Role models are usually there to be followed. But sometimes they are not. As in the case of producer and DJ Soela. Her mother listened to rock’n’roll, her father to Russian songs that deal pathetically with everyday problems. She herself didn’t want to know anything about it. Soela, who was born Elina Shorokhova in Russia near the Ukrainian border, learnt to play the piano with the aim of becoming a professional classical pianist.
But that wasn’t for her either. It was only through the influence of her older sister that she finally arrived where she has been at home ever since: with electronic music. Soela has been releasing her own tracks on labels such as Kompakt, Detroit Underground and Lost Palms since 2016 and moved to Berlin in 2018. Her amazing first album »Genuine Silk« was released on Dial in 2020, and the unconventional micro house was a perfect fit for the Hamburg label.
Dear Trip-Hop,…
Soela’s second album »Dark Portrait«was recently released on the New York label Scissor And Thread. The title is to be understood as programmatic in terms of content and music. The album deals with the artist’s inner and outer conflicts, such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which she experienced as traumatic. On »Dark Portrait«, she combines ambient textures, minimal house, trip-hop, dubby vibes, occasional excursions onto the dancefloor and late romantic piano playing to create melancholic music that is free of kitsch and in which even the smallest effect in the background is a deliberate sound-aesthetic statement.
Dark Portrait
About her guest mix, Soela says: »I’ve been listening to a lot of trip-hop lately and wanted to dedicate a mix to this genre.Every time autumn comes around, my playlist gets stretched out with something slower, more reflective and a bit more melancholic. I’ve had several versions of this mix with different moods and genre shifts, and the version that’s online now is my favourite.«
