Olivia Anna Livki: New Album, New Sound.

Last updated: February 29, 2024 10:07 pm

Divine Magazine 4 Min Read

Olivia Anna Livki (aka LiVKI) is a DIY-force of nature. A singer, bassist, songwriter and producer who creates her own artwork, costumes and music videos – a postpunk-diva working her bass guitar like a weapon. Influenced by art pop giants like Talking Heads and Kate Bush, Livki shares their no limits attitude towards musical fusion; indie pop, electronic hip-hop, kuduro, orchestral pop and raw blues with the unity of voice and bass at the core.

We Are Carthago, the second single from Digital Dissidents is the album’s big banger and secret title-track, a melodic dancerock-anthem of determination, solidarity and hope. The song was originally inspired by the new, female-lead social and ecological movements and their demand, that we as a society take charge of our power and world. Olivia Anna Livki grew up as a multicultural child in constant migration, experiencing abuse and gender-discrimination. When the rise of #Metoo began and the voices of nationalists and the alt-right grew louder, she started writing the We Are Carthago to cope with her personal process. The song evolved into a powerful anthem for everybody, a humorous, passionate case for learning from history, against divisions and for solidarity. Its call seems now more current than ever – we are a community, We Are Carthago:

“We’re breaking through the waters. Beautiful sons and daughters. The great heat’s below us. And only one sky above us. ‘Cause the future is now”

Her hands-on DIY-approach started out of necessity, yet she turned it into a philosophy of empowerment. Livki literally creates and owns herself, her narrative, music and image with no strings attached. Growing up in the countryside of South Germany with few opportunities she taught her self-reliance and how not to give up. She began making films at age 10 and writing songs at 16, releasing two albums in 2011 and 2015. Now based in Berlin, she’s earned her a passionate fanbase and caused a buzz on social media with videos such as Hologram, Abby Abby and Blood Ponies.

The Album: ‘Digital Dissidents’

Digital Dissidents is about freedom, power and the revolutionary way the internet has impacted our relation to them, both in terrifying and empowering ways.

Livki tells the stories of female influencers with extreme bodies (Spectacular), of trolls who fuel political crises (#Collapse, Information War), of existential fears in the age of climate change, terrorism and neo-authoritarian, misogynistic fury (Wave in Rage, Solaris, Black) but mostly of the determination to ‘take the lead’ in the face of those fears (We Are Carthago, Resist). Some of her stories are pure satire, others are based on deeply personal experiences of struggle, abuse and hope, seen in the bigger picture (Reconciliation). In DIY Cinderella, Livki cheekily refers to her own journey as a female artist, ironically reflecting on gender-roles and power.

Digital Dissidents consists of radical contrasts: Livki mixes up pop-anthems, dance-punk and dark voice’n’bass. Her lyrics go from black humour and ironic postmodernism, paying homage to Ghost in The Shell, John Oliver or Jaron Lanier, to fragile, melancholic and dystopian.

Digital Dissidents is Olivia Anna Livki’s first release in the UK/US.