There’s something intoxicating about attending a concert where you can feel the band’s love of music. When stripped down to its essence, performers connect with an audience through the art they create. This past semester, I experienced this connection while watching the Paris-based band Oracle Sisters play their 2023 album Hydranism at DC9 Nightclub. As the band performed on the tiny stage in get-ups of silky shirts, cowboy hats, and glittery jumpsuits, their mystical presence and dazzling music resonated deep within the hearts of the audience and created fans for life.
The Oracle Sisters’ appeal comes from their organic sound; their ethereal vocals, intricate harmonies, and lush instrumentals create a captivating and authentic sonic tapestry. Each song takes you on a journey, with layers of sound weaving together to form rich, immersive compositions that linger in the mind long after the music stops. Their authenticity likely stems from the close relationship of the band members. Formed by childhood friends Lewis Lazar and Christopher Willat in Paris in 2016, Oracle Sisters now includes members from Northern Ireland, Paris, and Finland. Their range of backgrounds is showcased in the band’s unique ability to blend dream pop, folk, and psychedelia into a mesmerizing sound.
In Hydranism, the band creates a vision of a utopian world suspended in time. To create the 11 tracks on the album, the band spent three months in 2020, during the peak of Covid, on Hydra Island, an idyllic destination in the Aegean Sea. They disconnected from the outside world, hoping to create a sense of timelessness on the album and produce tracks where the listener can completely relax and get lost in the world the Oracle Sisters built. The record’s lyrics delve into themes of introspection, nostalgia, and the human experience. The opening track Tramp Like You sets a tone of yearning for freedom. Lyrics like “I wanna be a tramp like you, I wanna have all my tales told just like you,” speak to the desire of finding release from worldly expectations and allowing yourself to wander and experience life as it comes. Hydranism captures a feeling of reminiscence through complex harmonies and beautiful instrumentals, and it’s one of my favorite records of all time.
Kelsey Perriello is a freshman in the College planning on majoring in Government.