Daughter Darling

Country of origin:

U.S.

Type of music generally:

Ethereal ectronica/altpop

Status:

Only release, Sweet Shadows (2003)

See also:

Wikipedia's entry on Daughter Darling

Comparisons:

The overall sound is somewhat like Halou, Kym Brown, Two Loons for Tea, Lamb, or Portishead; Nathalie Walker's vocals remind me on various occasions of Dido, Sarah McLachlan, Kristy Thirsk of Rose Chronicles, Lynn Canfield in her Area and The Moon Seven Times era work, Katell Keineg

Covers/own material:

Own, occasional covers

General comments:

Daughter Darling's delightful Sweet Shadows is my favourite disc of the year so far. It's totally wonderful. It has a variety of moods and flavours, but is basically moody trip hop pop, full of gorgeous, evocative vocals, interesting sounds and melodic lines. It's haunting. Kind of a combination of Halou and Two Loons for Tea. Electronic pop along the lines of oh, I don't know, Dido? Not as aching as Portishead, but like a more musically interesting Dido. (Neile)

Her voice reminds me of Sarah McLachlan and Kristy Thirsk of Rose Chronicles, but very suitable to the music. Gives it a very ecto tinge to the trip hop sound. A sweeter version of Portishead mixed with Lamb. Very etheral trip hop. (jmgurley@drizzle.com)

Recommended first album:

Sweet Shadows is their debut

Recordings:

Sweet Shadows (2003)

Sweet Shadows

Release info:

2003—Plain Jane Records

Availability:

See CD Baby's Daughter Darling page

Ecto priority:

Highly, highly recommended

Group members:

Nathalie Walker—vocals, guitar, keyboard
Travis Fogelman—programming
Stephen Fogelman—programming

Guest artists:

JD Kinder—piano on 2 tracks
DJ Infiniti—scratches on 7 tracks
Daniel DeJesus—cello on 4 tracks, violin on 1 track
Jim Cameron—additional vocals on 1 track
Bob Stokes—bass on 1 tack
Jason Baron-guitars on 1 track

Produced by:

Travis Fogelman, Nathalie Walker, Stephen Fogelman

Comments:

This is a haunting album of dark-shaded songs made lovely by Nathalie Walker's gorgeous vocals—the album title is particularly apt. The first song, "broken bridge" introduces the sound of the album: lovely acoustic instruments (in this case, piano), gorgeous painful vocals, and touches of fascinating beats, a beautifully constructed song with enough hooks to make it catchy and enough unusual musicial twists to make it compelling. "Shattered" is just as lovely, haunting, and mournful to show that "broken bridge" isn't a one-off. With "let me speak" percussion pushes a change to more gut-level than haunting emotional tones. The following track, "Absconding", is an almost painfully yearning song. "Mermaid" follows, mixing whalesong and vocals with deep percussion beats, and a short spoken piece leads directly into the driving "Sad & lonely". The next track, "Things untold", is a quieter haunting piece which is followed by the darkest tunes one the album, "voodoo games". "You won't see me" is somewhat lighter in tone especially in its instrumentation, while "sweet shadows" seems the defining and moodiest tune on the album. The disc ends with a surprisingly fresh cover—and listenable for those of you who thought you could never bear to hear that song again—of 70s band Kansas's "dust in the wind".
     Overall a wonderful album, and an extremely impressive debut. Damn, I love this. (Neile)