Bio
Dorian Wood comes armed with the charisma of a Pentacostal preacher, the voice of a soul diva and a repertoire of songs once described as marrying the “fevered spirituality of Southern gospel to the virtuosity of golden era Tin Pan Alley composers.”
Dorian’s work challenges the separation of artist and spectator, with visceral, fleshy and elaborately-choreographed videos and live performances, drawing on subject matter informed by their perspective as a non-binary person of colour.
Born in Echo Park, California, Dorian was educated in Costa Rica, before returning to Los Angeles. In 2007, they released the critically-acclaimed BOLKA, a genre-defying album combining elements of folk, soul and Bulgarian choral music. They followed this in 2009 with Black Pig Suite, an ambitious collaboration with LA experimental orchestra Killsonic. In 2010, Dorian embarked on a first European tour, stopping off in the UK to record a live solo album Brutus at St. Giles-in-the-Fields church in London.
Dorian’s breakthrough album, Rattle Rattle, was four years in gestation, finally emerging in 2013, freakish and fully formed, as a truly apocalyptic masterpiece of aural theatre. With over 65 musicians and a 45-member choir, it showcased the enormous breadth of Dorian’s work; from sparse elegiac ballads to demented Seventies rock operatic excess. The album XALÁ followed in 2017. Stripped-back, sung entirely in Spanish, with Dorian accompanied only by bass and percussion, it marked another fearless step forward from an artist either unwilling or incapable of compromise.
“A fearless artist and performer whose voice inhabits a room like a choir of ghosts… imbued with both bleeding rawness and dramatic flair.” – L.A. Weekly
We were delighted to release Dorian’s Glassellalia EP in 2013. Dorian’s other releases are essential listening and are available via Atonal Industries.
Photo credit: Laura Pardo
