Bertrand Dossa is an emerging Marseille, France-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer, best known as CLOUDNiNE. Since he was a teenager, the French singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer has played in countless jazz bands across his native France, the UK and the US as a pianist — but as an adult, CLOUDNiNE split his time between music and a career in the science and medical fields, which brought him to stints residing in Birmingham, UK and Chapel Hill, NC for a few years.
Interestingly, while splitting his time between a legitimate day job, the Marseille-based artist wrote his own original material but never had the chance to release it — but as he got into his 30s, he recognized that now was the right time to step into the limelight as a solo artist with his self-titled, solo, full-length debut. Recorded, produced and written by the emerging French artist in his Marseille-based home studio, the album touches upon falling in and out of love, lust, the complexities of adult life and adult responsibilities and more.
The album’s latest single “I Know” is a slow-burning and sultry pop song. Centered around layers of shimmering synth arpeggios and expressive bursts of guitar, as well as stuttering beats, an infectious, radio friendly hook and CLOUDNiNE’s plaintive vocals, the song finds the emerging French artist seamlessly Quiet Storm-era R&B and contemporary pop with a coolly swaggering, self-assuredness. But at its core, the song is an achingly sad song about a relationship that’s run its course — and both parties have come to the sad realization that they’ll soon be going their own separate ways. And although it isn’t what they ideally would want, it just has to be that way.
