YAEL NAIM RELEASES HER NEW ALBUM ‘NIGHTSONGS’

In a career that has developed over the course of the last 20 years, the Parisian-born, Franco-Israeli multi-instrumentalist, producer and singer songwriter has been on a restless quest to create a sound world of her own across a string of increasingly absorbing albums – none more so than her latest offering, NightSongs – which is out via Tôt ou tard and distributed by Believe. 

 
The material on NightSongs includes recent singles ‘How Will I Know’, ‘Shine‘ and ‘She’, plus the waltzing ‘Sweetheart’ and emotional ‘Daddy’ which is accompanied by a live performance.  The whole album’s lyrical confessional nature and intimacy is also matched by Yael’s remarkable arrangements as well as the space within the music itself.

 
“A lot of the songs are structured so that they start so we are close to the ear of the listener, almost as if we are whispering things in the dark. Then, suddenly there’s an explosion of music,” explains Yael. “It’s like moving from pure emotions into the unconscious or a dream-like state where you can fly away somewhere.”
 
The loss of Yael’s beloved father, Daniel, is of two themes that dominate the ‘NightSongs’ album – the other being the birth of her second child. These huge changes in her life inspired a new spell of self-discovery, which in turn changed how she approached songwriting. The songs – darker and deeper than before – were for the first time written, arranged and produced entirely independently. The result is the most remarkable, unguarded and absorbing album of her career.
 
“One thing I learnt during the process of making this record is that if you stop pretending that you are Superman, then people will tell you that they feel the same way as you. When that happens, it’s amazing. It proves that we are not alone,” she says.
 
Yael Naim released her self-titled album in 2007. She had recorded it over the course of two years with her husband and co-producer David Donatien in their flat in Paris’s Bastille district. The success of breakthrough single ‘New Soul‘ which has had over 86 million streams on Spotify alone and charted at Number 10 in the US Billboard chart when it was picked by Steve Jobs to launch the Macbook Air – provided them with resources to invest in a professional studio. Her career continued to flourish, first with the album ‘She Was A Boy’ (2010) and then ‘Older’ (2015). She has since won multiple awards at the annual Victoires De La Musique ceremony – the French equivalent of The Brits – including Best Female Pop Singer in 2016.
 
Select material from ‘NightSongs’ was first previewed when Yael Naim performed at the Meltdown Festival last year, having been invited to play by curator and Chic legend Nile Rodgers.
 

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