Today in-demand Paris-based artist and producer Sega Bodega releases his highly anticipated third album ‘Dennis’ digitally. A special vinyl release of the album ships from buy.segabodega.com from May 6th.
He also announces a run of headline US,UK and EU dates for autumn to follow a stacked summer of festival appearances. Headline shows include London’s Outernet (as part of Pitchfork London), Glasgow SWG3 Warehouse, LA’s El Rey Theatre, Amsterdam’s Melkweg and Paris’ Elysée Montmartre.See below for a full list of dates, buy tickets here.
Dennis explores the experience of a day in which you can’t be sure you woke up at all. Each song blends into the next as you sink deeper into REM sleep. Dennis is a translation of how this feels.
Sega Bodega’s records have always lent themselves to introspective listening as easily as they fill dancefloors, but with Dennis, the intention is to go harder: this is a club record to lose yourself in. “Adulter8” begins with the tinker of an 8-bit alarm clock before spiriting you away into a dazzling, drop-heavy floor filler; voices emerge into the light before receding back into the dark they came from. And “Elk Skin”, which calls on vocalist Cecile Believe, is a dislocating blend of euphoric highs, Mediterranean guitar rhythms and subterranean chanting.
Other tracks orbit around a defining image. “Deer Teeth” was inspired by a 7000-year-old Mesolithic burial of a woman and her baby who had died in childbirth in Vedbæk, Denmark. They were found with 200 deer teeth; the baby was cradled in the wing of a swan. This trance-like track, calling on the voice of Kiss Facility counterpart Mayah Alkhateri, twists sweet melodies into something with an unsettling, metallic flavour. It’s both of the future and yet, at the same time, recalls something far more primordial.
Sega Bodega has just finished an 8- week ‘Lose Yourself with..’ Sunday night residency on BBC 6Music with guests such as Shygirl, BEA1991, POiSON GiRL FRiEND and Marina Herlop — listen back to all episodes HERE.
Born in Ireland, raised in Glasgow and now based in Paris, producer, performer and label head Sega Bodega – AKA Salvador Navarrete – has built a reputation as one of the UK’s most innovative and precocious creative minds. His impact spans music, fashion and film, soundtracking some of the most important cultural moments in recent years, as well as building a catalogue of solo releases that traverse genre, style and composition. His irreplicable sound has been woven into the production of pop disruptors including Eartheater, Caroline Polachek and Shygirl, on her Mercury Prize-nominated record Nymph.
In late 2022, Sega released the 6Music playlisted single ‘Kepko’ closely followed by a remix of Björk’s ‘Ovule’ in early 2023. Sega Bodega’s last full release – 2021’s Romeo – showcases an otherworldly production style that has marked him as a pioneer within the alternative and electronic worlds. A true multi-hyphenate, alongside his two solo albums, Bodega has been a crucial hand in countless projects over the past decade, from the development of artists under his NUXXE label, to production for other artists, and work with fashion brands such as Bottega Veneta and Nike.