Dina Ögon
Dina Ögon @ Jazz Cafe, London, UK, November 16, 2023,
Nov 26, 2023
Web Exclusive
“I bought a new lipstick, is it all over my face now?”. At London’s Jazz Cafe, Dina Ögon’s singer Anna Ahnlund talks to the audience between the numbers in a very casual manner – just as if she were talking to a friend. “You look great!”, they respond. Someone declares their love in Swedish: “Jag älskar dig”.
Flow-like music of Swedish psychedelic jazz quartet Dina Ögon (translates as “Your Eyes”) has infiltrated the UK market only recently. Their 2021 eponymous debut album was reissued by big Scandinavian label and distributor Playground Music last year. Since then, the interest has been growing naturally – a few people at the show admitted they had found Dina Ögon on streaming services by coincidence and have been listening to their music on repeat since then.
Nevertheless, this month’s show at London’s Jazz Cafe is their first-ever appearance in Britain. Seeing them live, one gets the idea of how this affinity develops. As much as both of their albums (including this year’s Oas), the band grows on you. They warm up the somewhat lukewarm space with mellifluous tunes as well as dreamy and occasionally bird-mimicking vocals. Despite the mid-November gloom, spring is in the air.
The show at the iconic Camden venue is part of the annual EFG London Jazz Festival. Although they are billed as a Scandinavian soul act, Dina Ögon’s warm hues synesthetically extend to various colours and dimensions of music. On “Dolus and Culpa”, there are mellow textures indicating their, perhaps, distant kinship with Khruangbin, while more jazz-inclined tracks with a dash of exotica might bring to mind Factory Records’ signings Kalima. Suffused in reverberating polyphony, “Sol” echoes the Motown era as well as the quirkiness of Swedish prog.
This evening at Jazz Cafe sees the band members Anna Ahnlund (vocals and guitar), Daniel Ögren (synths and guitar), Love Örsan (bass) and Christopher Cantillo (percussion) greeted by a mixed audience of Brits and fellow Scandinavians. There are a few moments when the exchange between the collective and the fans goes on in Swedish. Still, this doesn’t impose a language barrier for the rest. On the contrary, a sort of synergy is achieved as everyone seems to be overpowered by the gentle energy of their music.