Anna Domino

Named Anne Taylor at birth, Anna Domino's entire life has perhaps been one of restless motion around the world -- before initially making a name for her music in early-'80s New York City, she had already lived in Tokyo (her birthplace), Ann Arbor, Ottawa, and Florence. After performing with a variety of bands in N.Y.C., her breakthrough came courtesy of the Le Disques du Crepsecule label in Belgium, which released her debut single, Trust in Love, in 1983. The following year produced the East and West and Rythm EPs, while Domino proceeded to split her time between New York and Brussels, where she gained a quiet cult following among musicians and fans alike. Her first album didn't appear until 1986, a self-titled effort that captured her knack for sly, danceable music and often quietly unsettled lyrical visions, though with a easy gloss and sass that compares favorably to prime Everything but the Girl without aping it. Domino and Belgian musician Michel Delory began a personal and professional partnership in 1987 that resulted in her second album, This Time, a more varied collection that scored a notable profile in Japan though no American dates surfaced beyond a New York-based residency in 1988. The result of that series of dates was the Colouring in the Edge and the Outline EP, a return to a more electronic approach, which in turn was contrasted by the 1990 album Mysteries of America, a more acoustically inclined reflection on the cycle of life and death. Following that release, Domino and Delory took an extended sabbatical, broken only by the release of a Canadian compilation, Favorite Songs From the Twilight Years, in 1996, accompanied by a smattering of shows. At the time, however, she and Delory had already begun work on a new project under the name Snakefarm, her revisioning of the alt-country/murder ballad aesthetic. The resultant album, Songs From My Funeral, was released in 1999, but nothing new followed for some years, while she and Delory eventually settled near Los Angeles. Domino received new attention in 2004 following a comprehensive re-release program of her work through Mysteries of America on the LTM label, which also assembled a new compilation, Dreamback. ~ Ned Raggett, Rovi