Thursday 8 March 2012

familjen with ninsun poli - bethnahrin

this was discovered while pressing in the name "ninsun poli" on spotify. she's a singer (of assyrian descent) that has been performing both under her own name and in collaborations with other acts including familjen. she's a very talented singer and i loved her debut ep titled "for real" and was in love with "feber" which she made with familjen.

this song is from familjens second album (named "mänskligheten) and featured the same stylings as the previous record, bumping house and acidlines mixed with pop sensibilities in a clever way. i should note that poli sings on two other songs ("mitt bästa" & "vinter i april") on the record and they work in the same school as "kom säger dom" and "feber". however this song differentiated itself quite a lot from those and takes the drums off altogether and is a mood piece.

it's moody in the beginning and then a haunting vocal comes out of nowhere and grabs a hold of you on an instant. poli sings in her native suryoyo and talks about the motherland known as beth nahrin that's the assyrian word form mesopotamia. the vocal is something between an syrian-orthodox choir recital and a mawal and it's really powerful.

i think it can compared to a famous piece by ofra haza called "love song" where she does her version of song of songs 8:6-7 (more known as "love is as strong as death") in hebrew. i don't think they are on the same par but they are close and equally powerful pieces of music.

i should note that ofra haza's song is full a capella (and it should be noted that it's been sampled and remixed left and right over the years) and familjen adds dark pads and long sweeping synth sounds to back up and enhance the song.

while this song is no clear hit like most of familjens other tracks it really works as the ending track of the album and brings it all down to a great closing. much like "dansa" in timbuktu's "sagolandet" lp.

buy here (7digital)

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