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The first thought I had when listening to Orion Rigel Dommisse's album, "What I Want from You is Sweet", is that it couldn't be a debut recording. The sound is too full, too mature. True Dommisse is not an inexperienced musician and the album comes armed with talented folks from other bands (Fern Knight, Espers), but this is still Orion's first real outing. And it's wonderful.
Dommisse is primarily a cellist (though she tackles at least five insturments on this CD) but it's her voice that really struck me. It's like a vocal stiletto, both piercing and fragile, almost brittle. It jabs quickly into your brain and pops out again, leaving an impression of lyrics as opposed to a concrete rendering of the words. There's no lyric sheet provided so with each successive listen you garner more bits and pieces as they get left pinned in your skull.
This recording has a lot of death. Five songs mention it in the title ("Fake Yer Death", "A Facelss Death", "Suicide Kiss (Because Dead)", "Drink Yourself (to Death)") and the subject crops up several other times (grave robbing on "Simon Sent for Me"). But there's a sprightliness here that keeps things from seeming dour. Orion's like a cello-pop wicked pixie.
The selection of instruments (cello, violin, harp, piano) gives these songs both a pastoral and chamber music feel. Taken together they could be a soundtrack to one of the original Brother's Grimm tales. Yes it may seem charming and child-like at first then you realize how dark it is, how much blood there is. There is a weight to the voice of the once-homeless Dommisse. She can't be dismissed as being merely playful.
Orion makes use of many of the elements that are associated with contemporary cello based artists: the neo-madrigal pizzicato plucking, the raw urgency followed by languid soothing, the squirmy energy reminiscent of a young player's first recital, the clever verse. But she eschews the nod and wink wit that other cello slingers lace through their recordings. This album is funny strange, not funny ha-ha.
There are goats, a girl and a trailer home on the cover of "What I Want from You is Sweet", a melancholy yet mundane landscape. But after listening to this recording and going Grimm with Dommisse you can see how that little girl transforms her world into something magical and inviting.
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Orion Rigel Dommisse:
http://www.myspace.com/OrionRigelDommisse
Language of Stone:
http://www.languageofstone.com/
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