Amber Arcades – in concert at Best Kept Secret 2017 – June 16, 2017 – VPRO/3VOOR12 Netherlands –
Amber Arcades tonight. In concert from the Best Kept Secret Festival 2017, recorded earlier this month by VPRO in The Netherlands and broadcast by 3VOOR12–FM.
Amber Arcades is no stranger to these pages – I ran another one of her concerts last year and considered her to be a star-on-the-rise. I played a hunch and was right – she’s back this year and with a growing fan base as well as debut album, Fading Lines, which came out in June of last year.
Amber Arcades, aka: Annelotte de Graaf has a fascinating story. Studying Law in her native Netherlands, she got her Masters Degree and landed a job as Assistant with the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, under the auspices of the United Nations. De Graaf has been responsible for “assessing the claims of refugees granted asylum in the Netherlands who are seeking to have their families brought over.” (her job title).
But her career as a talented singer-songwriter certainly belies the more pragmatic one as a campaigner for Human Rights, And it was only through sending along a copy of her then-current release to various industry insiders that she landed a contract with Heavenly Records.
So last year Annelotte de Graaf put her International Law pracice on hold and focused on this brilliant new career. Like I said last year, she was a star-on-the-rise and I anticipated good things happening with her. A year later, the prediction has come true. She’s hitting up most of the summer festivals across Europe this Summer. What, if anything, she may have planned for anything further West (i.e. the U.S.) is anybody’s guess. But whatever you do, give this concert a listen and check out her music and story. No disappointments.
Enjoy.
