Tag: Soto Voce

New Video: Soto Voce Returns with a Sensual and Anthemic bit of Industrial Electronica Paired with Feverish Visuals

Late last year, I wrote about the Los Angeles, CA-based electro pop duo Soto Voce. Comprised of Oakland, CA-born, Los Angeles-based vocalist Miguel De Vivo, now known as Mia De Vivo and Colombia-born, Los Angles-based producer Kenny Soto, the electro pop duo can trace its origins to a mutual love of electronic much and industrial music, and to the duo having similar experiences as outsiders — De Vivo, who was born male, grew up gender non-conforming and was relentlessly teased and beaten up “for being like a girl,” and who recently transitioned. Soto on the other hand, fled his native Colombia with his family as a teenager in the 90s, after his port official father refused to collaborate with Pablo Escobar’s drug cartel. When he and his family arrived in the US, they were extremely poor.

Now, as you may recall the duo’s debut single “Better” was quietly released but within a few weeks of is release, the track grabbed the attention of the blogosphere for a brooding, cinematic and difficult to pigeonhole sound that some described with Sade-fronting Radiohead comparison; however, in my opinion that song possessed a deeply personal and aching plea for acceptance both within and without paired with a club-banging yet atmospheric production. And the video specifically focused on the tensions around the Black Lives Matter, Trans Rights Matter and LGBTQ rights movements, how politically and socially things are much more fearful and uncertain for many minority groups across the world.

The duo’s latest single “Pop” will further cement their reputation for crafting propulsive and forceful industrial-leaning electro pop that manages to be sensual yet rousingly anthemic and club-banging. But arguably it may be the darkest, most unhinged and urgent track they’ve released to date.

Directed by Jon Danovic, the recently released music video for “Pop” possesses a surreal, feverish, dream-like logic.

New Video: The Politically Charged Visuals for Soto Voce’s “Better”

The duo’s debut single “Better” was quietly released and within a few weeks of its release, the track grabbed the attention of the blogosphere for a brooding, cinematic difficult to pigeonhole track that many of my colleagues have described with Sade-fronting Radiohead comparisons. And while being a bit reductionist, I think that what a lot of my colleagues have missed is that the song possesses a deeply personal and aching plea for acceptance, both within and without, in which De Vivo’s vocals manage to be sensual and aggressive within a turn of a phrase are paired with a production that alternate between moody atmospherics and club-banging, propulsive cascades of shimmering synths.

Although the video was specifically made as a comment on the deeply troubling and unsettling times we live in, complete around tensions around Black Lives Matter, Transgender and LGBTQ rights and fears of greater global unrest have reached boiling points, the video manages to not just be timely but serves as a fitting description of how uncertain things seem for minority groups around the world and how close to our destruction we actually are. As the duo’s Kenny Soto explains of the video ” In the video, I’m visualizing [sic] some really dark images, or maybe they’re being broadcasted to me. It depends on your perception. I’m watching people being desecrated and killed, crosses being burned. There comes a point when the car stops and Miguel steps out to open the door. I’m handcuffed, and he pushes me into a grave, and I come out on the other side another version of myself. For us the Black Lives Matter stuff, of course that’s something that becomes relevant [now], and it wasn’t necessarily we made it for that in any way. But it obviously is relevant to the current , and culture in general. Then the gender stuff as well, and both of those things kind of tie in and maybe being seen as worthless.”