Jacob Montague is a San Francisco, CA-based electronic music artist and producer, best known as a of member BRANCHES and as a solo artist, who has had his music appear in a number of popular TV shows including — America’s Got Talent, The X Factor, One Tree Hill and others, as well as the film trailers for The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Afternoon Delight, and Love Is Strange. Adding to a growing profile, Montague has also been on bills with Mutemath, Joseph, Twin Forks, DEVO and others.
However, with his latest solo recording project Tsutro, Montague’s sound draws from a diverse array of influences including pop, worldbeat, future garage, ambient and downtempo. And with his debut as Tsutro, Montague’s sound reveals a new sonic approach in which the Bay Area-based producer and artist carefully chose a vocalist that would work with a particular aesthetic in mind, sampled a few phrases and then carefully built up a new arrangement around that sample; so while seeming like a remix and a rework of sorts, the material Montague has crafted manages to feel as though it’s a crafted original song in which a producer has collaborated with a vocalist. In fact, with his latest single as Tsutro “Back To You,” you hear shimmering aqueous-like synths paired with stuttering drum programming paired with Sunday Lane‘s plaintive and tender vocals reminiscing and mourning over an ex-lover in a radio-friendly, house-music-leaning electro pop song that reminds me quite a bit of Octo Octa‘s Between Two Selves as it evokes a lonely, late night ache and a falling into a bracingly cold bath.
