Denmark’s Lydmor (‘Sound Mother’), aka Jenny Rossander, featured in the review of the Oslo By: Larm festival back in March, and in one of the streaming advisories we put out later that month. A unique artist who somehow manages to combine sophisticated and subtle balladry with strident electronic pop, I’ve declared previously that I believe she is only one step away from becoming a big name, possibly more so than her compatriot MØ and that step could well be taken with her forthcoming fourth album. She's also announced tour dates - hopefully live music will be happening by then.
One advantage that MØ has over Jenny is that she is more mainstream, and that helps in winning over the masses. She’s also predictable, where Lydmor isn’t, let alone ‘dangerous’ – another tag that has been attached to her. Some of Lydmor’s songs verge on the obscure and require a lot of digging to fathom out their meaning. Her most celebrated one to date, ‘Claudia’, concerns a mysterious Chinese acquaintance in Shanghai about whom she has vowed never to reveal her identity or the circumstances of their friendship.
‘Someone we used to love’ is more accessible but even then it is tinged with literary allusion, in this case to Oscar Wilde’s classic novel 'The Picture of Dorian Gray', which quotes: “There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love". Not unusual for Lydmor, who is something of a thinker in her own right and currently writing a philosophical treatise. However, the main line, “Nothing matters less to us (…is as grotesque to us…) than the feelings of someone we used to love” seems to turn Wilde’s statement on his head as the ex-lover becomes a figure of opprobrium rather than one to be pitied.
Perhaps the feelings are supposed to be mutually inclusive, as the song swings musically from simply cold to complexly hot. It is one that does try to combine both sides of her song writing persona, the introverted balladry and the more elaborate, extrovert electro-pop.
She says, “In ‘Someone We Used To Love’ I have taken a scenario where I imagine myself sitting with someone I’m still in love with and you can see this person reacting with this kind of cold disgust, and I’m just sitting there about to break and burst into tears. And you just know that you are completely pathetic”. Which reverses it yet again, with the plaintiff (her) being both the one to be pitied and to be scorned. There’s so much going on her head it’s hard to keep up.
She adds, "I wanted to make a real fragile banger! It should have a proper hero chorus. The song has taken a long time to produce because I have been such a perfectionist about it. I tried about 50 different versions of the song until I found the right one.”
Now that bit I find easy to assimilate myself to. I watched her online during one of her recent lockdown fan sessions, putting together a song from scratch using Ableton and the proprietary drum beat product, Pulse. She certainly is a perfectionist and will work around dozens of different interpretations. It’s a skill like DJ-ing with multiple vinyl record turntables that I hadn’t previously understood. So, perfectionism, together with unpredictability and danger. Quite a concoction.
She has other creative outlets, too. This year Lydmor was involved in cross-aesthetic collaborations with the dance company Corpus at the Danish Royal Theatre and at this year's Roskilde Festival (both postponed). She has also created the soundscape for a new stage production of William Shakespeare's ' Twelfth Night’, which is scheduled to run at Norway’s “Oslo Ny Teater” this autumn.
I don’t think ‘Someone we used to love’ is her best song, but there are plenty of those already. What it is, is more mainstream and chart-ready, mainly on account of the catchy ‘hero chorus’, if that’s a direction she wants to take. I’m not convinced she does, though.
'Someone we used to love' is released today through HFN Music. We also mentioned tour dates, which have just been announced.
07.10.20 Belgium, Kortrijk, De Kreun (supporting Compact Disc Dummies)
11.10.20 Belgium, Sint-Niklaas, De Casino (supporting Compact Disc Dummies)
15.10.20 Belgium, Gent, Het Dopot (supporting Compact Disc Dummies)
21.10.20 Denmark, Randers, Turbinen
06.11.20 Norway, Oslo, Rockefeller (supporting Bendik)
25.02.21 Denmark, Aalborg, Studenterhuset
26.02.21 Denmark, Aarhus, Train
27.02.21 Denmark, Odense, Posten
As always please check her Facebook page for confirmation and ticket details, and for any changes. She's also on Instagram.