Musician Aleksandra Prelevic Palladino, who is building a career under a pseudonym Dolce Hera, last night from 22 pm on all platforms, she presented the first single. The track in question is "Common Dreams", which she did in collaboration with the singer Ninom Žižić.
Prelevic is known to the general public as the drummer of the punk-rock band Šinei, who performed at many festivals and held concerts ten years ago, and life took her "across the pond", and she has been living between Podgorica and Rome for ten years.
After a break of ten years, Dolce Hera decided to return to music, but to introduce herself to the audience not only as a drummer, but also as a songwriter, while creating music and arrangements in collaboration with her producer, a Montenegrin musician. Stefan Pantović.
The track "Common Dreams" is an announcement of Dolce Here's first album, which should appear next year, and until then, as she promised, she will present three more singles to the audience. For this project, she had the help of the Capital City, PAM, and Jagermaster, and about the first song and what the audience can expect, Dolce Hera tells Vijesti...
The audience got used to you in a different genre, you were the founder and drummer of the band Šinei. You said yourself that you want to attract a younger audience with music. What was the transition from punk to electro-dance like for you?
It's a process that went on for years, I listened to a variety of music even when I was in the punk-rock story. Early on, I became attached to two bands that are one and the same in Joy Division and later New Order. Somehow that transition itself is not logical, they are completely different genre stories, but they have one thread that connects everything. I like to say that I am a New Order Kid, I grew up with their music and now, after so many years, I can listen to them. Let it be a guideline for what the audience can expect from me.
Even as a member of the Shinei band, you were one of the authors of the music you created at that time. You announced that thanks to the track "Common dreams" and the whole album, you will introduce yourself to the audience differently. Will you perhaps be one of the vocalists in a song?
I have been singing for a long time through music school, but my dominant way of expressing myself is the drum. My songs have the reverse way of creation - the drum line and the beat are created first. Sometimes the text is created first, to which I give meaning and in a way it is the heartbeat that determines the genre of the song for me. I don't see myself as a singer, but what I can't rule out is appearing on a song in the form of a narrator and collaborations of that type.
Where does the drum stand out better, is it in punk rock or electro music where we rely more on the computer?
Punk rock music is extremely good in the drumming sense for live and the energy that a drummer can show and provide in a live performance. It is the only kind of music where we listen to concerts of our favorite singer or group, play them at home. That energy only exists at concerts, we don't have it in the studio. Whereas with electronic and disco music, the opposite is true. We have a problem with performing it all live because inevitably we're going to put layers of electronics on there. In this song "Common dreams" I recorded the complete drum. It wasn't a song recorded by beating a drum in some program and adding layers of instruments. This is part of my work with the producer Stafan Pantović and deciding where we should add something, for me it was something new - the possibility to see what I could enrich and what I would do from the drummer's point of view, while Stefan also helped and knew how to make suggestions to emphasize that drum line.
When creating this track, did you have Nina as the main vocalist?
On this album, where I appear in all these new roles, primarily as a songwriter in English and Italian, I record the drums, I do the music and the arrangement together with Stefano. Basically when I write the lyrics and do the beat, I always have the vocals already in my head. It's a spontaneous process where I never had any doubts, but when a song is created I have a picture in my head of what kind of voice such a song is looking for. Nina is a great professional and has vocal capabilities so that even live she can justify everything she does in the studio and she can sing all genres. She cannot disappoint the audience in that sense. The song is very demanding as a singer. I only want to attribute the selection of collaborations to myself. As much as I make a good song and be enthusiastic, if I don't choose well the voice that can appear, the song may not live up to its full glory and it may not sound right. That feeling I have is a good card to play.
Will the other tracks that will be on the album that you will release next year also be in this electro-dance genre?
The whole album is a journey through genres, through retro with a background theme, dance. I want to play with trep, it inspires me a lot, I listen to Roman trep, which is popular among young people, and it's inspiring to me even though I didn't grow up with this genre. I am inspired by young people and I want to communicate with them through my music. Roman trep is very interesting and melodic, I don't know how that genre developed here, but there it is extremely melodic and danceable. Also, my goal is to travel through voices on this album. There will be male performers, because my lyrics are more about the mental states of the artist. The artistic soul is as fluffy as the versions of ourselves when we were carefree and unaware of life, and that was before we entered the world of adults. With that entry, we lost those versions of us forever. My whole album is a nostalgic, yet cheerful attempt to awaken in the listeners that version and awaken those emotions when we were all carefree in the clubs, dancing. In this way, we will awaken infantility. Listening to this album, I want it to throw the audience into some states that have nothing to do with reality. The narration itself is very much inspired by the art itself, the videos we make are each their own way to visually communicate the song and its message, and to let the imagination run wild.
The songs on the album will be in English and Italian. It is interesting that musicians from these areas who do not create in languages that are understandable in the Balkans fare worse. Does that mean that your focus is exclusively on the foreign market?
I am aware of that moment in our country, but I am encouraged by the fact that I know that Montenegro is a positive example in the region. Just because I live in Italy where young people don't know the English language that well, because they synchronize everything, I hope that Montenegro can embrace this kind of work. I am aware of the difficulties, but I know that young people know English, that they do well abroad, travel a lot, and have a broad understanding. I firmly believe and follow these events, and I hope that this and other songs will find their way to our audience. The fact is that the song and the album are aimed at the market of the speaking area in which the song communicates. If this poem is in English, the goal is to be understood by anyone who speaks that language. I also have collaborators in Italy who will market this track and the complete album, and that is important to me because I have become attached to Rome, even the local music world. It is important for me to try to reach the audience there in a natural way. I'm looking for a way for them to hear about me and what I do so that they can judge for themselves whether they like it or not, because I'm aware that the competition is high and that it's difficult for the audience to orient themselves in that amount of content.
An interesting video was also recorded for the first single made by Đorđe Jovanović and Jovan Dudić, the costumes were designed by Ana Krgović, but it was inspired by gaming. Given that gaming is the fastest growing industry, and that there are genres, did you already have a certain game in mind when you were making the music for "Common Dreams"?
In this video, apart from the fact that Nina and I are the protagonists in the animated versions, the car mentioned in the song's lyrics also appears with us. It's an Escalade, and we got a license from General Motors for the animated Cadillac in our video. It also gives us great pleasure because it is an important part of the story.
Bonus video:
