Although Fridolijn van Poll considers triphop as one of her major influences, her music has mostly been described as jazzy dream folk. Echos of Portishead and Massive Attack are definitely there: her sound is floating in a pleasant, distancing mood. She has been described as the heir of Nick Drake. On Catching Currents, she floats – yes, definitely a reoccurring word – between the softness of Joni Mitchell and the dreamy, untouchable sound of minimalist composers.

Earlier this year the singer-songwriter from Amsterdam released Chapter One, a collection of three songs somewhere between dreampop and folktronica. Follow-up Chapter Two just came out and takes the electronica influences even further. Together with actor and composer Lieuwe Roonder, Fridolijn crafted three moody, dreamy songs that rub against ambient house. The songs have two versions: a vocal and an instrumental one.

Fridolijn’s voice has distinct qualities and gives the songs a dreamy feel and on the moody side more depth, but to be honest, I absolutely love the instrumental versions. ‘Once More’ as instrumental for example sounds like quality microhouse from Cologne and could earn a place on one of the recent compilation by Kompakt. 

The same goes for ‘Forever Maybe’ and ‘If Your Heart Were A City’. The slowed-down rhythm of the first one is mysterious and distant and would be a cool edition to next years Velvet Desertcompilation. ‘If Your Heart Were A City’ is more ambient and moody, like the work of producer The Field.

Can’t wait for Chapter three.

Chapter Two by Fridolijn is released on Freija Label / Lab Music.