Dana Hilliot is a singular character. He is the devil that creeps in
each of you, he is the one who will do everything you will never do,
everything you’re scared of doing. Moreover, he tells you his
stories, his victories or more likely his defeats, his wanderings and
brainwaves. The lo-fi crooner, the porno-soft songwriter is back, with
his country-style English accent that is so charming and truthful and
his salacious, overwhelming, sad but true stories.After a brilliant first LP, “I was a rabbit and i won”, released on Another record in 2004, he comes back with a vengeance and a new collection of songs, still utterly personal and moving, composed and recorded on the spur of the moment, panic-striken and almost drunk with spontaneity. Accompanied on delicate piano and voices by Delphine Dora on almost every song, we also find what had made his reputation in the first place: naked folk tracks on classic guitar and voice with just the fair amount of hiss in the background, and a few flute notes, light and pastoral, symbolic of his attachment to nature.
The weight of memories, the despair of clumsiness are here transcended by crystal-clear arrangements and honest interpretation, discarding anything that might be superficial to leave only real-life facts, the blood of existence. In his new album, “Misfit”, Dana Hilliot (who never parts ways with his friends) unveils even more, unblushingly : stories of non-reciprocal love (“Song for L” in two versions, one opening and the other closing the LP), unlikely encounters (“five years after”), fairly disreputable fun-facts (“Looking for a prostitue”, “My first boyfriend”), guilty teenage dreams with a proletarian background (“Lovers in the wood”) and so many other things...
Dana Hilliot ( and his friends) thus shows his status of Leonard Cohen of the most remote villages, of unlikely and untouchable European Bill Callahan, as sly as a fox in a wood of which he knows every inch of grass and then shows it to you with arrogance, tongue in cheek with words that hurt and heal at the same time.