Black Sea Dahu

To listen to Black Sea Dahu is to stand barefoot in a thunderstorm: completely exposed, yet completely alive. It’s to be cracked open in real time, emotions unfurling like smoke from a newly lit fire.

Led by Janine Cathrein, singer, songwriter, and fierce architect of feeling, the band exists in a world of their own making. Part collective, part family, part traveling soul-repair unit, Black Sea Dahu are known for crafting songs that are as fragile as they are ferocious. They’ve never played it safe and they never will.

Now, with their next album Everything (Release date: 20.02.2025) looming on the horizon, Black Sea Dahu dig deeper still. Not by changing who they are, but by revealing more of what was always there: raw nerve, a steady hand, an unflinching willingness to be vulnerable, and the kind of music that meets you exactly where you are.

The new material was shaped by a tidal wave of grief: the loss of Janine’s father and the vertigo of living in a world at odds with itself. It speaks to death and grief, self-reckoning, carrying everything, and magic.

On “One Day Will Be All I Have”, the first single, Cathrein doesn’t just sing about loss, she sings from within it.

The song is a luminous grief offering and arrives like a wave: sorrowful, steady, soul-hewn. Grief is a texture here. A frequency. Her voice, at once fragile and unflinching, moves like a tide over arrangements that feel hand-carved and cinematic, each note telling a story of sorrow, resilience, and the kind of emotional clarity that only comes with lived experience. This is not music made to impress. It’s music made to survive.

“Only in music can I sit with this grief without going mad.” – Janine

Genre is a cage, and Black Sea Dahu were never meant to be caged. From their early days as JOSH, with The Kids of the Sun (2012) and Kingdom North (2014), to their ocean-deep breakout debut White Creatures (2018), they’ve refused to color inside the lines. With the haunting No Fire in the Sand EP (2019), the widescreen I Am My Mother (2022), and the follow up Orbit EP, this Swiss outfit has carved a niche for themselves beyond genre.

Their music, often described as indie folk, chamber pop, and art rock, evokes something much deeper. Their songs are handwoven tapestries: an emotional landscape where melodies unfold like short films, each song a moment of introspection, unapologetically vulnerable.

At the center is Janine Cathrein, a quiet storm in motion, whose voice carries entire worlds. The songs she writes don’t decorate pain; they sit with it, stare it down, whisper it into something almost beautiful. Her lyrics are raw but refined, introspective without retreating, poetic without the sugarcoat. No melodrama, no masks. Just a clear attempt to map the chaos within.

They trace the threads of human connection, the ache of love when it stretches or slips, the blur between self and other, the slow burn of grief, and the fragile outlines of hope. But there’s resilience in the way she writes, like she’s trying to translate inner weather into words. And in doing so, disarm it.

Black Sea Dahu has always been a tight-knit gang: siblings, friends. Over the years, the Swiss collective led by Janine Cathrein — the band's voice, vision, and heart — has become something rare: a band that builds their own world and invites you to live in it.

For Everything, the whole group got together: Janine, Vera, Pascal, Ramon, Alon, Paul, Simon and Nick. Longtime friend and collaborator Gavin Gardiner also helped shape the sound. The string, brass, and woodwind arrangements were developed in close collaboration between Janine, Janos Mijnssen, and Gina Été.

Since their debut, the band has forged a path marked by depth over speed, intimacy over spectacle, and has become one of Europe’s most compelling live acts. Their shows, whether in packed clubs or roaring festival tents, feel like collective exhalations and have sold out from Berlin to Paris to London.

Touring, for Black Sea Dahu, is not just the grind, it’s a quest. A nightly invocation. A way to turn collective ache into catharsis.

They’ve played numerous stages across Europe and were invited to Reeperbahn (2018/2022), The Great Escape (2019), m4music (2019), MaMA (2019), Eurosonic (2020), and Montreux Jazz Festival (2024). They’ve shared bills with the likes of Ben Howard, José González, Lucy Rose, Agnes Obel, Amy MacDonald, Dermot Kennedy and Sophie Hunger, and drawn comparisons to Jeff Buckley, Big Thief, Phoebe Bridgers, Bon Iver, and Radiohead, though really, they sound like no one but themselves.

In 2024, the band released their first live album LIVE in Zürich and Bern, featuring the string quartet Amour sur Mars. What started as a one-off, four evenings that felt like spellwork, has grown into a full-blown collaboration. This year, they return to the stage as one, bringing this rare constellation to selected stages across Europe. Amour sur Mars will also be heard on their forthcoming album Everything.

Black Sea Dahu tour to connect. And what they bring, each time they step onstage, is the kind of presence you don’t forget. Which is why a devoted audience has gathered around them, drawn to the band’s rare gift for holding shadow and light in the same breath.

With their forthcoming album Everything, Black Sea Dahu once again show what sets them apart: a band that isn’t chasing trends or fame, but seeking something real — something that happens when words and music meet the soul.

It’s music that refuses to hide and speaks truths many can’t find words for.In a time of noise, Black Sea Dahu offer a quiet truth. When you press play, you’re not just hearing a band — you’re entering their world.