Today Dorian releases his new album, ‘Futurosimpossibles’, a work that offers Dorian’s classic sound, adding a new handful of great songs to his repertoire. The album may not have existed: Dorian was about to break up as a result of the breakup between Marc Gili and Belly Hernández, two of its members. Marc, vocalist and composer of the band, reveals that the recording and promotion of ‘Ritual’ (2021) was nothing short of hell, although at the time no one knew it. Today, with the waters calm, Dorian delivers a healing album that revolves around the concept of “positive overcoming grief.” We met with Marc in a bar in Barcelona to talk about this idea. Furthermore, he explains why he does not rule out making a ‘Ritual 2’ even though he considers this album misunderstood by his followers, and elaborates his statements about the obsession of record companies with figures and the possible “Nirvanas of the future” that the world is experiencing. losing.
What do you propose in this album?
The proposal of ‘Impossible Futures’ is to put on the table the idea of positively overcoming grief. Reflecting on the history of pop, I realized that there are tons of breakup songs full of resentment, but not so many that are positive, that talk about breakups out of gratitude for the path taken together. There was a vein in the fact of treating the sentimental breakup not as a source of hatred and reproach, but of gratitude for what was shared. It is a positive message to send to fans and in public debate.
What songs on the album revolve around this concept?
‘Something Special’, which opens the album; ‘For you’ with Belly, which is a response to ‘Something special’; ‘Elegía’, one of the most important songs on the album, and ‘Solo el cielo’, which closes the album.
Perhaps in the current musical generation this idea is explored more than before; has me
Ariana Grande’s ‘thank you, next’ came to mind.
If “thank you” is not ironic, then yes. The songs on ‘Futures impossible’ are along those lines. We have to turn the page in pop from that romantic and aggressive feeling of what a breakup is.
The title is initially negative: ‘Impossible Futures’. Reminds me of Mark Fisher’s theory of canceled futures. This concept is very present right now in discourses about job insecurity, housing… Is the title pessimistic or the opposite?
On the contrary. Today’s society has inherited an idea of the word “crisis” that has nothing to do with that of the Greeks. In Greek “crisis” is a word that defines the opportunity to make new decisions and discriminate against what is no longer good for you. Over the centuries, literature and popular sayings have given this word a negative connotation: there has been talk of economic and personal crisis, market collapse and depression. The meaning of the word “crisis” has been distorted: for people it means quagmire, fall from grace, end of the road. For me it has always had a positive meaning, of opportunity, of moving to a place that you would not have considered otherwise. In the abstract, the title of ‘Impossible Futures’ may seem negative, but if you delve deeper into the album you realize that the message is the opposite: for every impossible future that is closed to you, life opens up many others.
Do you take the artistic direction as a return to your roots? Since you already experimented on the previous album, was it time to relax?
It is just as you describe it. We had a great time making ‘Ritual’: we brought in hip-hop, Pimp Flaco, Ana Mena, Lida Pimiento, Alizzz… It was a brutal mixer of talents that they taught us to work from other places. In addition, we explore other rhythms and other types of vocal production. We do not rule out making a ‘Ritual 2’ in the future. However, on this album we have relaxed and, from that place, the songs have emerged on their own with the classic Dorian sound. We had it almost assembled eight months ago and that’s why it comes out so soon. The album has emerged from what we know how to do.
What is the chronology of the album’s creation?
The total process from when we started it until it is published on October 25 is a year and a half. The album with the final songs has been ready, with advanced recordings, since last March or April.
‘Ritual’ was a very political album. Was it time to make an album dedicated to emotions?
At the time of ‘Ritual’ we were in the middle of the post-pandemic, the world had gone to hell and social problems abounded: it was time to make an album that talked about political corruption, gentrification, bisexuality, feminism… We had the collective concept , mutual help, very present. Since then, strong things have happened to me personally in my life on a personal level, I have had conflicts with several people. In addition to the breakup with Belly, the songs on ‘Futures Impossible’ tell about other sentimental experiences that I have gone through, and others like ‘What I Remember About You’ talk about deceased friends. For us, the time of the 2000s was dark because we lost several friends to drugs. ‘Impossible Futures’ is an album that arrives when the covid is already behind us. I wanted, in this new work, to make personal catharsis and bring the most intimate part of Dorian to the fore, without metaphors or concealments.
Your breakup with Belly almost took Dorian away. To get to a point where you decide to continue with the band, there have had to be many conversations involved.
We had a very bad year. While we were recording ‘Ritual’ we left the studio crying, each one of us separately, we had to interrupt the recording sessions because we couldn’t bear the pain that was in the studio. We couldn’t talk about that in the interviews because it was too recent and it would have been unbearable. The four of us went through that fire together and, once the worst months had passed, brotherly love began to emerge between Belly and I and also between Bart, the bassist, and Lisandro, the drummer. First Belly and I, and then the four of us, had many conversations, we did reflective therapy, and we realized, with cold hearts and tempered heads, that the best decision was to continue because Dorian is more important than our breakup. The situation was overcome through love and dialogue. ‘Impossible Futures’ is an album of resurrection.
Did the four of you agree to maintain the group?
We wanted to save the group because it makes us happy and when the four of us make music there is still magic between us.
«The best decision was to continue because Dorian is more important than our breakup. “The situation was overcome through love and dialogue.”
Is it better to write after you have healed than during the grieving process?
The songs have been written in mourning processes. ‘Elegía’ is one of the deepest songs I have written and it is, along with ‘Enanywhere else’, the only one I have composed crying out loud, with live tears. I dedicate it to a person who was also special in my life, who is not Belly, with whom I also had a very turbulent relationship. Right now I’m in a great personal moment, but a year ago while I was writing the songs, it was the opposite.
How do you handle having to talk about these songs now?
The other day on Radio3 Belly, I and Virginia Díaz started crying. It was one of the most special moments I have experienced on the radio. Sometimes in promotion the emotion overwhelms you, because, in addition, the songs from ‘Impossible Futures’ tell our story as we have lived it, without characters or metaphors. It’s been a nice media tour, but we are also experiencing moments on the surface. Everything is over, but from time to time the emotion comes.
‘El sur’ with Santiago Motorizado is track 2. Does the album need an external voice so soon? Is it because it’s single?
The decision to place ‘The South’ in second place does not respond to any commercial reason. The album follows a line of lively and relaxed songs, and that line has made the order of the songs what it is. The important thing is that the songs work together; If ‘El Sur’ had been meant to be the eighth track, as ‘Dual’ was on the previous album, it would have been. I especially like how ‘Something Special’, ‘The South’ and ‘What I Remember About You’ dialogue with each other, which are the three hits at the beginning of the album.
How does Daniella Spalla get on the album? She is not an emerging artist, she has an important career.
We had Daniella on the radar for a long time, she is an artist who has been playing since she was 8 years old. For ‘In slow motion’, which is a love song, we needed a sensual interpretation, we did not want a talent show voice (NdE: the chorus of ‘I Will Always Love You’ by Whitney sneaks into the conversation playing from the radio Houston), and Daniella Spalla was ideal for the song. In ‘In slow motion’ we were looking for the atmosphere of the man-woman duets on the albums of Serge Gainsbourg or Jane Birkin, or of those wonderful duet albums by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood.
«I wonder how many Nirvanas, Planets or Cupids we are missing because they do not know how to communicate on networks, they are not funny or they do not have engagement»
‘Dark Matter’ is a pretty obvious single.
It is the focus track on the day of the album’s release. And I love that a Dorian single includes a little tribute to Permanent Paralysis. ‘Dark matter’ refers to an astrophysical concept according to which 80-85% of the matter in the universe is not visible, but is known to be there due to the gravitational movement of the planets. We do not see this matter because it does not emit an electromagnetic gas. In the same way, the personality of a human being is full of dark matter, parts that are hidden from others. ‘Dark Matter’ talks about a person who, while making love, begs the other to explain his sexual fantasies openly. It is an invitation to open your heart to a trusted person, as long as there is a special contract between the two parties.
Do you think ‘Ritual’ is a misunderstood album?
It has been an album misunderstood by the fan base but it has left three essential Dorian songs: ‘Dual’ with Pimp Flaco, which has become an anthem for the band and has a fixed place in our repertoire; ‘Rare Energy’ with Alizzz and ‘Glass Ceilings’. It’s no small thing. But I insist: we had a blast making that album and if a ‘Ritual 2’ has to be made, it will be done.
A year ago you denounced on social networks the obsession of record companies with figures. You were wondering if we are missing the “Nirvana of the future.” Those Nirvana guys can’t get off tiktok?
Nowadays a label like Geffen would never have looked at those long-haired guys from Seattle to sign them. At that time someone had the eye to see, when Nirvana played in rooms for 300 people, that this group had something. I wonder how many Nirvanas, Planets or Cupids we are missing because they don’t know how to communicate on networks, they aren’t funny or they don’t have engagement, even though they have the most important thing: talent. I think we are living in a dramatic moment in the music industry because everything is quantifiable in views and followers, and labels are very lazy and go with what they think will work for them. A lot of talent is lost along the way and it seems like a drama to me. Where is the A&R figure that goes around the streets and in clubs looking for talent?
Well, The Last Dinner Party were discovered playing in bars. The idea that we are missing music shocks me a little considering the enormous amount of music that is available today.
That’s the second problem, an immeasurable amount of new music comes out every week, some of it very interesting, and no one has time to listen to it all. I think a lot about you, about the music journalists and the work you do; You really have to reach 30% or at most 40% of the music that is released each week. You don’t know if you’re being unfair or if you’re late for something… It would make me anxious, but I guess you guys are used to it.
It’s reaffirming when you highlight Chappell Roan’s album among the best of the year and the following year it hits the fan.
The function of music journalism is to filter or, as Santi Carrillo of Rockdelux says, to put “traffic lights in the jungle.” Now, given the tremendous amount of news that comes out every week, it is difficult to know where to go fishing.
