Sunday Mix: Ydegirl

There’s a certain murkiness lurking beneath the surface of Copenhagen-based musician Ydegirl’s music. (It lurks beneath her alias, too, which was inspired by a 2000-year-old bog body found in the Dutch village of Yde.)

The artist, real name Andrea Novel, crafts haunting songs that juxtapose R&B and chamber pop with baroque motifs and hymnal, folk-like qualities. It’s a beguiling combination made all the more intriguing by Novel’s vocals. This is best exemplified on last year’s self-titled debut album, which saw Novel furthering her explorations into the swampy setting she envisioned for the Ydegirl project. 

For today’s Sunday Mix, Novel guides us through a spacious selection of tunes old and new from artists such as Mica Levi (“one of my heroes”) and Oliver Coates, Oli XL, Sega Bodega and Zsela.

“We are listening from somewhere in the swamp,” says Novel. “Being under water you listen differently. You suddenly pay attention to sounds very close. Same goes for making and listening to a mix; sounds from the outside world are cut off. I tried letting a lot of space and silence into the mix without a lot of dense transitions, to make space for this presence.”