Natisa Gogol ○ Wind Of Hope

 

It was produced by US-born, Prague-based songwriter and musician Gregory Darling, whose latest co-write, "Lucky" - with Julian Lennon and Gregg Alexander (New Radicals) - recently spent two months in the Top 40 of the Billboard Triple A.

"Wind Of Hope" is heart-wrenching stuff – ‘Tell me why they broke into our house/Tell me why they tore apart our lives?’ sings Natisa, and then, at her most-bulletproof, ‘Love will rescue us/Ukraine lives in our hearts’ - showcasing a voice at the outer limits of perfection, a mellifluous, brittle instrument so finely poised and positioned as to be able to claim land rights of its own. It also accents a common theme running through Natisa’s songs: love. “Love is like air,” says Natisa. “it is everywhere.”

Born in 1988, in the city of Dnipro in Ukraine, Natisa attended the Kyiv Municipal Academy of Performing and Circus Arts, before graduating to become a soloist for the state academic orchestra, an institution that saw her collaborate with DJ Shiller, as well as 1970s Afro-German-Carribean, disco/funk vocal supergroup, Boney M, an outfit who are still massive in Ukraine. 

 

Natisa cites jazz as an influence, although her musical heroes include artists like Ella Fitzgerald, Quincy Jones, Elton John, Barbara Streisand, Madonna, and Mariah Carey, and you can sense the influence of some of these artists on Mantra, Starting To Get Used To and Birds, songs likely to surface on her debut album due to be released in 2023.

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