Dahlia

Dahlia Kõiv; born February 7, 1989), usually referred to mononymously as Dahlia, is a Liechtensteinian recording artist and songwriter. Born in Balzers, Dahlia wrote and produced her own music from her home from the age of 17, sharing her material online via her Myspace account. In 2008 she gained recognition in her home country, and by 2010 had become a household name. In 2011, she signed with several small record labels as a songwritter, writing for small unsigned acts. In 2013, Dahlia prepared herself for international success, with her debut album "Chasing Shadows" being released in the UK on 24 June 2013, alongside her debut single "No Angels". "Chasing Shadows" debuted at number one in the United Kingdom.

1989-2006: Childhood
Dahlia was born in Liechtenstein in the town of Balzers on February 7, 1989. At this point, Balzers's population was just over 4,000. Her mother was a pianist and her father was a mechanic. Her parents separated when she was 11 due to domestic violence. Dahlia has two younger siblings, twins born in 2002.

As a child, she received piano lessons from her mother from the age of four, practicing six days a week. She was always surrounded by music due to her mother's occupation, and began writing her own songs at a young age. She began writing stories, mini books, and poems at the age of 10 to escape from her "abusive" household to an "imaginary world". Despite being discouraged, Dahlia dropped out of school at the age of 16 to pursue her musical career.

2006-2012: Career beginnings
From 2006, Dahlia signed up to Myspace at the age of seventeen, after feeling she was limited to the people her music could reach, coming from such a small and excluded country. She quickly began to become noticed, putting early songs onto the site such as "Hurting World" and "Escape", written about her troubled upbringing and longing to escape her native country. By 2009, Dahlia had over 12,000 subscribers (by far the most any Liechtensteinian act had on the site) and became a household name in her native, leading to her making her own EP, "The Early Years". The following year she signed to a small independent label, "LMA Records" and began writing for small Liechtensteinian acts. By 2010, Dahlia had become frustrated with the amount of opportunities her country could offer her, feeling trapped and like she had peaked. Disputes began between her and the label, leading to her being dropped. Later, the media in Liechtenstein labelled failure as the "Dahlia Curse". Dahlia has stated she feels no resentment towards her home country, as she told in a 2013 interview:

''“No, I don't feel any resentment. For a while, because I left Liechtenstein and Liechtensteinians didn't hear anything about me so all these Liechtensteinian young singers were like... I guess they're slowly turning around now and understanding that I really was doing something here.”''

Dahlia briefly signed to another independent label, "Hidden Momentum" but the label went bankrupt, after Dahlia produced only one song, the track "Ugly Everywhere". Despite this, she posted the song online and gained recognition, eventually leading to her receiving offers in the United Kingdom with producers, leading to Dahlia finally leaving her home country in persue of chart success.

While in London for a year, she worked with numerous producers and due to lack of money as the contracts she had gained previously were unsuccessful, she ate nothing but rice for three months when she lived in an abandoned house during winter and slept on a cot. At the age of 23, she finally began to receive some serious acclaim, and meetings with top British record labels are ongoing.

2012-present: Chasing Shadows
In 2009, Dahlia worked with producer, songwriter, and mixer David Maurice on an autobiographical set of songs, the first set of which were released on an EP titled "The Early Days", released online in Liechtenstein in 2011. Work on her debut album has been ongoing for several years, however real progress has been made in 2013, with it expected to receive a UK and potentially worldwide release in Summer 2013. The debut single and album have a scheduled UK release date of 24 June 2013. On 17 May, Dahlia revealed the title of her debut single is "No Angels". Less than two weeks later she revealed the single will be taken from her debut album, titled "Chasing Shadows". On 30 May, Dahlia revealed via her official website that she had been signed by Coral Harris to her label, Next Generation Records. Upon their releases, both the single and album became a massive success in the UK, with "No Angels" debuting at number three on the singles chart, and "Chasing shadows" hitting number one on the album chart. The album was nominated for "Best Alternative/Rock Album" at the 24th Urapopstar Awards. Dahlia spent the rest of 2013 travelling and promoting her album across the rest of Europe.

On 28 February 2014, Dahlia confirmed that she would be releasing the second single from the album, "Cerulean Tears" on 07 April. Upon it's release, the single debuted at #02 on the UK singles chart, giving Dahlia her highest charting single to date. Dahlia was nominated for "Best Newcomer" at the 25th Urapopstar Awards.

On 12 March 2015, Dahlia revealed that the third single to from "Chasing Shadows" would be getting released in the near future. To build up hype around her return, she released album track "Beautiful From Afar" as a Digital Release on 16 March 2015. It debuted at #3 on the Digital chart.

The third official single from the album "Last Train Home", featuring Pandora is due for release on 21 September 2015. While promoting the single, Dahlia revealed she would be re-releasing her album in December. "Last Train Home" charted at #3 in the UK, giving Dahlia her third consecutive single to chart within the top three.

In October 2015, Dahlia was nominated at the Urapopstar Awards 27 for Best Rock/Alternative Artist. On 27 June, 2016 Dahlia released "Wings Off Butterflies" as a Download-only single to raise money for the families of the victims of the LGBT Orland shootings. It charted at #2 on the Digital chart.

Discography
Main article: Dahlia Discography

Albums
2013: Chasing Shadows (#1)