Two years after her Goya nomination in the category of Best Original Song for the film ‘Chinas’, by Arantxa Echevarría, the Catalan singer and songwriter Marina Herlop returns with a new album. Titled ‘Dja Dja’, the work is described as a “giant sudoku made up of small sudokus”, according to the official press release. The text also highlights that, for the first time, Herlop has incorporated brass instruments into his sound palette, “orchestrated from intuition.”
Herlop, who became known with ‘Pripyat’ (2022), attracting the attention of international media such as Pitchfork and artists such as Björk, now presents, according to the official release, his most ambitious work to date. The artist has been sharing the album’s recording process through her stories.
The album, which will be released on October 9, is presented with ‘Jaque’, Marina Herlop’s umpteenth sound cathedral: a composition made up of countless elements that fit together like the pieces of a puzzle. The song insists on his unmistakable style and, at the same time, sounds like nothing he had done before.
‘Check’ is a trip. The introduction of winds and piano gives way to Marina’s characteristic choirs and her vocal improvisations on invented lyrics – it is worth remembering that Herlop composes in a language created by herself -, creating with her voice a sound labyrinth that little by little is intertwined with more voices, more percussions, more vocal melodies and more winds.
The song, effectively a sudoku made up of smaller sudokus, progresses until it becomes that “hero’s journey” that the press release also talks about and that has served as Herlop’s inspiration. In other words, the journey leads to a pure epic ending.
