Featuring members who hail from Czechia and Germany, Trendos and Viralli is a EDM production and DJ team, who manage to be restlessly prolific, releasing several songs a month. Their latest single “Blood Rave” is a woozily hypnotic, euphoria-inducing banger featuring tweeter and woofer rattling thump, glistening synth stabs and enormous hooks and drops.
Sonically channeling The Prodigy and deep, underground house, “Blood Rave” is the late night, seemingly drug-induced anthem for dancing the night away — and hopefully forgetting your troubles for a bit.
Throughout the course of this site’s close to 14 year history, I’ve managed to spill copious amounts of virtual ink covering the ridiculously prolific, New York-based producer, DJ, remixer and JOVM mainstay Rhythm Scholar. And during that same period, the New York-based JOVM mainstay has built a profile both nationally and internationally for crafting slickly produced, crowd-pleasing mashups and remixes.
Earlier this year, Rhythm Scholar released a woozy remix of one of my favorite Tears for Fears tunes “Change” that retains familiar and beloved elements of the song, including the vocal melody, the chiming and percussive synth line, the squiggling New Wave guitar figure and the acclaimed duo’s uncanny knack for anthemic hooks paired with a spacious and dreamy, club friendly production.
The BLEUFEU team recently announced the lineup for this year’s Toboggan — New Year’s Eve Celebrations, presented by SiriusXM. Held in the Grande Allée District, in the heart of the gorgeous and historic provincial capital, this year’s edition will take place between December 28, 2023 – December 31, 2023.
2023’s Toboggan gains a new election with the addition of a new stage at Place George V, the SiriusXM Cube, which will host festive electronic music nights between December 28, 2023 – December 30, 2023. The SiriusXM Cube is a must-faced stage that will allow attendees to see that stage’s performances from three sides, starting each day at 5:00pm.
December 28, 2023 will see Canadian duo Loud Luxury headlining, returning after headlining back in 2019. Montréal-based sensation GLOWZI and Québec-based DJ Derrick will complete the SiriusXM Cube’s first night.
December 29, 2023 will see French multi-platinum selling artist DJ Klingande, who has been a mainstay at the world’s major EDM festivals headlining. Montréal-born, Franco-Congolese, Afro House artist DJ Karaba and rising artist Millimetrik will complete the SiriusXM Cube’s second night.
December 30, 2023 will see Montréal-based electronic music pioneer High Klassified capping off the SiriusXM Cube’s final night.
The traditional New Year’s Eve show, which will take place at Place de l’Assemblée-Nationale between 8:00pm-12:30am will be headlined by Italian Grammy-nominated production outfit Meduza will bring in 2024 with a euphoric EDM set. Québecois artist La Diable à Cinq, Les Louanges and Mike Demero will complete the night’s wild party.
On-site, visitors can also enjoy the Winter Village, which will feature heated areas under tents and relaxation spaces to enhance the experience, starting at 1:00PM each day. (Believe me, from what I understand, those heated areas will be prime real estate for an outdoor festival in Québec in late December!) And this is all 100% free for visitors to enjoy, making Toboggan a great destination to celebrate the last days of 2023.
“New Year’s celebrations hold a special place in the hearts of the people of Quebec. We are very pleased to offer these four festive evenings free of charge to the entire population in the heart of our beautiful city,” BLEUFEU’s CEO Nicolas Racine says. “With each new edition, we aim to establish Toboggan as a must-attend event and showcase the potential of Quebec as the ultimate Nordic destination,” he adds.
“We are excited about the new stage at Place George V. It was high time to equip the event with a stage setup and production worthy of the EDM festival it has become. Performances by artists such as Loud Luxury or Klingande will take on a whole new dimension,” explainsLouis Bellavance, VP Content and Artistic Direction at BLEUFEU.
Lastly, as a festival, Toboggan is environmentally conscious and seeks to reduce its ecological footprint. Among their many actions taken, the festival will soon be carbon-neutral, with the greenhouse gas emissions generated by the event being offset through Planetair. They also produce sustainable mobility through its communication campaigns, Additionally, the festival will warm attendees in an environmentally conscious fashion, by using eco-friendly logs in its outdoor fireplaces.
The festival also has come up with a Good Festivalgoer Guide, which is available on their homepage, and offers festival goers a series of green actions that they can do to minimize the ecological impact of their visit.
Diamondz is a Miami-based DJ and electronic music producer. As an open format DJ, who has blended genres together for crowds at clubs and venues across Miami, he has shared stages with a number of luminaries including Rihanna, Lizzo, T-Pain, Darude and Roger Sanchez.
The Miami-based DJ recently stepped out into the spotlight as a producer and artist, and he manages to continue the genre-blending approach to his own original music with his work blending elements of hip-hop, electronic music and pop, influenced by producers like Diplo and David Guetta.
Last month, the South Florida-based DJ released “Blind,” a song build around a slick production featuring glistening synths, skittering beats and a soulful vocal melody paired with twitter and woofer rattling house music-inspired drops. Throughout, the song’s vocalist tells a story of two people, who just can’t seem to see the love that they have right in front of them. The result is a remarkably crowd-pleasing, club friendly bop that seamlessly meshes elements of Billboard Top 40 pop and EDM.
Diamondz’ third single “Speed Dial” is a sultry, radio friendly club banger built around a pop-tinged production reminiscent of The Weeknd, built around skittering trap beats, atmospheric and twinkling synths and a yearning vocal melody. “Speed Dial” is the sort of mood-setting song that you’d hope would be playing when you’re trying to holler at that pretty young thing at the bar or the club.
It’s a nod to those late nights, leaving the party or the club and you get that call or text from someone you caught a vibe with,” the Miami-based producer explains. “The airy pads capture the aura of that late night drive to meet up while the allure of the dancing synth line captures the energy and feeling you get when you first link with that new person…the proverbial butterflies!”
Travis Stewart is a sound designer, composer and electronic music producer, best known as Sentiom. Stewart has spent the past two-plus decades composing music for film scores as a teenager, and gradually moved towards electronic music as one half of the EDM duo Paragon Axis, an outfit whose material has amassed almost one million streams across different streaming platforms. With Sentiom, Stewart crafts lush and melodic techno/deep house that frequently sees him pairing organic melodies with aggressive synthesizer work and driving bass.
Stewart’s latest single, the sleek, dance floor friendly “No Limits” is built around glistening synth arpeggios, skittering 808s, a relentless motorik-like groove and his penchant for rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses paired with a sultry pop starlet vocal sample. The result is a song that seems to channel Robyn and Little Boots with a similar crowd-pleasing accessibility.
Diamondz is a Miami-based DJ and emerging electronic music producer. As an open format DJ, who has blended genres together for crowds at clubs and venues across Miami, he has shared stages with a number of luminaries including Rihanna, Lizzo, T-Pain, Darude and Roger Sanchez.
The Miami-based DJ recently stepped out into the spotlight as a producer, and he manages to continue the genre-blending approach to his own original music with his work blending elements of hip-hop, electronic music and pop, influenced by producers like Diplo and David Guetta.
His second and latest single “Blind” is built around a slick production featuring glistening synths, skittering beats, a soulful vocal melody and a twitter and woofer rattling house drops. Throughout, the song’s vocalist tells a story of two people, who just can’t seem to see the love that they have right in front of them. The result is a remarkably crowd-pleasing, club friendly bop that seamlessly meshes elements of Billboard Top 40 pop and EDM.
Finesse is an emerging London-based electronic music producer and artist, who has a passion for creating energetic, uplifting EDM and house with a melodic vibe that can simultaneously help you chill out — and make you dance.
His debut single “So Alone” is a summery club friendly banger built around a deep house-inspired production featuring glistening synth arpeggios, tweeter and woofer rattling thump and a soulful vocal sample paired with an incredibly catchy hook. The result is a song that strikes me as sounding like a mix of Between Two Selves-era Octo Octa, Larry Levan, and 90s dance pop.
Patrice Woolley is a Monégasque-born multidisciplinary artist. After completing his studies, he spent a few years as a decorator in his native Monaco but then relocated to Nice, where he experimented with Art Deco. and then became a decorator/scenographer — and then a finally a theater manager for Galabru, Lagerfeld, Gilbert and others. He then steps out into the spotlight as an actor, with a a decade-long stint at Nice’s Théâtre du Fou.
Woolley eventually relocated to Paris, where he worked a decorator, stage manager, actor, draftsman actor and painter. He spent some time as a decorator at the Monte Carlo Opera when it was in Paris, and was a temp at the French School of Press officers (EPAP3), where he taught design and editing courses.
Back in 2019, the Monégasque-born multidisciplinary artist releases his full-length debut, SILLIS, a pop/rock effort under the moniker Woolley. His sophomore album PULSATIONS MIND’S features the swaggering”Funky Noises,” banger built around buzzing synth oscillations and tweeter and woofer rattling thump that sounds like a synthesis of Tweekend-era The Crystal Method, Out of the Black-era Boys Noize and Daft Punk.
Fittingly, the video by Woolley features a collection of dancing robots, explosive lights and more.
Sinan Özgur Koç is a Berlin-based, Turkish electronic music producer and artist, drummer and sound engineer, best known as Rozarc. Koç has grown up with a diverse array of music influencing his own work ranging from Bjork, Amon Tobin, and Nine Inch Nails to Siouxsie and The Banshees and Kyuss among others. But as an electronic music producer and artist, his work is influenced by techno, tech-house. industrial, synth wave, downtempo, glitch and IDM while paired with sound design ideas moulded with narrative and cinematic structures.
The Berlin-based producer and artist first emerged into the electronic music scene with his debut EP, 2019’s five-song Odds Are Tough, which saw him quickly establishing a forward-thinking, genre and style-defying sound and approach to his productions while being remarkably harmonious. Koç’s full-length debut, last year’s 12-song Flamacue was released to quite a bit of attention with the album being showcased in FAZEmag, The Groove Cartel, The Further, Zero Music Magazine, R+, Roadie Music, Zone Nights, Electronica.org.uk, and a list of others.
Built around layers of fluttering and shimmering synth arpeggios, tweeter and woofer rattling thump, twinkling keys and skittering beats, the remarkably cinematic album track “Sand Grains” seems like a slick synthesis of John Carpenter soundtracks, Tour de France-era Kraftwerk and Snap!‘s “Rhythm Is A Dancer” — but with a club friendly accessibility.
Cyril Thévenard is a Dijon, France-born, classically trained flute player, and highly regarded electronic music producer and artist. Initially influenced by French touch, Thévenard becomes a DJ and plays at raves under the moniker Hermetic Unity.
Thévenard started releasing material as John Lord Fonda in 1997 with the release of that year’s Vulcan through Choice Records. After gaining experience on the turntables, the Dijon-born electronic music producer and artist, signed with Citizen Records, who released 2004’s VoltAge. 2005 saw the release of Erase My AngerEP, followed by Debaser, which featured a cover of Depeche Mode’s “Personal Jesus.”
2009’s Composite compilation, included some live versions of tracks. 2011 was a busy year: He started the year with the Bang The Fire! EP and closed out the year with Supersonique. Thévenard then disappeared from the scene for the next decade, reappearing with the release of 2021’s Walk Again, which featured “Together Again,” a club banger built around glistening synth arpeggios, skittering beats, tweeter and woofer rattling thump and euphoria-inducing hooks.
Recently Grenoble, France-born and based electronic music producer and artist Endrik Schroeder remixed “Together Again” feat. Gabriel Afathi turning it into an Italo Disco banger, along the lines of From Here to Eternity-era Giorgio Moroder with a contemporary EDM sheen — but while retaining the song’s original, mysterious air.
Allegories was a long-dormant experimental noise duo that reappeared in 2014 as an electro pop unit that experimented with genre, meshing eclectic soundscapes with pop inclinations. Gathering further, inspiration from DJ’ing house and hip-hop nights, the act began to create electronic music that often shifts between the mainstream and underground spectrum.
The duo’s latest single “Pray” is a feverish left field take on dance music, centered around `shimmering synth arpeggios, thumping beats, euphoria-inducing hooks and pitch shifted vocals that sonically is a slick synthesis of Evil Heat era Primal Scream and Sound of Silver era LCD Soundsystem. Or in other words, it’s a bizarre yet winning mix of menace, irony and sincerity within a club banger.
“‘Pray’ feels like a tree grown out of a seed of house music, but its leaves are wild and varied,” the mysterious duo explain. “Sometimes you let gravity take over a composition; you start one way but over time music evolves naturally. At the same time, “Pray” doesn’t function in an uncomplicated fashion. It was written and recorded over many years and each new iteration added conflicting emotional layers. A menagerie of feelings. Owing as much to the overtly sincere as it does the misleading insincere. “
Today is the 16th day of February — and the 16th day Black History Month. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been proudly featuring Black artists across a wide and eclectic array of genres and styles with the hopes that these artists can guide you towards further understanding of the Black experience.
As the month goes on, I hope that you’ll be reminded of these urgently important facts:
Black culture is American culture — and Black music is American music.
America’s greatest and beloved contributions to the world are Black music styles — the blues, jazz, rock ‘n’ roll and hip-hop.
Black art matters.
Black lives matter — all of them, all of the time.
Nile Rodgers has written, cowritten and/or produced some of the biggest and most beloved dance floor and pop hits of the past 50 years while working with a who’s who list of artists across a diverse and eclectic array of artists. I’d guarantee that Rodgers has worked with an artist you love on a song you love. And as a result, his sound and approach has been instrumental in your life.
Clocking in at a little under three minutes, Longbois’ latest single, the minimalist “Techno Medicament” is centered around hypnotic repetitions of dense synth arpeggio layers, tweeter and woofer rattling polyrhythmic thump. Sonically, the song strikes me as a sleek and energetic synthesis of Kraftwerk and The Chemical Brothers‘ “Star Guitar.” Interestingly, as Longbois explains the song is influenced by several different electronic music styles and genres including minimalist techno, IDM and house. Ideally, the song was created as a a way to escape one’s troubles after a hard day’s/night’s work.
