Dido

Dido Armstrong (full name – Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle Armstrong) was born and raised in London in a family of a book publisher and a poetess. She was named after the first queen of Carthage. Dido grew with no TV in the house, which forced her to search entertainments elsewhere. Aged five, she stole a recorder from her school, which became the first music instrument she mastered. That was how she became interested in music. At a school of arts she learned to play violin and piano. Nevertheless, the girl did not plan to become a professional musician. She studied law and combined it with working at a book publishing house. Things changed with her elder brother Rollo launching the Faithless project. He did not believe in his sister’s vocal skills, which prompted Dido to dig in her heels and make him take her in as a backing singer. Despite the success of the Faithless debut album, Reverence, Dido saw no opportunities to reveal all her talent on the band, and made up her mind to start a solo career.

Dido got her manager’s permission to leave the publishing house for a year to commit all her time and efforts to music. She spent this period touring with Faithless and recording her own material. In a year, she signed a contract with Arista. Dido’s first album, No Angel, was released in the USA in 1999. The producing was performed by her brother Rollo, who was a rigid supporter of his sister throughout her music career. The album was promoted by a high selling single, Here With Me, taken as a main theme for the TV show Roswell. Dido presented a very interesting piece of music embracing slight electronica, folk guitars and tender vocals. In the same year, she participated in recording the new album by Faithless, Sunday 8pm, featuring the song Postcards recorded with parts of her single My Lover's Gone. It took No Angel quite a while to draw much attention. Within the frames of the supporting tour, Dido gave a number of performances in different cities and states of the country. After one of them, she met Eminem, who intended to sample her song Thank You for his composition Stan. She gave her permission, which became a decision to pave her the way to stardom. It was namely Stan that got masses of listeners interested in Dido’s music. Sales of No Angel soared high up in a blink of an eye. It retained a place in the UK charts for a hundred weeks with twelve million copies sold worldwide.

After the end of the two-year tour for No Angels, Dido completed her way from the status of a promising artist to the international superstar. The sin ginger’s subsequent album, Life for Rent, was delivered to stores in 2003 and featured the celebrated single White Flag. This studio work became the best European album and earned warm welcome from the audience and praiseful reviews. Still, Dido treated this triumph like a real professional and announced her plans to evolve further and open new horizons. She combined work on her project with continuous cooperation with Faithless. Besides, her voice can be heard on songs of several standout performers, including celebrated guitarist Carlos Santana. Preparation of Dido’s third album took three years, which was probably caused by her father’s death. Safe Trip Home was finally released in 2008.

Dido’s new album felt more serious and mature than her previous work and featured touching sentiment and vulnerable emotions. In Safe Trip Home Dido covered the topics of great grief and lost love, as on the album’s lead single Don’t Believe in Love.