  |
 |
| by John Mundazio with additional writing by Bridget Petrella |
|
Although she
completely disappeared from view, Dido took very little time off
from music. However, rather than immediately starting to write new
songs, she threw herself into playing, whether it be her music or others
people's. "I wanted to take some time to become a much better musician,"
she explains. "For the first two albums, any playing I'd done had been
used purely for songwriting, which is very different from just playing
for fun, like I had done as a child. So I just spent a lot of time just
picking up instruments for playing's sake again. I loved it." |
|
John Mundazio works for one of the numerous publishing companies in the New York metropolitan area which is currently planning a bold takeover of the parallel universe in which he occasionally resides with several of his imaginary friends and at least two of the strange voices in his head. But he is confident it is not the one you're thinking of at this very moment. Convinced that Susie-Q's are indeed a food group and that no REAL list of fun toys is ever really complete without mentioning "Log"— that quintessential Ren and Stimpy Show toy that boldly dared to go where no toy ever could... "The Dazed-Meister" refuses to partake in anything which requires him to dress up like Wonder Woman or sing the theme song from The Partridge Family in its entirety. He also opposes floatation devices of any sort. |
|
|
|
|
Safe
Trip Home is the very warm, moving and phenomenally musical
third album from Dido, the London born singer/songwriter/prodigy with
the cracked crystal voice. The first CD offering, you might remember,
was No Angel, a record made when Dido was only a part-time back-up
singer with a tiny budget and no label. When that record's heartfelt
snap-shots of life were released in 1999, no one, the least of all Dido,
expected the album to eventually become the biggest seller of 2001. The
follow-up, 2003's Life For Rent, also burrowed its way into millions of
hearts, hitting number one in 26 countries... lighting up the airwaves
in many more. By the time Dido had toured that record around the world,
she was ready for a bit of a breather. "It was a whirlwind," she says.
"When I got back from touring early in 2005, it took a while just to
take in what had happened. I was so unprepared for it. As far as I was
concerned I was making this little underground record for me to listen
to and then, suddenly, eight years later I was getting off this
incredible speeding train. I'd had an amazing time, but I guess I needed
to take a step back, reconnect with normal life and bring the focus 100
percent back to music." 
"Jon
persuaded me to go out to LA and do some writing," says Dido. "We
had this brilliant few weeks working together. It felt like I could try
anything I wanted, with whatever instrument I wanted. That was really
the start of the whole album." Songs like the sensuous Never Want To Say
It's Love and the string-soaked Let's Do The Things We Normally Do were
two of several tracks to emerge from those productive sessions. Buoyed
by that initial progress, Dido decided to relocate to LA for a while to
continue working with Brion on the album. It was a city ripe with
opportunities, whether that be the potential for long drives into the
desert listening to music, the amazing vocal sound in Brion's broom
cupboard, the chance to get Citizen Cope in to sing on the gorgeous
Burnin Love, or the fact that Dido's favorite drummer Mick Fleetwood was
on hand to play on Grafton Street, the plaintive album highlight she'd
written with another inspiration, Brian Eno. "I wasn't actually a big
fan of LA before," she admits, "but it turned out to be an amazing place
to follow through an idea and keep going without anyone saying you're
being completely ridiculous. It's a city built on imagination,
story-telling and creativity. Plus, everyone seems to go to bed at 9pm,
so I'd get a lot done at night."
Dido's
musical experimentation also extended to learning more about the
mechanics of recording. "I was very impressed by that," says Brion. "It
would be a very easy life for her to allow people to make stuff for her
to sing on and I think it's more than a little bit admirable that she is
so inquisitive about everything. She learned a ton of stuff about
engineering, about arranging, about mastering, about the construction of
music. She even went and took some music courses at UCLA. This is not
the thing the average person who's just looking to crank it out does."
Indeed, rather than rushing to get the album done, Dido was happy to
take her time. "I didn't really feel any urgency to stop writing," she
says. "In fact, when I'd finished all the stuff with Jon in LA, I came
back to England and realized I really wanted to start using all the
things I'd learned there. So I sat down at my kitchen table with my
laptop and a microphone and just started writing and recording, using a
new computer program I'd got. I ended up with a whole load more songs."
One afternoon, Dido's brother Rollo, who co-wrote and co-produced her
first two albums, came round for tea, so she played him a bunch of the
new songs. "He got really excited about them, so we decided to go into
the studio with them. But a lot of the recordings on the album actually
came from that time in my kitchen. If you listen closely, you can hear
my neighbors drilling or the rain pelting down outside."
"I
still manage to get into this headspace when I'm writing where I
completely forget that anyone's going to hear the songs," admits Dido. I
don't really draw any limits for what I put in the songs, emotionally.
Some of these songs are about general themes and some are about other
people's lives, but some are specific and personal to me. Maybe I leave
myself exposed, but I find it hard to do anything that isn't emotional
or doesn't move me in some way. by not explaining my lyrics to people ,
it actually gives me the freedom to express myself without limits in the
songs." That, as much as anything, is what makes Safe Trip Home such a
rewarding listen. "This album is full of the joy of making music," says
Dido. "The process of making it has been a wonderful experience,
something to totally cherish. I've put every emotion into these songs.
And now I just really hope they move people." It's hard to imagine that
they won't. UB