"Demonic dreams floating on celestial melodies, the marriage of heaven and hell." -NPR
"Darby has an excellent grasp on how to create a mood that envelopes the listener, even as the mood becomes increasingly disturbing." -Rolling Stone
Dear friends,
It’s been twelve years since my last record, IV (Intravenous), was released. It’s been a long road, full
of death, injury and rebirth. I doubted if I would ever make another album again, but here I am. I started recording what would become, Otterson during Covid, while locked away like everyone else on the planet. There were so many songs I thought it would be a double album, but I thought better of that and decided one was enough for now (another is coming very soon, I promise). What is happening in our country is so horrific that I don’t even know if music can help heal anything, but my sincere hope is that it can. It’s the reason I write and put out music. I write to heal my wounds, and in doing so hope I heal others. I guess you could say I’m kind of a “soul doctor.” I named the album “Otterson” after my friend John Otterson, a visual artist who lived in my building in Santa Monica many years ago. John and I are both artists, except my words are my paint brushes, and my emotions are my colors. I think of the twelve original songs on this album, (plus one cover song of "Rosie" by the Kinks), as portraits frozen in time…and hope they bring to mind all of the richness and imagery of a still life - a moment captured for eternity, like a painting. Each time I write a song, I come out on the other side of it - changed. I might not even know what the song was about when I wrote it, or what part of me was in pain that needed my attention. I usually realize that weeks later, sometimes even years later. But there is no hope of healing myself unless I go inside and feel what’s wrong. That is what I do in all my writing - Go in to come out. If I don’t go in, the emotions build up inside of me and I get a bit crazy. I’ve always been like that. So, here is Otterson. My album for a hurting world. I help it hopes.
-Diana
