Words By: Jordyn Kieft

Danish composer, musician, and producer Trentemøller is back with another offering from his highly anticipated upcoming studio album, Memoria — “Dead Or Alive.” No stranger to noise rock or dark psych, Trentemøller fuses both to create a powerful track, coming out of the gate at full throttle and storming the senses. “Dead Or Alive” comes from a more primal place and is a mainly instrumental piece. Disorienting strobe light guitar collides with a jet flanging psychic assault, ratcheting everything up one more notch before it all collapses upon itself.

A captivating bass line opens “Dead or Alive,” ultimately taunting whip-crack drums into entering an unabating duel. Oscillating echoes materialize, like murmurs from the netherworld, eventually culminating into actual voices. The video begins in a yellow-tinted room, where a girl rolls over in bed before getting dressed. As the music escalates, we see the girl looking at her appearance in the mirror as bugs crawl in her sink and down the drain. She continues to get ready, making coffee and laying on the counter as an ominous voice begins to chant in the background “You’re not dead or alive.” The scene then switches to a violent image of the girl dancing around in an almost possessed manner, the screen flashing between that and complete black, almost as if someone were flickering the lights. Fans may be triggered by this flashing sensation, so view at your own risk. The beat is at an all-time high here with a strong base thumping and eccentric guitar.

All at once, the strobe effect and intense beat end, dropping down to a quiet image of the girl laying on the couch. The image alternates between the girl on the couch and in a red-tinted hallway, dancing once more as the tempo picks up. She is then in a blue-tinted room, with a door opening before her, a blinding white light lighting up her face. She goes through the door and finds herself outside. She starts running, now in a different costume with a different hairstyle. There is almost no light around her, making her seem as if she is in some sort of limbo. The chant begins again, getting louder and louder as it repeats. The peak hits as the girl starts dancing again, the editing of the video making her movements look jerky and inhuman. The music video ends with complete silence as the girl looks up from a hunched-over position, staring off to the left of the screen.

Copenhagen’s Anders Trentemøller has long been respected as a creator of extraordinarily memorable melodies and lush soundscapes, but for the last decade, he’s been getting long-overdue praise for being a producer with few rivals, as well. While many artists follow a pattern of invention and reinvention, Trentemøller’s arc has been a series of points along the same curve, playing the long game, with each release representing the next chapter in a constantly evolving series.

With Memoria, Trentemøller continues to work with familiar themes of light and dark, turbulence and serenity, piercing chill and comforting warmth; clearly inspired by the inherent antipodal elements of the Nordic environment he calls home. A heady mix that also includes motorik, shoegaze, and electronic music calling to mind Joy Division, the Cocteau Twins, and Massive Attack, Memoria follows 2019’s critically acclaimed Obverse, heralding Trentemøller’s first full-length album in three years and his longest album yet, clocking in at 14 songs. Memoria includes both instrumental and vocal songs, and for the first time, Trentemøller also composed all the vocal melodies and lyrics on the album, which are solely performed by Lisbet Fritze.

Memoria is due out February 11th, 2022 via his own label, In My Room.

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