While she still carries a huge and impressive voice, — also known as Nika Roza Danilova — has embraced more pop, rather than Gothic musical tastes. And yet, as she danced — more like writhed with sensuous, simmering up to occasional explosive convulsions — on the low-lit stage at the Tuesday night, her demeanor showed she still owes allegiance to the Swans, Michael Gira/Jarboe and Jim “Foetus” Thirlwell crowd.
Her small accompanying band made huge, bombastic sounds in the same way her small body belied the power of her voice. They also created slow, gently crushing dirges accentuated by alternating horn blasts and explosive, tribal floor toms and crashing bass drums. On “Hollow” Zola and her band did this with more power than the recorded counterparts.
At her most pop-centric, Danilova approached a Katy Perry, Norah Jones or (gasp) Christina Aguilera in tone, attesting to her embrace of a definite pop sensibility. But she never quite became ensconced in that persona enough to lose her tough, noise-gothy roots. Lyrically, her tunes were still biting, challenging and telling her story of awakening with a certain amount of ecstasy.
More confident with herself and her audience than her Denver debut a few years ago, she pranced in brighter and much more evocative light. Her porcelain, almost delicate face was thrust into view under long, straight black hair, rather than hidden most of the time in low light and fog as a platinum blonde. It became quickly obvious that, with her latest album, “Taiga,” Danilova has reached a new level of comfort both with herself and with her music — and even more so live. And at the tender age of 26, it seems the right time for her to take off.
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Billy Thieme is a Denver-based writer, an old-school punk and a huge follower of Denver’s vibrant local music scene. Follow Billy’s explorations at , and his giglist at .
Michael McGrath is a Denver area photographer. His work is available at . Visit .
