Tag: Jagwar Ma

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstay Genesis Owusu Releases a Trippy Visual for “Waitin’ For Ya (Remix)”

With the release of his debut EP, 2017’s Cardrive, the acclaimed and rising Ghanian-born, Canberra, Australia-based, artist Genesis Owusu — born Kofi Owusu-Anash — quickly established a reputation for being a restless, genre-blurring chameleon with an ability to conjure powerful and deeply personal storytelling.

The EP eventually garnered an ARIA Award nomination for Best R&B/Soul Release and praise from Sir Elton John (!), NME, i-D, mixmag and others. Owusu supported the EP by opening for Dead Prez, Col3trane, Sampa The Great, Cosmo’s Midnight, Noname, Animé, Ruel and others in Australia.

Last year, Owusu-Anash released a couple of highly-celebrated singles — the fiery street shit meets mosh pit ripper “Whip Cracker” and the ARIA Award-nominated smash hit “Don’t Need You,” which quickly became the #1 most played song on triple J radio and eventually international airplay on BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 6 and here in the States on KCRW, KUTX, The Current and Alt98. 

Owusu-Anash’s critically applauded full-length debut Smiling With No Teeth was released earlier this year. The album as the acclaimed Ghanian-Aussie artist explains is essentially about “performing what the world wants to see, even if you don’t have the capacity to do so honestly. Slathering honey on your demons to make them palatable to people, who only want to know if you’re okay, if the answer is yes. That’s the idea, turned into beautiful, youthful, ugly, timeless and strange music.

Each of the album’s 15 tracks can trace their origins back to studio jam sessions with a backing band that features Kirin J. Callinan, Touch Sensitive’s Michael DiFrancesco, World Champion‘s Julian Sudek and the album’s producer Andrew Klippel. 

In the lead-up to the album’s release, I wound up writing about three of Smiling With No Teeth‘s singles:

  • “The Other Black Dog,” a mind-bending production that meshed alternative hip-hop, industrial clang, clatter, rattle and stomp, off-kilter stuttering beats and wobbling synth arpeggios that was roomy enough for Owusu-Anash’s breathless, rapid-fire and dense flow. Managing to balance club friendliness with sweaty, mosh pit energy, the song is a full-throttled nosedive into madness that reminds me of the drug and booze fueled chaos of ODB, and the menace of DMX.
  • “Gold Chains,” a brooding yet seamless synthesis of old school soul, G Funk and Massive Attack-like trip hop centered around shimmering and atmospheric synths, stuttering boom bap beats, squiggling blasts of guitar and the rising Ghanian-born, Canberra-based artist’s Mos Def/Yasiin Bey-like delivery, alternating between spitting dense and dexterous bars and crooning with an achingly tender falsetto. “‘Gold Chains’ got me thinking about the flaws of being in a profession where, more and more, you have to be the product, rather than just the provider of the product, and public misconceptions about how luxurious that is,” Owusu-Anash explains in press notes. “Lyrically, it set the tone for the rest of the album.” 
  • “Same Thing,” a jolting and uneasy future funk banger centered around shimmering synth arpeggios, skittering beats, bursts of Nile Rodgers-like guitar, a propulsive bass line and infectious hook serving as a silky bed for Owusu’s alternating dexterous and densely worded bars and soulful crooning. But at its core is an unflinchingly honest — and necessary — view of mental health struggles. 

In July, the Ghanian-Aussie JOVM mainstay released the Missing Molars EP, a five-track accompaniment to his full-length debut. Recorded during the Smiling With No Teeth sessions, the Missing Molars EP material didn’t make the album — but further continue the soul-baring narrative of the album. “Missing Molars is an extension of Smiling With No Teeth,” Owusu-Anash explains. “A small collection of tracks from the SWNT sessions that take the already established world-building groundwork of the album, and expand that universe into new and unexplored places. These are all tracks that I felt were special in their own right and needed to be shared. This is music without boundaries.” 

In the lead up to Missing Molars‘ release, I wrote about “The Fall,” a slick and pulsing synthesis of industrial house, hip-hop and future soul centered around Owusu-Anash’s silky falsetto that manages to convey a restless and uneasy energy while being a banger.

Originally commissioned to be part of a global ad campaign, Jagwar Ma’s Jono Ma gave album track “Waitin’ On Ya,” the remix treatment. The original was sultry bit of neo-soul centered around shimmering and arpeggiated Rhodes, a sinuous bass line and Owusu’s silky smooth delivery. The Jono Ma remix retains the acclaimed JOVM mainstay’s silky smooth delivery but pairs it with skittering drum ‘n’ bass-like beats and glistening synths and buoyant horns, turning the song into a trippy yet club friendly bop.

The “Waitin’ On Ya (Remix)” caps off a wildly successful year for the Ghanian-Aussie JOVM mainstay: Owusu-Anash has firmly secured himself atop international “emerging artists to watch in 2021.” Smiling With No Teeth has received critical acclaim internationally from NPR Music, i-D, Paste Magazine, Hypebeast and countless others. The album has also received over 50 million streamed globally while landing on a number of Spotify and Apple Music playlists.

The video for the “Waiting On Ya (Remix)” was directed by Riley Blakeway, who directed the award-winning video for “The Other Black Dog.” The video continues the narrative developed from “The Other Black Dog” but through a fever dream-like prism that features that visual’s main character running a complex and crazy scam that seems him travel to all kinds of paradisal locations — but while appearing and being a menacing and uneasy look at someone, who might be slowly going mad.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Started in 2014 and comprised of San Francisco-born and-based married duo Andrew Gomez and Bevin Fernandez, the darkwave duo NVRS LVRS (pronounced Nervous Lovers) received attention locally with the release of their critically applauded full-length debut The Golden West, which was praised by SF Weekly as “crepuscular and opaque, with a grimy layer to it that thinly disguises the vein of pop running through the song[s].” Building upon a growing profile, the duo has since opened for the likes of Jagwar Ma and Telekinesis as well as receiving praise from PopMatters and Noisey. 

The duo’s latest single “whatever & ever” is the first bit of new material since the release of their critically applauded full length effort Electric Dread and while the single finds the band continuing to draw influence from the likes of Massive Attack, Kate Bush and others, the single also nods at classic New Order and industrial electronica thanks in part to a production featuring thumping beats, metallic clang and clatter, a rousingly anthemic hook, glitchy arpeggiated synths, and a motorik groove paired with the duo’s easy-going yet self-assured harmonizing. Thematically, the Eric Palmquist-produced club banger offers incisive criticism of our current moment — a perpetual stream of outrage and apocalyptic news, unsolicited opinions and curated brands with the song’s narrator asking if the empty and unfulfilling dopamine hit from each new notification is leading to our increasing stupidity and distraction.

The duo is embarking on a series of tour dates throughout March. Check out the tour dates below.

Tour Dates
03.08 – Reno, NV @ The Loving Cup
03.09 – Redding, CA @ The Dip
03.10 – Arcata, CA @ B.A.D. Collective Presents Outer Space
03.13 – Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey
03.14 – Bellingham, WA @ The Firefly Lounge w/ Lié, Glitchlette, Scum Eating
03.15 – Portland, OR @ Dan Cable Presents The Library at Growley’s Taproom
03.16 – Victoria, BC, Canada @ House Show
03.17 – Victoria, BC, Canada @ Venue TBA
03.22 – San Fransisco, CA @ Everything Elastic Presents Amnesia 
Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Since their formation in 1995, the Ghent, Belgium-based electro pop/electronic music production and artist act Soulwax, currently comprised of brothers and founding members David Dewaele and Stephen Dewaele, and Stefaan Van Leuvan have developed a reputation for continently pushing the boundaries of their music and creativity into new, innovative territory: along with Soulwax, the Dewaele Brothers tour as DJ duo 2manydjs, own and operate DEEWEE Records and DEEWEE Studios, are the founders of Radio Soulwax, a visual radio station and app, have collaborated with DFA Records‘ and LCD Soundsystem‘s James Murphy in the Despacio project. They’ve also remixed the work of LCD Soundsystem, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Jagwar Ma, Warpaint, Tame Impala, Metronomy, Arcade Fire, Daft Punk, Gossip, Hot Chip, MGMT, and others.

Last year, BBC Radio 1 approached the acclaimed electronic music act about doing an Essential Mix, and as the Dewaele Brothers joke in press notes, “When we were approached to  make an Essential Mix for the BBC in May 2017, we chose to do what every sane human being would do, we decided to lock ourselves into our studio for two weeks and make an hour of new music based around the word ‘Essential’, instead of preparing a mix of already existing music.” Interestingly enough, the Belgian electronic music act the first to ever submit an entire hour’s worth of original material for a BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix. “It felt like a challenge,” the members of Soulwax explain in press notes, “and something no one had done. We loved the challenge of releasing a full record live on a radio show without people having any advance notice, and we always wanted to release it on DEEWEE after it was aired on Radio 1.”

Essential, the Belgian electronic act’s latest album is slated for a June 22, 2018 release, and the album, which was recorded in two weeks at their DEEWEE Studio finds the duo using the gear that they didn’t use for their celebrated From Deewee, an album that was recorded live and in one take. Each of album’s 12 tracks is centered around and titled with Essential — “Essential One” through “Essential Twelve,” and the album’s latest single “Essential Three” features a slick, club-banging, house music-like production consisting of thumping, tweeter and woofer rocking beats, arpeggiated synths, a Kraftwerk-like motorik groove, some industrial clang and clatter and a sultry vocal sample. The track reveals an act that can manage slick, hyper-modern productions with a sweaty and soulful sultriness.

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Jono Ma’s Lysergic Remix of The Babe Rainbow’s Sweaty Dance Floor Friendly Single “Monkey Disco”

Earlier this fall, I wrote about the Bryon Bay, Australia-based band The Babe Rainbow. The up-and-coming act which is comprised of Bryon Bay, Australia-born and-based founding members Jack “Cool-Breeze” and Angus Darling The Hothouse Flower and Venezuelan-born pianist Lu-Lu-Felix Domingo can trace their origins to when its founding duo started a songwriting partnership while in middle school; however, the project started in earnest in late 2015 when the founding duo met Venezuelan-born pianist Domingo while they were traveling in France.

Now, as you may recall, the trio’s self-titled debut was produced by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’s Stu Mackenzie, and from album single “Johny Stays Cool,” the band specializes in lo-fi, off-kilter funk inspired by African Diaspora-like rhythms and a breezy, Tropicalia-like melody and much like The B52s, the song found the trio managing to mischievously evoke 60s psych pop and surf rock. However, album single “Monkey Disco” finds the trio nodding at sweaty, tribal house, Afropop and Fear of Music-era Talking Heads, with the Australian band pulling their lo-fi sound into the early 80s while retaining its off-kilter, quirky quality. 

Interestingly, Jagwar Ma’s Jono Ma recently remixed the song and while retaining the sweaty tribal house feel of the song, he adds thumping drum beats and extends the song’s infectious hook and driving groove, adding a lysergic sheen to an already dance floor friendly song. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Gorgeous and Wistful Visuals for Ten Fe’s “Overflow”

Hit The Light was recorded at Kompakt Records Studios in Berlin with Ewan Pearson, who has worked with Jagwar Ma, M83 and The Rapture and the album reportedly finds the duo meshing contemporary electro pop, Americana and the renowned Manchester sound — while thematically focusing on renewal, hope and possibility. And the duo’s latest single “Overflow” is a shimmering 80s-inspired synth pop/New Wave ballad with a motorik-like groove that focuses on the end of a romantic relationship and a lost love. And while being naturally wistful over what once was, the song possesses a hopeful message, that heartbreak no matter how profound is a reminder that you once knew and had love in your life, and that you will have heartbreak and love many times over.

Directed and edited by Modu Sesay, the recently released music video is shot in a gorgeous, cinematic black and white and features the band playing the song in their rehearsal space; but it’s cut in between with flashbacks of the band playing a live show in front of an ecstatic live audience, friends and couples having fun, hanging out and catching their friends play live shows — and it suggests that many of these small seemingly mundane things can influence art and the artists who create it.

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

2014 was a big year for Future Classic, the Sydney, Australia-based electro pop and electronic dance music label,management firm, booking agent and music publisher as a number of the label’s artists including Chet Faker, Jagwar Ma, […]

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

I’ve mentioned this on a number of occasions but as a blogger I receive an incredible amount of singles and videos for my perusal and as I’m going through all of this media, i’m usually […]

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

Brooklyn-based producer Chrome Sparks first won quite a bit of attention with the 2011 release of his debut EP, Surface Glows. That EP’s first single, “Still Sleeping” felt much like being gently aroused from a […]