Tag: indie electro pop

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Initially formed in Bryon Bay, Australia the members of up-and-coming synth funk/dance pop act Parcels, comprised of Patrick Hetherington, Louie Swain, Noah Hill, Jules Crommelin, and  Anatole Serret relocated to Berlin, Germany after they all graduated from high school to seriously pursue music and to hone their sound in one of the most culturally thriving and diverse cities of Europe. As soon as they relocated, the quintet quickly developed a reputation for a sound that paired slick studio production with deliberate attention to live performance, and as a result the act caught the attention of renowned Parisian electronic label Kitsune Records and the members of world famous electronic music production and artist duo Daft Punk, who caught the band play a set in Paris, and was so impressed by the Australian-born, German-based act that they decided to mentor the up-and-coming act.

Earlier this year, the members of Parcels along with the members of Daft Punk wrote and recorded their latest single “Overnight” in a secret location in Paris, and the single is a breezy, easygoing, summertime anthem that subtly reveals a careful attention to craft, as the band pairs infectious, razor sharp hooks with a sinuous bass line, Nile Rodgers-like funk guitar and shimmering arpeggio synths — and while clearly nodding at Daft Punk’s “Get Ready,” the song possesses a mischievously sensual swagger.

The Bryon Bay-born, Berlin-based members of the band are touring throughout the European Union and the UK during the year and the tour will include two Glastonbury Festival sets this weekend.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Ella Thompson and Graeme Pogson, GL is a Melbourne, Australia-based electronic music production and artist duo, who with the release of 2013’s Love Hexagon EP and their full-length debut Touch developed a reputation for specializing in a sound that’s very much a contemporary take on disco, funk, boogie, soul and house music, and as a result the Australian electronic music duo quickly earned international attention from The Guardian, i-D, The FADER, V Magazine, XLR8R and others, as well as played sets at New Zealand’s St. Jerome’s Laneway Festival and Splore Festival while nationally they’ve opened for Nick Murphy fka Chet Faker and played a successful headlining national tour to support their full-length debut.

Building upon a growing national and international profile, which resulted in a busy touring schedule, the duo locked themselves away in the studio to write and record the double A-sided single “Destiny”/”Reflect,” and as the duo explain “‘Reflect’ is an extended jam we made at TFS Studio in North Fitzroy, Melbourne. We wanted to try a long form exploration piece. Listen out for the delightful keyboard solo by Harvey Sutherland! Lyrically, it’s about searching inward, when the outside gets a bit much.” Interestingly enough, the song while being decidedly introspective manages to be joyous, suggesting that searching inward can be a profound solace in a cruel world or as George Clinton once wisely sung “The kingdom of heaven is within.” Of course, sonically, the song will further cement the duo’s reputation for crafting a sound that draws so much  from 80s and 90s house music and 80s synth soul that it brings to mind The Whispers “It’s A Love Thing,” “And The Beat Goes On,” and “Rock Steady,” Evelyn “Champagne” King’s “Love Come Down” and Cherelle‘s “Saturday Love” as Pogson pairs a production featuring layers of shimmering and cascading synths, a sinuous bass line, tribal drumming, bursts of shimmering keys and a soaring hook with Thompson’s self-assured vocals. Simply put, it’s arguably one of the most DJ-leaning, club rocking tracks I’ve written about in several months; in fact, if I were DJ’ing, I’d make sure to fit this one into a set.

 

 

 

 

 

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Sultry and Sensual Sounds and Visuals of Anna of the North’s Latest Single “Lovers”

Comprised of the Gjøvik, Norway-born and-based singer/songwriter and musician Anna Lotterud and New Zealand-born, Melbourne-based producer Brady Daniell-Smith, the Norwegian/New Zealand-Australian indie electro pop duo Anna of the North can trace its origin back to 2012. As the story goes, Lotterud was working in a shop in her small town near Oslo, and was settling down with her first love, anticipating a life of routine, normality and banality when a customer came in and changed her life. Polite and well groomed, this stranger began making daily visits, browsing for hours but never buy-in anything. One afternoon, the woman suddenly approached Lotterud and implored her to abandoned the traditional life she had planned out, and go and expand her horizons. The plea jolted something in Lotterud and in an act of rather uncharacteristic spontaneity, she booked a flight to Australia, leaving her life and her partner behind. 

The time Lotterud spent in Australia was personally fulfilling but also incredibly turbulent. She fell in love again, only to have her heart broken as suddenly and inexplicably as her decision to leave Norway in the first place. Around that time, she met her future producer and collaborator Brady Daniell-Smith. At the time, Smith who was also struggling with his own complicated relationships, was performing as an acoustic singer/songwriter in Melbourne, and in a serendipitous moment, Lotterud had caught Smith performing while she was friends. Interestingly, Lotterud and Smith then quickly became friends, with Smith encouraging his new friend to find solace in songwriting — and that by making music they could exorcise the ghosts of their past love lives. The project’s name actually came from a joke — Smith jokingly referred to Lotterud as “Anna of the North” and the name stuck. 

The release of their debut single “Sway” three years ago began an incredible run of attention grabbing singles that have received over 60 million streams across every streaming service, multiple number 1 spots on Hype Machine’s charts and rotation on BBC Radio 1, Triple J and  Beats 1 — and in many ways that shouldn’t be surprising as the duo’s sound pairs brooding, icy minimalism with bright, buoyant and radio friendly/dance floor friendly production. 

The duo’s highly-anticipated full length effort Lovers is slated for release on September 8, 2017 and reportedly the album’s material focuses on a subject familiar to the duo and to countless others — heartbreak. And through the album’s ten tracks, the album goes through the various emotional stages people typically feel after a relationship ends, including turmoil, grief, confusion, and the tentative joy in letting yourself start moving forward. Of course, along with that there’s the recognition that knowing love, including its inevitable heartbreak is necessary and wonderful because it opens up the possibility to know love once more. 

Interestingly,  the album’s latest single, album title track “Lovers” pairs a production featuring layers of shimmering synths, buoyant almost rubbery beats and a soaring hook with Lotterud’s tender and aching vocals, expressing a desperate an urgent longing that’s frustrated and can’t be fulfilled. 

The recently released visuals for “Lovers” features Lotterud at a party by herself surrounded by couples — and in some way she’s haunted by the fact her relationship has fallen apart. As the duo explains “On a literal level, the video is about being lost at a house party and surrounded by couples when your own relationship has fallen apart. Digging deeper, it’s set in the same place as the song, that point when you feel so alone and you’re reaching out but they’re not reaching back. It’s desperate”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Ibeyi Returns with Triumphant and Joyous Visuals for “Away Away”

If you’ve been frequenting this site over the past three or four years, you may recall that I’ve written quite a bit about the critically applauded French-Cuban twin sibling duo, Ibeyi (pronounced ee-bey-ee). Comprised of Lisa-Kainde Diaz and Naomi Diaz, the sibling duo’s name is derived from the Yourba word for twins ibeji — and interestingly enough, the Diazes are the daughters of Anga Diaz, best known as a percussionist for the world famous Buena Vista Social Club, and for collaborating with Ibrahim Ferrer, Ruben Gonzalez and Compay Segundo.
Anga Diaz died when the Diaz sisters were 11 and upon his death, they studied Yoruba folk songs an the cajon, an Afro-Caribbean drum, which their father had specialized in throughout most of his musical career. Interestingly, while Yoruba is a dialect primarily spoken throughout Nigeria and Benin, it’s been spoken in some fashion in Cuba since roughly the 1700s when the slave trade brought Africans to the Caribbean. And in some way, it would seem that when the Diazes started studying their father’s instrument and his musical culture, it gave them a greater understanding of him, his music and their ancestral past. And with the release of their 2015 self-titled debut, the Diaz sisters quickly gained an international profile for a sound that draws from contemporary electro pop, hip-hop, jazz, the blues, and traditional Yoruba folk music in a fashion similar to Henry Cole and the Afrobeat Collective‘s Roots Before Branches; in fact, much like Roots Before Branches, Ibeyi’s work makes a musical and deeply spiritual connection between the African Diaspora here in the West and with Africa that’s both modern and incredibly timeless.  

Now, it’s been a couple of years since I’ve last written about the Diaz sisters, but after touring to support their self-titled debut, the sisters spent the better part of 2016 writing and recording their highly-anticipated, yet still untitled sophomore effort, slated for release through XL Records later the year. And the album’s first single “Away Way” will further cement their growing reputation for pairing slick and swaggering, contemporary electronic production with the Diazes’ gorgeous harmonizing and resoundingly positive and resolute messages, complete with traditional Yoruba chanting.

As Naomi Diaz explained in an email to the folks at The FADER, the song “reflects on at time when Lisa was gazing out her window and thinking about the permanent follow of creation and destruction.” Her sister Lisa-Kainde adds “We are witnesses of the world’s craziness (which is sonically symbolized by the sirens in the track) and we wonder if the promises of better days will be kept. The chorus of ‘Away Away’ represents a burst of positive energy, us taking a conscious step towards movement and action because only the people can make good on that promise. The song culminates with a Yoruba chant for the Orisha Aggayu, a ferryman known for providing strength. Aggayu in nature ignites a violent eruption of volcanos, however, with the intention that the lava ultimately refertilizes the soil to create new life.”  Lyrically and thematically the song focuses on accepting pain as a part of life, and recognizing that it’s a necessary part of life, while celebrating life for its complicated entirety. 

Directed by Christian Beuchet, the video features the Diazes goofing off dancing, singing and immersing themselves in the song’s positive energy and throughout the entire video they radiate an infectious, mischievous joy and comfort within each other. 

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

With the release of “Don’t Act Like a Stranger” and “Try To Fight” earlier this year, the San Francisco, CA-based electro pop act Cathedrals, comprised of Brodie Jenkins (vocals) and Johnny Hwin (production) have developed a reputation for crafting anthemic, swooning, 80s-inspired synth pop with a radio friendly/arena friendly vibe. And the duo’s latest single “With You” which features Jenkins gorgeous, pop star belter-like vocals paired with a production featuring strummed guitar, reverb-filled drum programming, swirling electronics and shimmering synths, will further cement their reputation for anthemic pop — with “With You” arguably being the most urgent, yet aching single they’ve released to date. As the duo explain of the song “‘With You’ is a song very special to us, especially during these times of turmoil, about finding sanctuary in the person you love. That sense of comfort and peace you find when someone ‘feels like home’ to you. It is a different mood than the last 2 singles, with a dreamier almost melancholy bent — a bit of a harken back to their first EP.”

 

 
 
Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Striking and Sensual Visuals for Ozteki’s “True Love”

Comprised of cousins Mike Sharp (vocals, guitar) and Joel Roberts (synth, percussion, programming), the London, UK-based electro pop duo Ozteki have received attention across the UK and elsewhere with the release of singles “Touch,” “Already Dead” and “Falling Out,” which revealed that the duo specializes is sleek, percussive, modern electro pop that conveys a complex and paradoxical array of emotions with an almost novelistic attention to psychological detail; in fact, the duo’s latest single “True Love” is based around facing up to the darker aspects of humanity and confronting them with non-idealistic (and selfless) love — and while being a remarkably sultry and sensual song, it simultaneously possesses an underlying swooning vulnerability and anxiousness.

Directed by Christian Cargill and Will Farrell, the recently released video features Otzeki’s Mike Sharp in an eerie and strikingly vulnerable one-take performance of the track that sees Ozteki’s frontman performing the song while lying down; throughout his strained and deeply emotional performance, Sharp’s features gradually become distorted, as a way to mirror the song’s themes — and as the duo explains, the visuals delve the viewer into a pained and revealing world of what is, in their own words, “a dark-hued hymn of love and euphoria.”  

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

If you’ve been frequenting this site over the past few years, you may have come across a couple of posts featuring the Dublin, Ireland-born, Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and electro pop artist Sorcha Richardson. Initially relocating to the States to study, Richardson quickly developed a number of close relationships within Brooklyn’s underground electro pop/electronic music scene that wound up influencing the sonic direction of the material she had started to write and record; in fact, the Dublin-born, Brooklyn-based pop artist first caught the attention of the blogosphere with CON VOS, a musical project that received praise from Nylon, Pigeons & Planes, and Indie Shuffle.

Richardson quickly followed that up with her bedroom recorded debut EP Sleep Will Set Me Free EP, which received 200,000 Soundcloud streams and caught the attention of Crosswalk Records/Delicieuse Musique, who released the Last Train EP. Adding to a rapidly growing profile, Richardson has played sets at Northside Festival and CMJ, and several other festivals, as well as a number of headlining shows. Now, it’s been some time since I’ve personally written about the Dublin-born, Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and pop artist, but she’s been rather busy writing and recording a number of singles that have further cemented her reputation for crafting deeply introspective pop, including her latest single, “4AM,” single in which the song’s narrator muses about her current love prospects — with recognition of two things: that if things go wrong in a prospective relationship, it’s not always your fault — and the narrator proudly recognizes that being alone is perfectly fine to want to be alone and unbothered by someone else’s baggage and bullshit. Reportedly, the song, which is by far the most brooding in Richardson’s growing catalog, finds her pairing a sparse, Dido-like arrangement of dramatic piano chords with a soaring, radio-friendly hook with a club-leaning production featuring enormous tweeter and woofer rocking beats, swooning synths and Richardson’s ethereal yet achingly earnest croon. The song manages to walk a careful tightrope between late night, lonely regret over a relationship that has gone wrong and the pride of moving forward as quickly as possible from a flaming disaster — and it’s done with an honesty that comes from personal experience.

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Centered on its founding and primary songwriting duo Tim Abbey and Rebeca Macros-Roca, the London, UK-based post-electronic dance act Park Hotel have developed a reputation for a sound that meshes neo-disco and dance punk with off-kilter, downtown art scene-based songwriting — and unsurprisingly, the duo’s sound has been favorably described as a joyfully communal face-off between LCD Soundsystem, Earth, Wind and Wire with flashes of Talking Heads and a sprinkle of Steely Dan. Along with that, they’ve developed a reputation for a live show in which the project expands to a sextet featuring three-way vocal harmonies, rhythm and lead guitar, drums and lots of cowbell.

Produced by Eliot James, mixed by Nathan Boddy and mastered at New York’s Sterling Sound, the act’s debut single “Gone as a Friend” was recorded last year and after playing a number of critically applauded, buzz-worthy shows across London before officially releasing their debut single earlier this year. Building upon their growing profile, the act’s latest single “Going West,” is an off-kilter, dance floor-friendly track that sounds inspired by Tom Tom Club‘s “Genius of Love,” Talking Heads’ “Making Flippy Floppy,” Miami Horror‘s “Leila” and The Rapture‘s “House of Jealous Lovers” as the song possesses an infectious, ear-worm worthy, hook paired with boy-girl harmonizing, shimmering synths, a Nile Rodgers-like guitar line and an even funkier bass line, but they manage to do so in a fashion that feels like a fresh and mischievous take on a familiar, crowd pleasing fashion.

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

If you had been frequenting this site over the past year or two, you may have come across a small handful of posts featuring the Los Angeles, CA-based electro pop duo Sibling. Comprised of Elodie Tomlinson and Bryan Osuszek, the duo, which officially formed in 2015, can trace their origins to when they immediately felt a synergy after exploring the lore of astrological connections and the immediate sense of simpatico. With the release of their first four singles — Easy,” “Westside,” “Revolve,” and “Rearview,” the Southern Californian electro pop duo received attention for crafting radio friendly and emotionally direct, honest pop productions paired with Tomlinson’s pop star vocals.

Several months have passed since I’ve last written about them and as the duo’s Elodie Tomlinson explains about they last single “Knights,” “Sometimes people suck, things feel out of control and you want to escape life for a night That’s what this song’s about. i wrote the lyrics during what felt like one of the longest weeks ever, when I just wanted to check out and have a good time.” And as a result, the song possesses an inward frustration over the unavoidable, shitty and embittering things that life will throw in your way and although here’s a desire to escape and mindlessly enjoy yourself for a little while, there’s also a sense that it’s just an escape, that it never truly solves the problem at hand. Yes, at some point you have to be an adult and face the shitty situation you were had yourself in, in the first place.

Sonically speaking, the song will further cement the duo’s growing reputation for crafting slickly produced, radio-friendly electro pop — in this case, the song features a moody, ambient leaning production — delivered with a fearless honesty and directness that comes from personal experience.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Melancholy Sounds and Visuals of Amsterdam’s Nambyar

Nambyar is a half-Fijian, half-Dutch, Amsterdam, The Netherlands based alt R&B/electro pop singer/songwriter, whose music career was initially centered around guitar-driven melodies and band-leaning projects; however, the Amsterdam-based singer/songwriter can trace the origins of his solo recording career to when he began writing songs on an PolySix and Prophet analog studios in his own studio — and interestingly enough, the solitary time resulted in his uninhibited and bracingly honest, new single “Once More,” a bold statement of an artist and a man, finally letting go of his past and moving forward to a new and uncertain future, alone. In fact, as the Dutch-born singer/songwriter explains “Alone for the firs time, I didn’t need to listen to others and was able to focus on what I wanted to tell,The stripped-down production was layered with three synths, while the high-pitched vocal samples are taken from an old Italian singer, which I pitched to create the grid of the whole song.” 

Sonically speaking, Nambyar’s latest single reminds me quite a bit of Beacon’s initial releases — namely For Now EP and The Ways We Separate, as his achingly tender vocals singing deeply confessional, viscerally honest lyrics are paired with a sparse, ambient-leaning production to create an overall aesthetic that’s eerily spectral and mournful; it’s the sound of someone, who’s lead a full and messy life, reflecting back on it and being haunted by the ghosts of it; of someone who’s readily recognized that we often are drawn to people and situations for reasons we can never really explain; of someone, who recognizes that the relationship at the center of the song is heading towards an inevitable finality; but underneath the surface is a narrator, who’s desperate to free himself and live the life he feels fit — at all costs. 

Directed by Theo Captein, the recently released video for “Once More,” is based around a fairly simple concept that Nambyar came up with, as the video features the Amsterdam-based singer/songwriter earnestly brooding in a stark, white room but shot with slow-motion techniques, shallow depth of field, a shattered mirror and an animated bleeding-heart — all of which further emphasize the melancholy  nature of the song.