As the Bedouine moniker suggests, Azniv Korkejian’s music is informed by a nomadic life. Born in Aleppo, Syria to Armenian parents, she spent her childhood in Saudi Arabia, moving to Boston when her family won a Green Card lottery. After Boston, the family moved to Houston, and Korkejian left for Los Angeles as soon as she was able. From there she spent time in Lexington, Kentucky; Austin, Texas; and Savannah, Georgia before returning to Los Angeles.
Korkejian’s return to the city turned out to be a homecoming of sorts. She discovered a close-knit community of musicians in Echo Park, and as she puts it, “I just kept meeting the right people, who were professional musicians, and even though they were going on these big legitimate tours, they were still coming back to this amazing small scene, still demoing at home, and I immediately felt welcomed to join in on that.”
It was within that context that Azniv Korkejian’s first album came about. A sound editor by day, she entered the studio of Gus Seyffert looking for reel-to-reel tapes and left it with with a producer for her debut album. After preparing some thirty tracks over the course of three years, Korkejian and Seyffert whittled the music down to ten songs and brought them to Spacebomb Records. The resulting album, titled Bedouine after Korkejian’s recording moniker, is a quietly confident debut.
Backed by the strumming of an acoustic guitar, Korkejian delivers the lyrics to standout track “Solitary Daughter” poetically, occasionally drifting almost into spoken word. She discussed the lyrics in an NPR interview, saying, “the song is kind of a reaction to traditional gender roles. It was sort of a rejection of conventional romance; it’s not something that I needed.”
Single “One of the These Days” is similarly quiet, but its melody is brighter and more upbeat. Korkejian discussed the track as well, calling it “an optimistic outlook on wanting to speak the same language as someone, or at least close enough for you both to feel loved.”
The songs on Bedouine rarely stray above quiet, but they don’t need to. The power of Korkejian’s music does not lie in its volume, but in the gorgeous orchestration and her thoughtful lyrics.
Bedouine is out now on Spacebomb Records and is available for purchase through Amazon, iTunes, and Spacebomb’s online store.
