal experiences of living in France while maintaining deep roots in Lebanon, an interplay between present safety and distant trauma.

‘Shamaali’, for example, is an Ottoman-era Palestinian poetry piece and melody that combines masterfully with Paris-based producer Marc Collin’s droney and electronic Stromae-like beat and synths, making a truly unique sonic experience.

This very noteworthy formula is seen all over this record; production on tracks like ‘Vows’ creates a expertly crafted trip-hop beat, that meets succinctly with Hamdan’s Lebanese vocal melody and what sounds to be a snake charmer's flute in the later half of the track.

And tracks like ‘I remember I forget’, which brings you through funky Sub-Saharan Desert blues guitar riffs, dancable Shamstep-like synths and vocals, and a groovey maraca create an eerie juxtaposition between it and the lyrics: “I remember, I forget, killing is normal, lying is normal.” Calling out on-going geopolitical events. A Reflection on the backwardness of Western complicity and in some cases active participation in the Palestinian genocide and the constant threat of Israeli attack back home in Beirut, parred with the inability to help as states like the United States and Hamdan's home country of France look on in deafening silence.

In all, I would highly recommend this one, if not for its uniqueness, then for its expertly done and beautifully sounding production.

Fav track: Hon