Diamonds & Demons is the debut album by the British-Portuguese musician Nessi Gomes, a composer and lyricist of rare invention and beauty. Ensuing tales of darkness and light allow a deeper exploration of the human condition, psyche, collective fears and torments. Nessi has produced a record that is at once lustrous and shadowy, mysterious and magical, which she sings in a voice that is intimate and idiosyncratic.
The creation of the album took place over the last 18 months, while traveling through London on the Regents canal inside a portable studio on a little rusty blue boat called 'The Wild Goose’.
Born on the tiny Island of Guernsey to a family of immigrants from Portugal, Gomes channels influences from both sides of her ethnicity, blending the essence of the traditional, ‘larger than life’ Fado folk music with progressive British inspiration.
Producer Bridgeman seasoned and slow-cooked the naked songs with an ambitious soundscape: cherry picking some superb musicians. Amongst them are the world-acclaimed classical violinist Viktoria Mullova, contemporary cellist Matthew Barley, rising jazz talent Misha Mullov-Abbado, indie whiz Cosmo Sheldrake, nu/traditional award-winning folk singer Sam Lee and more. Together they forged a musical bridge that unites the multicoloured texture of the wild forest with Brit-pop, prog, folk and the underlying inspiration of Gomes’ native Portuguese ‘fado’ style. The result is a nostalgic, eclectic and ultra-detailed sound.
These Walls, the first single from the album, explores indecision and self-doubt, and the voices in your head - “the demons on your case,” as Nessi puts it. And yet, as with the album as a whole, it is no self-indulgent wallow but an exercise in shaping beauty out of despair.
Whether ‘Diamonds &Demons’ will be heard by millions due to its epic and listenable nature, or whether it will stay a hidden secret for a few thousand followers… Nessi Gomes's debut album is already a great achievement for both the singer and her producer. It is an album revealing an authentic search. It fulfils Gomes's wish to touch and shake the audience. To stir and shift something, to speak of the uncomfortable and to that part which aches in all of us, to let that which we are, be expressed in its fullness, in its utter 'yes' to all flavours of existence.
Artist: Nessi Gomes.
Genre: Singer-Songwriter.
Sounds Like: Kate Bush, Beth Gibbons, Alela Diane, Agnes Obel, Ane Brun.
Single: These Walls.
Album: Diamonds & Demons.
Release date: Single - 2/9/16, Album - 14/10/16
Link to Website: www.nessigomesmusic.com
Link to Facebook: www.facebook.com/nessigomesmusic
Link to Twitter profile page: twitter.com/nessigomesmusic
Link to YouTube Channel: www.youtube.com/user/nessigomesmusic
Vevo - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIhoiy9SZve9aqIvBjZ-G5w
Upcoming tour dates:
September:
17 Munich, Germany
20 Vienna, Austria
22 Ghent, Belgium
24 Amsterdam, The Netherlands
25 Copenhagen, Denmark
28 Gutenburg, Sweden
30 Stockholm, Sweden
October:
1 Helsinki, Finland
8 Florence, Italy
20 Bristol, UK
22 Firle, UK (near Brighton and Lewes), St Peter's Church, Saint Stephens Church
25 Extra London show (TBC)
26 London, UK, Official album launch concert, The Old Queens Head (Sold out).
November:
Israel, Switzerland, Germany and more.
Touring all over Europe till end of 2016.
Management:
Lino Hermesh - info@nessigomesmusic.com
Press:
Online: Kate Whitmarsh - kate@spacepromotions.com
Press: Will McCarthy - will@willmccarthy.com
Label:
Baraka Records, distributed via Absolute Label Services.
Absolute contact - James McGuinness - James@absolutelabelservices.com
Publisher:
None (Sentric - admin - leon.calveley@sentricmusic.com).
Radio Plugger:
Will McCarthy - will@willmccarthy.com
Producer:
Duncan Bridgeman
Recording at:
Wild Goose
