Yasmine Hamdan


Yasmine Hani Hamdan is a Lebanese singer and songwriter, now based in Paris.

Biography

Hamdan became known with Soapkills, the duo she founded with Zeid Hamdan while she was still living in Beirut, Lebanon. The first album released by Soapkills was Bater. Soapkills was one of the first independent electronic bands in the Middle East, and its innovative approach exerted a lasting influence. To this day, Yasmine Hamdan is considered an icon of underground music across the Arab world.
After moving to Paris, Hamdan collaborated with CocoRosie. She teamed up with Mirwais Ahmadzaï, with whom she recorded the 2008 album Arabology under the Y.A.S. moniker.
Hamdan then joined forces with Marc Collin, and was released internationally in 2013 by Crammed Discs under the title Ya Nass. In this album, which blends pop, folk and electronic sounds with melodies and lyrics inspired by various Middle-Eastern traditions, Hamdan "has undertaken the challenge of affirming and rewriting Arabic musical heritage", according to Al Akhbar. Her personal life and her curiosity have enabled Hamdan to playfully use various dialects of Arabic in her lyrics, which alternate between Lebanese, Kuwaiti, Palestinian, Egyptian and Bedouin, as well as some of the code-switching which is so typical of Middle-Eastern humour.
Hamdan had a cameo in Jim Jarmusch's film Only Lovers Left Alive alongside Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston. She has written an original soundtrack for the theatre play Rituel pour une métamorphose by Syrian playwright Saadallah Wannous for a production at Comédie-Française.
Entitled Al Jamilat, Yasmine Hamdan's second solo album came out in 2017. Recorded in Beirut, Paris and London, it was produced by herself, co-produced by Leo Abrahams and Luke Smith, and features performances by Shahzad Ismaily, Steve Shelley and more. Jamilat Reprise, an album of reworks by the likes of Acid Arab, Matias Aguayo, Brandt Brauer Frick and several others, came out in 2018.
Yasmine Hamdan is married to the Palestinian film director and actor Elia Suleiman and lives in Paris.

Discography

;with Soap Kills
  • Bater
  • Cheftak
  • Enta Fen
;with Y.A.S.
  • Arabology
;Solo recordings