Jamilat Reprise

Lebanese singer Yasmine Hamdan founded Beirut's groundbreaking electro-duo Soapkills, garnering a cult following across the Arab world. In 2013 she featured in Jim Jarmusch's Only Lovers Left Alive, and that was the same year she released her debut album, Ya Nass. Its follow-up, Al Jamilat (The Beautiful Ones), followed in 2017, and is a dreamy, lyrical foray into the shifting soundscapes of contemporary Arabic and Western pop and electronica.

One year on and Crammed Discs is releasing a set of reconstructions and remixes by a range of producers, including Parisian duo Acid Arab, Chilean Matias Aguayo, Berlin techno artist Shed, Olga Kouklaki from Greece, and Crammed's very own Greg Bachau, whose remix of ‘Assi’ opens this nine-track reinterpretation of the original 11-track album. The original's already rich electronic textures were combined with lyrical acoustic playing while here, remix and reconstruction generally means reduction and distillation according to the artist- producer's intent. Here, the material is remixed with a light hand and a close ear rather than a wrecking ball of club beats and glitchy repeats. It makes for a fine extension to the original and, while nowhere surpassing it, the songs' subtleties survive the remix and keep on singing.