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Dido: No Angel

© Portia J. Lino

Dido. Everyone knows her name now. But two years ago, when her debut album came out, no one knew her name - except maybe for a few die-hard fans of the group, Faithless, a trip-hop band she provided vocals for, along with her brother Rollo.

Music has always been in her blood. When she was six, she was accepted into London’s prestigious Guildhall School of Music. Four years later, she was playing the recorder, piano and violin. In her teens, she sang with her brother in Faithless, helping sell over 5 million copies.

She met Clive Davis of Arista Records in 1997. She was immediately signed, and No Angel was born.

It took Eminem to help her gain the fame she deserved. She tells MTV that she got a letter stating that he included snippets of Thank You in his song about a mentally deranged fan, Stan. Lucky for him (and for her), she loved it, even agreeing to tour with him singing her part in Stan. Before that, Thank You was featured in the soundtrack to the movie Sliding Doors.

This week, Thank You reached #3 in the Billboard charts.

The album starts off with Here With Me, a song that exploded in rock and alternative airwaves last year. It was also featured as the theme song to the teen version of X-Files, Roswell. Missing her lover very much, she stubbornly cries, “I won’t go, I won’t sleep, I can’t breathe, until you’re resting here with me.”

The next four songs parallel that of Alanis’ song writing techniques, although without as much of the male bashing. In Hunter, she tells the self-proclaimed “king” that this queen wants “to be a hunter again…to see the world again, to take a chance on life again.” In her last desperate plea, she begs her lover, “let me go.”

Don’t Think Of Me reeks of sarcasm. “So you’re with her, and not with me. Oh how lucky can one man be?” she sings. The song blends orchestral sounds with fast paced drumbeats. My Lover’s Gone slows it down a bit. In fact, the whole song is a bit, well, slow, except for a guitar and percussion solo in the middle. Her heartbreak extends to the next song, All You Want. She tells her lover, “All you want, all you need, is sitting here with you.” But it’s a heartbreak song, so of course she doesn’t keep her man.