Photo: Press handout
I spent the past twelve months living inside the music of Olivia Dean, the London singer who taught pop how to breathe again.
A Good Find
There’s a particular joy in discovering good music. It doesn’t announce itself. It simply turns up and quietly rearranges your playlist.
This one began in the car, on an ordinary afternoon. A song drifted out of the speakers (radio or algorithm, I couldn’t tell you which), and a voice so warm and unhurried made my thoughts slow down. Now that is intriguing, I thought. I filed it away and went on with my day.
A few days later, my best friend sent me a link. “I am utterly obsessed with this singer,” she wrote. “You NEED to listen.” The name was Olivia Dean.
It was the voice from the car, of course.
The Anatomy of an Obsession
Over the following year, that voice acquired a name, a face, and an entire world. I worked my way through the discography, then through her live performances on YouTube, which my best friend and I still trade back and forth. Dean has the rare gift of making a huge stage feel like a living room. I watched the video for “So Easy” more times than I can remember. And I kept wondering why she hasn’t announced South American tour dates. If there’s an audience ready to sing every word of “Man I Need” or “Dive” at the top of their lungs, it’s us.
Photo: Lola Mansell
An Antidote to a Gray Day
Listening to Olivia Dean is like feeling the sun settle on your shoulders. Messy, her debut, and The Art of Loving, the album that made her a global name, are both about love and the untidy business of early adulthood. She writes with a casual honesty and a vulnerability that never feels performed, like someone who can laugh at herself and still treasure the small things.
The sound is neo-soul and Motown-style brass, with the loose, syncopated sway of bossa nova and a bright, modern pop finish. You can hear Lauryn Hill, Sade, Amy Winehouse, and Brazilian grooves, and it still sounds like no one but her.
The Warmth of Real Instruments
The awards followed: a Grammy for Best New Artist, four BRITs including Album of the Year, and a second Mercury Prize nomination. Proof, if any was needed, that listeners were hungry for real instruments and an unvarnished voice.
The year is almost over, and I’m no less obsessed. Dean has given us music for driving, cooking, and dancing around the living room, and something rarer: the pleasure of following an artist at the height of her powers. Now I’m hoping the next chapter involves a ticket in my hand, whether under the London sky or somewhere closer to home.
The world fell in love first, Olivia. We’re ready when you are.
Photo: Lola Mansell
