Dido (singer)
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Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle Armstrong (born December 25, 1971 in London) is a Brit Award-winning English singer who performs under the name Dido.
Biography
Dido is partly of French descent; her mother, Claire, is a French poet and her father is Irish publisher William Armstrong. Named after the mythical Carthaginian queen, Dido was educated at Thornhill Primary, City of London Girls', and Westminster Schools. At the age of six, she attended the Guildhall School of Music in London, England. She began, but did not complete, a degree course in law at Birkbeck College, London. By the time she reached her teens, Dido had already mastered piano, violin, and recorder. As an adult, she learned to play the guitar, showcasing her skills to audiences during her 2004 Life For Rent tour.Following her track, "Thank You" (which had already been used in the 1998 movie Sliding Doors) being sampled by the rapper, Eminem, in his UK #1 single, "Stan" (Dido appeared in the music video, acting as Stan's long-suffering girlfriend), Dido shot to worldwide fame and critical acclaim with her debut album, No Angel, which was already available in the USA, and charted in the UK top 5 on import sales alone. Her debut single, "Here With Me," had already caused demand for the album, as it was used as the theme music for the television programme Roswell (it was later used in the soundtrack for the movie Love Actually).
No Angel was the top-selling album of 2001 in the United Kingdom, debuting at, and returning to, #1 in the official UK albums chart many times throughout 2001. Her second album, Life For Rent, was released September 30, 2003, and became one of the fastest selling albums in UK music history, debuting at #1, and debuting in the US top 5. Dido has also won 4 Brit awards, winning Best British Female artist and Best British Album for No Angel at the 2002 ceremony, and Best British Female artist and Best British Single for "White Flag" at the 2004 ceremony. She also won Best Album for No Angel and Best Newcomer at the 2002 NRJ awards in France. Dido's hairstyle at this time was widely copied and became known as the "Dido flip".
Dido's brother, Rollo Armstrong, is part of the music group Faithless, and gave Dido her big break, by allowing her to provide guest vocals on certain Faithless album tracks, such as "Flowerstand Man" and "Hem Of His Garment." She continued the trend, even after she found fame in her own right, providing vocals for "One Step Too Far," which was released in the UK as a limited edition single, where it debuted at #6, and "No Roots" the title track of the final Faithless album. Rollo also co-writes and produces tracks with Dido, including many tracks on both No Angel and Life For Rent. Dido has also provided guest vocals to tracks by other artists including "Feels Like Fire" for Carlos Santana's 2003 album, Shaman and a duet with Rufus Wainwright entitled "I Eat Dinner (When The Hunger's Gone)" for the "[[Bridget_Jones: The Edge of Reason (film)|Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason]]" movie soundtrack.
Following her sold-out world tour of 2004, Dido took time out of her worldwide travels to perform at three of the Live 8 concerts on 2 July, 2005 - performing in London, then at the Eden Project in Cornwall, before flying over to Paris, performing solo and duetting with Youssou N'Dour.
In late 2005, Dido began working on her third solo album, writing and recording in America. She appeared at Clive Davies' pre-Grammy awards party in January 2006, where she said she aims to release the album sometime in 2006. Jon Brion is producing.
Critic
Life for rent received generally favourable reviews, but Dido has been critcised for providing "twee and bland aural wallpaper"..and offering "one polite song after another". [link] as well as being grudgingly respected for the quality of her voice and songwriting and hailed for the courage to go her own way completely
"In its own vapid, curiously sexless way, Life For Rent is actually fascinating stuff, so set against the usual rules of successful music that it starts to look oddly revolutionary" Q Mgazine[Oct 2003, p.99]
Discography
- No Angel - June 1999 - (#1 UK, 9x Platinum; #4 US, 4x Platinum; #1 AUS, 9x Platinum) - Worldwide Sales: 13.5million
- Life For Rent - September 2003 - (#1 UK, 7x Platinum; #4 US, 2x Platinum; AUS #1, 5x Platinum) - [Worldwide Sales]. a : 8.5million
Total Album Sales: 22 Million [link]
| Year | Song | US Hot 100 | US AC | US Dance | UK singles | AU singles | Album |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | "Stan" (with Eminem) | 51 | - | - | #1 | 2 | The Marshall Mathers LP |
| 2000 | "Here with Me" | - | 21 | - | 4 | 39 | No Angel |
| 2000 | "Don't Think of Me" | - | 35 | - | - | - | No Angel |
| 2001 | "Thank You" | 3 | #1 | #1 | 3 | #1 | No Angel |
| 2001 | "Hunter" / "Take My Hand" | - - | 16 - | 9 #1 | 17 | 16 | No Angel |
| 2001 | "All You Want" | - | - | - | - | 40 | No Angel |
| 2002 | "One Step Too Far" (with Faithless) | - | - | 4 | 6 | - | Outrospective |
| 2003 | "White Flag" | 18 | 4 | - | 2 | #1 | Life for Rent |
| 2004 | "Life for Rent" | - | - | - | 8 | 27 | Life for Rent |
| 2004 | "Stoned" | - | - | #1 | - | - | Life for Rent |
| 2004 | "Don't Leave Home" | - | 22 | - | 25 | - | Life for Rent |
| 2004 | "Sand in My Shoes" | - | 24 | #1 | 29 | 37 | Life for Rent |
| 2004 | "Do They Know It's Christmas?" (as part of Band Aid 20) | - | - | - | #1 | 9 | DTKIC CD-single |
- "Dido: Live"/"Dido: Live At Brixton Academy" (2004) - June 2005
External links
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All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.