rescuing musical virtue in distress.
I’m sure we could all do with something to smile about. It’s been a tough year all-round, no matter who or where you are. Between the political turmoil and the pandemic's imposed angst and isolation, it is perhaps now more than ever that we need music to come to our rescue. And whilst 2020 seems... Continue Reading →
Stephanie Rodriguez trades in soulful grooves, R&B-infused pop, slow-burning torch songs and, occasionally, euphoric dance music. She seems to have found a way to marry the smooth sonics of the past with a more cutting-edge delivery and in doing so she delivers a sound which will appeal to the traditionalists as much as it will... Continue Reading →
Although Your Waist runs along on some confident grooves, it is flavoured by some neat additional sonic touches and it is these less-expected moves which make it stand out from the slew of bed-room rappers and identikit urban wannabes. At its heart is a joyous beat, one which seems to be a wonderful collision of... Continue Reading →
Words paint pictures. You hear words like Dance or terms such as EDM and your mind conjures images of packed clubland dance floors moving to euphoric and bombastic electronica. Hear the word ambient and you think of drifting minimalism and gossamer light sonic threads. Yet Present Paradox manages to blend both of these mutually exclusive... Continue Reading →
What happens when you take one of the most happening Dutch electronic music artists of the moment, the hottest Argentinian dance producer of the day and throw all of their skills and imagination into one track? Three and a half minutes of euphoria and bliss, energy and impulse called In My Head, that's what. Not... Continue Reading →
Having more than proved that it can hold its own in the modern electronic music scene with All Of My Love and a deft remix of To My Heart, RMA returns with another slice of incendiary dance music. Designated floor fillers need to be infectious and easy on the ear, groove-aware and full of life,... Continue Reading →
If dance music is built around intoxicating and hypnotic rhythms and pop music sass and addictive groove, then this latest song from Dejhare seems to exist at the point where those two sibling genres meet. Not only meet, but meld and merge, then mutate into a hybrid sound which is as likely to sooth the... Continue Reading →
Faith is a very personal thing but it is through the following of those individual paths which has been responsible for much of the art and culture which defines civilisation. From awe-inspiring, ancient architecture to painted renaissance masterpieces to the voices raised in musical celebration, all have played a part in shaping the world we... Continue Reading →
Never has a single been so perfectly titled. The spaciousness of the music and the soulful, not to mention tasteful, deliveries makes for a very opaque song, one that allows you to really appreciate the mechanics that it is built on…and it’s all groove.Very often artists write songs that has a sonic engine room full... Continue Reading →
Music has come a long way in such a short time. There was a time, even within my memory, where you accessed your music news via the printed word, listened to it via a physical, vinyl pressing and if you wanted to see music being played, you had to wait until a bunch of people... Continue Reading →
Perhaps, now more than at any other time in recent history, people are looking for a ray of hope, a long lost, sliver-lining, a glimmer of light breaking through the dark clouds which seem to be gathering at an ever increasing pace. Okay, we shouldn’t look to musicians to provide the solutions, that isn’t their... Continue Reading →
It has to be the sign of a good song that so many people wish to cover it. But perhaps it says even more about the song-writing if that song is robust enough to stand up to constant reinvention, that other artists are able to take the core elements and re-mix, re-invent, re-imagine and come... Continue Reading →
Music has always provided the perfect mechanism for an artist to get things off their chests, a way to exorcise demons and negative thoughts and as a way of connecting with others who might find themselves in similar situations. You Know Me Better does all these things and more. Not only that, it does it... Continue Reading →
It is safe to say that Ridin is as much a song infused with BASE's Lebanese roots as it is with by the influences of his current Los Angeles base. It certainly has all the hallmarks of music made for the US market but amongst its western grooves and four-four dance rhythms there is also... Continue Reading →
There has always been a sweet spot to be found between the exoticism of African music and the more direct nature of western musical approaches and that is exactly where you find KoKou Kah and his latest release Best Friend. Infused with some deep rooted grooves and dexterous bass lines, Best Friend is also light... Continue Reading →
There has, for obvious reasons, been a wave of artists making music reflecting the times of late. After all it is in times of adversity when the most interesting music is made. Rock 'n' Roll, Punk, Hip-Hop, Rave…all music born out of heady combinations of frustration, disenfranchisement, rebellion, a desire for cultural or political change... Continue Reading →
Africali make music which is the equivalent of cutting a sonic gemstone. Hold it up and it throws out all manner of different colours and patterns depending on how the light catches it. The same can be said of Daughters of The Sun. Turn it one way and pick up on Afro-rock rhythms and heady,... Continue Reading →
If he as trying to create nothing other than a wonderfully chilled, dance-infused, mellow vibes, pop song, Olivier Herràn the man behind Dreams of Orion would have succeeded with room to spare. But the fact that he has claimed that the music has a higher purpose means that perhaps the music needs to tick certain... Continue Reading →
The strange and beguiling spoken word intro to the wonderfully named Made in Snoring pretty much sets out the mission statement for the man behind the Rural Manifesto. Over odd, meandering and slowly building electronic ripples he underlines the much held view that, compared to the city, everything that takes place in the countryside is... Continue Reading →
Imagine if dance music was more than the sum of its parts? More than the infectious rhythms and the solid, martial beats, more than the euphoric highs and the falling lows that help carve the dynamics from solid sound, more than just the stylish accompanying videos…and this has a particularly stylish accompanying video…more than the... Continue Reading →
I guess if you wanted any further proof that the world is a small place and that cultural influences and musical inspirations are free to tumble around and cross-pollinate at will, creating new, unique, hybrid sonic forms, then 3P1C H1D3R is it. Pshyche is a wonderful mix of sounds and styles, genres and geography, a... Continue Reading →
Sometimes you just need music which hits all the right spots, something fun and funky, something that washes over you and enters your body by some sort of groove-based osmosis rather than requiring you to put too much effort in. And when you are in that sort of mood then you can turn to Nikavo.... Continue Reading →
This latest song from Xalser takes pop along some interesting sonic pathways. It starts off in fairly familiar territory, a chilled, soulful, R&B groove built of sultry tones and casual beats, doing exactly what you might expect it to. And then about a minute in it mutates into a wonderful, futuristic, alternative-dance hybrid. Although dance... Continue Reading →
I guess the reason that so many people, especially in the pop and dance worlds, are referencing 80’s sounds, even if they don’t always realise it, is because that was a more pioneering time. Today, making music can be as simple as downloading samples, using technology to bend even the most lack lustre vocals into... Continue Reading →
There is something interesting about the language barrier. Whereas music, especially that aimed at the modern mainstream audience, relies heavily on the direct communication of the lyrics to engage with the listener, take that connection away and you force people to engage with the music in purely emotional terms. That is what makes Nadie Se... Continue Reading →
Just because you can’t pronounce a song's title doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy it. Just as, my limited knowledge of the Ukrainian language (I know the words thank you and…beer, obviously) doesn’t mean that I can’t get lost in it’s vocal charms. What is life without a little mystery? And what’s life without a... Continue Reading →
If you are going to do pop you might as well tick all the boxes, pop done half heartedly is a waste of everyones time. Those boxes include things like, infectiousness, addictive grooves, danceable beats, euphoric lyrics and a sense of adventurousness, abandonment and escapism. Kamryn Marie makes music which visits all of these stations... Continue Reading →
There is certainly something about Katrina Stuart’s brand of R&B driven, clubland pop that sets her apart for those around her. It isn’t so much the sounds that she uses or the type of song she is writing, for those aspects, whilst still cleverly wrought, stay within the generic norms for someone with an eye... Continue Reading →
Just because the vote doesn’t go your way doesn’t mean that you have to stop making the argument and at least the return of Boris Johnson, a resounding return at that, means that Cabinet of Millionaires will have no shortage of subject matter to work with. Not that they were ever stuck for things to... Continue Reading →
Collisions between the classical and contemporary music world have always gone on and to varying degrees of success. I guess where one is the realm of discipline and exactitude the other is more often the home of feeling and improvisational jamming. Getting the two to work together probably relies on being able to switch mindsets... Continue Reading →