On the cover of her album Hystérie !, Régina Demina appears as a Japanese steampunk lolita pouting against a background of wallpaper full of carnivorous flowers. The listen begins, synthetic whispers and beats are heard, then the languorous voice of Régina Demina, between a whisper and a growl, takes hold.
Madame Demina released a first EP in 2018, L’été meurtrier on Kwaidan Records. The label, founded by Marc Collin, boasts releases from La Féline, Nouvelle Vague and Jay-Jay Johanson, among others. With the help of Collin, producers Jérôme “Blackjoy” Caron and Sam Tiba, as well as the electro-gabber collective Contrefaçon, Régina Demina created Hystérie!, a first full-length with an erotic tone. The distracted listener might match what’s heard here with electro-bonbon ritornellas à la Lio or Mylène Farmer. Make no mistake, the ten tracks that Demina delivers on Hystérie ! ascend into the pop stratosphere, thanks to their obvious strengths.
First of all, the literary quality of the lyrics, which include some easily identifiable references and others less so, such as “The Jasmine Man”, which could be inspired by a story from the German artist Unica Zürn. The content is generally disturbing, emotive, provocative, and enticing – destructive relationships and other brutal love affairs, incest, exacerbated desires, disturbing onirism, inhumanity, and morbidity.
Then there are the seductive melodies, rhythms, and ornaments made of perfectly blended synthetic sub-genres. In short, these songs should prove to be as effective for trance as for dance.
Ms. Demina, who was born in Kaliningrad, Russia, has been living in France since the age of four. She corresponds to the archetype of the multi-faceted artist: dancer, actress, visual artist, musician with as much of an interest in contemporary music as in pop, director of short films and designer of sound installations. Her Hystérie ! is a sound object both heterogeneous and tightly bound, both cold and warm, capable of moving even the most stoic music fan.
