DICTE – THE SHORT STORY

For the past 14 years Dicte has been one of the most celebrated and critically acclaimed artists on the danish rock scene. She is a singer, songwriter, producer, programmer and guitar-player and is arguably one of the best live acts Denmark has to offer.

Dicte had her album debut in 1992 as part of the quartet HER PERSONAL PAIN, whose album SONGS FROM CINEMA CAFÉ introduced a totally new sound in Denmark. Partly poetic, blue, hard rocking and all over beautiful the album earned the band a Danish Grammy as Newcomer Of The Year.

Her Personal Pain was dissolved in ´93 and Dicte immediately started working on her solo-debut, released in ´94 as BETWEEN ANY FOUR WALLS. A strong and very personal album, predicting what was to happen internationally in the years to come, with its combination of heavy programming and sampling, as the musical background for Dicte´s songs of lust, love and longing.

The album was hailed as a masterpiece - and on a critics list from 2002, the album is seen as one of the 40 best albums ever made in Denmark.

In 1996 Dicte released the Stephen Hague produced album VOODOO VIBE, recorded and mixed in London. On this album Dicte was deeply inspired by what was happening at the clubs in London and musically the album was descriped as “Pop meets Jungle meets Dance. Motown meets Man meets Machines.” Among the players on the album was Mark Hunter, Dave Bayton-Power and Saul Davis of the UK-band James, who all became good friends during Dicte´s long stay in the famous RAK-Studios. There was interest from mainly Germany, UK and France but due to problems being sort of an indie-artist on a multi-national label, no deals were made.

From ´96 - ´99 Dictes did a lot of work with other people. To show the variety of her work, Dicte sang the Elvis-classic VIVA LAS VEGAS on a tribute album in ´97 and the same year, though under the name of DICTE & DUB TRACTOR, she released the song MACHINERY (as a tribute to 150 years of Danish railroads) and finally YOU´RE THE BOSS, a duet on a Big-band-album featuring several Danish pop- and rockstars! In ´98 Dicte recorded and released the soundtrack to the play HOUSE OF THE DOUBLE AXE - with lyrics all in Latin!

In 2000 Dicte released the very popular album THIS IS COOL - a vibey and very soulful collection of new songs including the hit single IF THIS IS COOL, that became a very popular track on Danish radio and on the Scandinavian branch of MTV.

In 2002 Dicte broke her long relationship with Pladecompagniet/Sony Music and started her own Velvet Recordings with the release of the single MAKE IT ALRIGHT, that turned out to be one of her greatest hits so far.

In 2003 Dicte´s fifth solo-album – the Americana-inspired GONE TO TEXAS – was released to awesome reviews from the press. The album earned the singer, songwriter, producer and musician named Dicte, the reward as “Female singer of the year” in the music magazine Gaffa – as well as nominations in the same category for Danish Music Award and the Zulu Award. A tour followed in the first months of 2004 – and again Dicte was hailed as one of the best performers of Denmark. Later Dicte played concerts in both Sweden and Norway – following local releases of “Gone To Texas”.

In 2006 the sixth solo-album from Dicte – DICTE & THE SUGARBONES – was released. After loads of concerts in 2004 and 2005, it was obvious for Dicte, that her new album should be made with her liveband much more involved than before – and in the end it turned out to be the first band album in Dictes career, since the release of SONGS FROM CINEMA CAFÉ back in I 1992. DICTE & THE SUGARBONES is an album of intense rock´n´roll, beautiful blue ballads, glam-slam-garage, soul and blues – with first single SUGARBONE and killer-ballad COOL WINDS (duet with Kashmirs Kasper Eistrup) as two of the stand out tracks. Once again the reviews were great – with Danish monthly Sirene hailing Dicte as being the best female rock vocalist in Denmark.

Dicte is also an actress and played the leading part (as a boy!) in the ´94-movie SMUKKE DRENG (Beautiful Boy) that earned her a Bodil-nomination (the Danish “Oscar”). Since then she has had two major roles on stage in Hotel Pro Forma´s experimental HOUSE OF THE DOUBLE AXE (´98) and the part of OFELIA in Hong Kong-director Ong Keng Sen´s alternative take on Shakespeare´s classic SEARCH HAMLET (2002), where Dicte also wrote the score.