Not being one to read press releases, I paid my usual scant attention to the brief words supplied with “Adverts, Love Songs &’ Official Soundtracks” by DIMITRI but I did notice an odd phrase that caught my attention – “contains 0 songs that are directly about cars”. What could that mean in musical, metaphysical or marketing terms?
Well, after listening to this album, I doubt that it means anything that a mere mortal might understand. However, it might provide a hint that madness is not far away when you enter the midnight wonderland of DIMITRI. All those analogue synth sounds that you have grown to love and sequence are present and correct yet there is more here than retro revivalism. DIMITRI, you see, is also nothing less than a soothsayer of style. Not just the style of the past either but the style of all time and his words could have come from the mouth of Colonel Kurtz - if Colonel Kurtz possessed any dress sense, of course – as they transcend the boundaries of brand in search of a greater, almost spiritual, truth.
I have no idea who DIMITRI is but he must be a literate legend of lounge, a man of mystery and a poet of the night people all in one and, while “Adverts, Love Songs &’ Official Soundtracks” might be just a cassette compendium of his genius, be grateful for who among us could actually handle the concentrated glory of DIMITRI in the flesh?
Best song? The truly bizarre “The Child Was Me”.
The verdict? DIMITRI is an original. Worship him (and buy the cassette).
Available from Bandcamp.