De.Ville is a half Quebec, half Moroccan duo, comprised of the musician and producer simonpierre and the singer Ziad Qoulaii. Their melancholy sound and their hard-hitting bass and percussion pair well with Ziad’s unique vocals. De.Ville borrows from Raï, North African and West African music while fully identified with Montreal’s music scene. With a linguistic repertoire consisting of Darija, classical Arabic, French, and English, the multicultural aspect of the project reflects the reality of Quebec and is a reaction to the obsolete classification that is “world music”. In short, these heavy beats are difficult to categorize into a genre.
