Tag: The Seshen

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Over the course of 2016-2016, I spilled quite a bit of virtual ink covering acclaimed Bay Area-based indie electro pop outfit The Seshen. Led by founding members Lalin St. Juste (vocals) and Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production), the acclaimed sextet have released three albums of material that draws from a broad and eclectic array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock and electronica, among others. 

Last month, the members of The Seshen made two announcements:

  • Their return in the wake of the recent separation and divorce of its founding members
  • Their long-awaited fourth album Nowhere, which is slated for an October 6, 2023 release

Nowhere reportedly not only showcases the sextet’s remarkable musical prowess, but also offers a window into the changing nature of love, the fragility of human connections, and the different ways to embrace impermanence. It also marks the closing of one important chapter and the beginning of a new one for the band, capturing their evolution as individuals and their resilience as a band. The album’s material is shaped and rooted in the experiences of its members, including the impact of St. Juste’s and Ehara’s marriage and divorce. 

While St. Juste’s beautiful vocals anchor much of the album’s material, the band’s intricate production work helps to create a sonic landscape that’s simultaneously ethereal and grounded, capturing and evoking the essence of emotional turbulence and self-discovery, while complimenting lyrics based on St. Juste’s journey through the complexities of love and loss. 

Last month, I wrote about album single, the trippy and expansive “Hold Me,” which pairs St. Juste’s ethereal and yearning vocal with a sleek and hyper-modern production featuring dub-like glistening and wobbling synth oscillations, a sinuous bass line and skittering beats with the band’s unerring knack for catchy hooks. The song is that desperate clinging to the hope that the relationship won’t end, that your lover won’t leave. But there’s the realization that maybe it’s inevitable, and that there’s nothing you can do to stop it or change it.

“‘Hold Me’ is about that moment before loss – the hope, the longing, the desire for love to stay,” The Seshen’s St. Juste told AFROPUNK. “During the separation between Aki and I, we held onto each other to navigate the darkness …a darkness that was dizzying, disorienting, and unfamiliar. We held on to each other and found our way out. This song is about connection even in the face of change.” 

“Waiting for Dawn,” Nowhere‘s latest single is built around a balafon rhythm, pitched percussion, glistening synths, wobbling bass synths and warped and pitched background vocals. St. Juste’s achingly plaintive vocal ethereally floats over the production. The result is to evoke the feeling of being untethered and fraying at the edges from anticipatory grief, knowing that the relationship will end — but you don’t quite know when, where or how.

“‘Waiting for Dawn’ is an expression of anticipatory grief – saying goodbye to something you thought you couldn’t live without,” The Seshen’s Akiyoshi Ehara shared regarding the track, which contends with his separation with St. Juste. “Lalin and I were both beginning to feel untethered and struggling with our mental health. The lyric ‘I’ve been fraying at the edges, coming undone from another lost night, waiting for dawn’ really captures what those days were like – both of us sleepless, trying to hold it together while individually falling apart.”

“I had a period of being really into pitched percussive sounds and balafon music and some of that definitely made its way into this tune,” Ehara says of the song’s production. “Throughout the song, I relate the warped/pitched vocals to those disturbing voices/narratives that can circle around in your head. When engaged in catastrophic thinking and grappling with anxiety it can be hard to discern what your voice is vs. what anxiety and depression are telling you. The way that the vocals start as a natural, unaffected voice and warp into something that becomes less of a voice and more part of the tapestry of the song reflects the difficulty of parsing out what is real and what isn’t when we’re struggling to keep things together.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Seshen Shares Intimate and Woozy “Hold Me”

Back in 2016-2017, I had managed to spill quite a bit of virtual ink covering the acclaimed Bay Area-based indie electro pop sextet The Seshen. Led by founding members Lalin St. Juste (vocals) and Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production), the Bay Area-based outfit have released three albums of material that draw from a broad and eclectic array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock and electronica, among others.

Earlier this month, the acclaimed Bay Area outfit made two announcements:

  • Their return in the wake of the recent separation and divorce of its founding members

  • Their long-awaited fourth album Nowhere, which is slated for an October 6, 2023 release

Nowhere reportedly not only showcases the sextet’s remarkable musical prowess, but also offers a window into the changing nature of love, the fragility of human connections, and the different ways to embrace impermanence. It also marks the closing of one important chapter and the beginning of a new one for the band, capturing their evolution as individuals and their resilience as a band. And the album’s material is shaped and rooted in the experiences of its members, including the impact of St. Juste’s and Ehara’s marriage and divorce.

While St. Juste’s beautiful vocals anchor much of the album’s material, the band’s intricate production work helps to create a sonic landscape that’s simultaneously ethereal and grounded, capturing and evoking the essence of emotional turbulence and self-discovery, while complimenting lyrics based on St. Juste’s journey through the complexities of love and loss.

“Hold Me,” Nowhere‘s woozy, latest single pairs St. Juste’s ethereal and yearning vocal with sleek and hyper modern production featuring dub-like, glistening and wobbling synth oscillations, a sinuous bass line, skittering beats with the band’s unerring knack for catchy hooks within trippy and expansive song structure. At the core of the song is a desperate clinging to hope, for that relationship to not end, for that dear one to not leave. But nothing you can do can change the inevitable.

“‘Hold Me’ is about that moment before loss – the hope, the longing, the desire for love to stay,” The Seshen’s St. Juste told AFROPUNK. “During the separation between Aki and I, we held onto each other to navigate the darkness …a darkness that was dizzying, disorienting, and unfamiliar. We held on to each other and found our way out. This song is about connection even in the face of change.” 

Directed by Paul Bates, the accompanying video for “Hold Me” is an intimately shot and woozy tour video diary that captures life on the road and elements of the creative and promotional processes with an uncanny specificity.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Rituals of Mine’s Queer “Space Jam” Themed Visuals for Sultry “Burst”

Initially formed in 2009 as Sister Crayon, the acclaimed Los Angeles, CA-based electro pop duo  Rituals of Mine, currently comprised of singer/songwriter Terra Lopez and percussionist Adam Pierce have received attention for a sound that draws from 90s trip hop, footwork and  downtempo R&B — and for years of relentless touring up and down the West Coast, playing house shows, DIY venues and basements with the likes of The Album Leaf, Built to Spill, Antemasque, Le Butcherettes, Maps & Atlases, Doomtree and others. Adding to a quickly growing profile, the Los Angeles-based duo’s first two albums — 2011’s Bellow and 2013’s Cynic — were released to critical acclaim. 

2015 was a profoundly harrowing and difficult year for Lopez: her father committed suicide and several moths later, her best friend Lucas Johnson tragically died in an accident. Reeling from the grief of inconsolable and unexpected loss, Lopez in a period of deep reflection felt the need to reassess her life and her work in Sister Crayon. She decided to put the Sister Crayon name to rest, moving forward with a new moniker  — Rituals of Mine. As Terra Lopez wrote at the time, “It was a mantra that I repeated under my breath on a daily basis when the loss I was experiencing felt too heavy at times. Music, the act of creating, performing, touring, writing, singing, experimenting – all the rituals we have created to get through life.”

After years of obscuring her own story and emotions through metaphorical lyrics, Lopez felt a sudden confidence to write much more directly about her experiences and life as a queer woman of color. Lopez began fleshing out the material on what would become her Rituals of Mine debut Devoted with her longtime collaborator and producer Wes Jones, who helped turn her heartfelt writing on her trauma and personal growth into urgent and pulsating electronic tracks. Lopez then enlisted Adam Pierce to play drums, knowing that their background in metal percussion would provide an intensity that could match her own.

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site for some time, you might recall that last year was a very busy year for Lopez and Pierce. They opened for a handful of dates for The Afghan Whigs and Built to Spill’s co-headliing tour, including a Chicago area stop last April. They also opened for Garbage during the multi-plantium Grammy Award-winning band’s US tour. They also went on their first UK tour with JOVM mainstay Geographer and The Seshen. 

Interestingly, the duo’s highly anticipated Wes jones and Neal Pogue co-produced follow-up to Devoted, Sleeper Hold EP is slated for an October 4, 2019 release through Carpark Records — and the EP will include the urgent anti-Trump anthem “No Time To Go Numb,” a track that forcefully reminded the listener that now isn’t the time to slink back from the horrors of a power mad, greedy and hateful administration; that we have to be fueled by righteous anger and fight like hell for the things that truly matter.  “Burst,” Sleeper Hold’s second and latest single is a glitchy and hyper-modern bit of electro R&B that’s centered around stuttering beats, tweeter and woofer rocking low end and Lopez’s sultry, self-assured vocals. And while the track may recall Timbaland’s forward-thinking work with Aaliyah and Missy Elliott, Rituals of Mine’s latest single is driven by Lopez’s commitment to unvarnished emotional honesty.  “I made a promise to myself that I’m no longer going to play small or hide behind metaphors, that I’m going to really lean into self-confidence, self-reliance and take up space,” Lopez says in a statement to Billboard. “‘Burst is the beginning of that.” 

Co-directed by Kris Esfandiari and Colette Levesque, the recently released video for “Burst” features Rituals of Mine’s Terra Lopez playing basketball against a team of evil and monstrous figures. At one point, her younger self appears and helps Lopez win the game. According to the statement Lopez wrote to Billboard, the recently released video represents overcoming past trauma to effectively move on in your life, with the young protagonist representing a younger version of herself. “The opponents all represent obstacles I’ve had to face being a queer woman of color in this industry … this video was a way for me to confront both my childhood traumas and adulthood obstacles through the activity that has always grounded me,” she says. “Also, I just really wanted to create our version of a Queer Space Jam for 2019.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Initially formed back in 2009 as Sister Crayon, the acclaimed Los Angeles, CA-based electro pop duo  Rituals of Mine, comprised of  Terra Lopez and Dani Fernandez developed a national profile through years of relentless touring up and down the West Coast, playing house shows, DIY venues, basement rooms, followed by touring with the likes of The Album Leaf, Built to Spill, Antemasque, Le Butcherettes, Maps & Atlases, Doomtree and others. Adding to a quickly growing profile, the Los Angeles-based duo’s first two albums — 2011’s Bellow and 2013’s Cynic — were released to critical acclaim, while cementing a reputation for crafting cathartic material centered around tweeter and woofer rocking beats, soulful vocals and trip hop-inspired production.

2015’s Wes Jones-produced album Devoted continued their successful run of critical applause with the album landing on a number of indie “Top Ten Albums of 2015” lists; but despite the attention the album received, that year was a rather harrowing and difficult year for the duo’s Terra Lopez, as her father committed suicide and several months later, her best friend Lucas Johnson died in a tragic accident. Reeling from the grief of such profoundly unexpected loss, the duo felt the need to put the Sister Crayon name to rest, moving forward with their new mane Rituals of Mine. As Terra Lopez wrote at the time, “It was a mantra that I repeated under my breath on a daily basis when the loss I was experiencing felt too heavy at times. Music, the act of creating, performing, touring, writing, singing, experimenting – all the rituals we have created to get through life.”

2016 saw the re-issue of the Tom Coyne re-mastered Devoted through Warner Brothers Records and the re-issue featured some previous unreleased remixes and B-sides. And although some time has passed since I’ve personally written about the acclaimed Los Angeles-based pop duo, Lopez and Fernandez have been incredibly busy — earlier this year, they opened for a number of dates for The Afghan Whigs and Built to Spill’s co-headliing tour, and they’re currently opening for Garbage during the multi-plantium Grammy Award-winning band’s US tour. Additionally, the duo recently announced their first UK tour in November with Geographer and The Seshen. They’re also currently working on Devoted‘s follow up with longtime producer Wes Jones and Neal Pogue — and the first batch of new material from the duo is the righteously furious anti-Trump anthem “No Time To Go Numb.” Centered around a hyper modern production featuring stuttering and thumping beats, distorted vocal samples over which Lopez sings and spits fire, reminding the listener, that now isn’t the time to slink back from the horrors of a power mad and greedy administration; that it’s time to be fueled by righteous anger and fight like hell for the things that truly matter. As the duo’s Terra Lopez explains in press notes ” We started writing this song on Inauguration Day. It was a bleak time in the studio and we were feeling very hopeless, like most of the country. Two years later and the collective fear and disgust we all felt is still there, if not compounded, and that really inspired every lyric in this song. I wanted to address things that stay on my mind: the mediocrity of men and how our society treats womxn, the strength of the LGBTQ community and the resiliency of POC. I’m angry but also hopeful and ready to fight, to keep fighting. I’m so tired of seeing the same shit repeat itself – it’s time we set the bar higher. This song is an anthem for the LGBTQ community, to womxn and to people of color.

We carry so much on our shoulders, on our hearts. And this current administration continues to burden us and place us in danger, so we have to stick together. This is my way of showing up for us. “

New Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Bay Area-based JOVM Mainstays The Seshen Perform “Right Here” at Berkeley’s The Clock Factory

Now, if you had been frequenting this site over the past 12-18 months or so, you’ve likely come across a handful of posts on one of this site’s newest mainstay acts, the Bay Area-based electro pop/electro R&B/electro soul act The Seshen. Comprised of founding members Lalin St. Juste (vocals) and Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production) with Kasha Rockland (vocals), Mizra Kopelman (percussion) and Kumar Butler (sampler), the Bay Area-based act have received attention from this site and elsewhere for a sound that draws from a broad and eclectic array of influences including  Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock, electronica — with the result being a sound that managed to be simultaneously contemporary and retro-futuristic.
Over the past year, I wrote about the first three singles off the act’s sophomore full-length effort Flames & Figures — “Distant Heart,” a sleek and sensual, synth-based single that sounded as though it were influenced by 80s synth-based R&B and pop,  “Already Gone,” a sultry and sensual track that subtly nodded at Giorgio Moroder, and “Colors Collide,” which managed to nod at 60s-inspired psych pop and rock rock, complete with a shifting and morphing song structure held together by a hazy vibe. The album’s latest single “Right Here” consisting of retro-futuristic-leaning production featuring cascading layers of synths, xylophone, subtly African percussion, a sinuous yet propulsive bass line and ambient synths within an expansive song structure featuring rapidly shifting key changes and mood and razor sharp hooks — and while there’s a lot going on within the song, there’s enough room for St. Juste’s sultry and coquettish vocals to dart and float about. But perhaps most important, the latest single should remind listeners that the Bay Area-based act specialize in balancing an accessible, pop sensibility with an uncompromisingly challenging songwriting approach and sound. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: The Trippy and Psychedelic Sounds and Visuals of The Seshen’s “Colors Collide”

Throughout the end of last year, I wrote quite a bit about San Francisco Bay Area-based electro pop/electro R&B/electro soul act The Seshen. Interestingly, the act comprised of founding members Lalin St. Juste (vocals) and Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production) with Kasha Rockland (vocals), Mizra Kopelman (percussion) and Kumar Butler (sampler) have recede attention both across the Bay Area and elsewhere for a sound and aesthetic that draws from a diverse and eclectic array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock, electronica — with the result being a sound that managed to be simultaneously contemporary and retro-futuristic.

Now you may recall that I had written about the first two singles off the act’s sophomore full-length effort Flames and Figures — “Distant Heart,” a slickly produced, sleek and sensual, synth-based single that sounded as though it were influenced by 80s synth-based R&B and pop and “Already Gone,” a sultry and sensual track that subtly nodded at Giorgio Moroder’s legendary and incredibly sexy productions. However, the album’s third and latest single “Colors Collide” finds the Bay Area-based act pairing St. Juste’s nostalgic, stream-of-consciousness lyrics and sultry vocals with hazy mellotron, layered rhythms, a distorted and chopped up vocal sample, swirling electronics and shimmering synths to craft a sound that nods at trippy, 60s-inspired psych pop, experimental pop and prog rock thanks to a song structure that consists of several shifting and morphing sections held together by the song’s hazy vibe and a deep longing for more.

Interestingly, as the band’s St. Juste explains in press notes, “Colors Collide is about the illusory spaces that are created for us, and how we wrestle with the identities and experiences that grow out of those creations. It reflects the journey of leaving this current space for another. Perhaps in this next place, I can be free. It’s not a physical space, but rather, the place within myself that I hope to reach.”

Directed by Jesse Cafiero, the recently released music video for “Colors Collide” employs the use of classic, stop-motion animation to create a detailed yet surreal world that adds and emphasizes the song’s psychedelia-tinged take on pop

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Last month, I wrote about San Francisco Bay Area-based electro pop/electro R&B act The Seshen, an act comprised of Lalin St. Juste (vocals), Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production), Kasha Rockland (vocals), Mirza Kopelman (percussion), Chris Thalmann (drums), Mahesh Rao (keys, synths), Mirza Kopelman (percussion) and Kumar Butler (sampler), that has received attention across the Bay Area and elsewhere for an aesthetic that draws from a diverse array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock, electronica and 70s dub to craft a sound that walks a tightrope between sounding remarkably contemporary and retro-futuristic. Interestingly enough, “Distant Heart,” the first single off the act’s soon-to-be released sophomore effort Flames and Figures reminded me quite a bit of the slickly produced, sleek synth-based R&B and pop of the early 80s. 

“Already Gone” the second and latest single off Flames and Figures finds the act pairing St. Juste’s sultry and plaintive cooing with glitchy and stuttering drum programming, swirling ambient electronics and layers of cascading, shimmering synths, some reverberating industrial clang and clatter in the background and a sensual hook to craft a song that manages to feel both deliberately crafted and improvised — all while subtly nodding at Giorgio Moroder’s legendary and incredibly sexy productions.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Sensual Visuals and Sounds of The Seshen’s “Distant Heart”

The band’s highly-anticipated sophomore, full-length sophomore effort is slated for an October 14, 2016 release through Tru Thoughts Records and the album’s material reportedly reflects a band expanding upon their sound and lyrical content; St. Juste sings lyrics in a stream of consciousness fashion and as you’ll hear on the album’s first single “Distant Heart,” as the group pairs cascading layers of ambient, squiggling and shimmering synths with stuttering and off-kilter percussion with St. Juste’s plaintive and ethereal vocals to craft a sultry, sensual song that possesses an underlying heartache at it’s core. And in some way the song manages to gently nod at 70s and 80s synth funk and R&B.

The recently released music video for the song is full of slick, sensual imagery including people moving and grooving at a small, 1920s themed club while the members of The Seshen perform the song; the act’s lead singer, strutting past a car accident to chat with a woman wearing a wedding dress, complete with the wedding veil, who later gets her veil sensually removed by two other woman and so on. Interestingly, the video possesses a disorientating, fever dream-like logic in which events occur in a seemingly disconnected fashion.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Lalin St. Juste (vocals), Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production), Kasha Rockland (vocals), Mirza Kopelman (percussion), Chris Thalmann (drums), Mahesh Rao (keys, synths), Mirza Kopelman (percussion) and Kumar Butler (sampler),  the San Francisco Bay Area electro pop/R&B act The Seshen can trace their origins to when its founding duo St. Juste and Ehara met in Ghana during a study abroad program and instantly bonded over their shared love of music. After returning home and completing college, the duo lived in Los Angeles before relocating to Ehara’s hometown of Richmond CA, where they started to collaborate together on music and gradually built the band through jam sessions with their closest friends.

The San Francisco Bay Area-based act have received attention across the Bay Area and elsewhere for an aestehtic that draws from a diverse array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock, electronica and 70s dub to craft a sound that uncompromisingly defies easy categorization  while carefully and gently walking the tightrope between sounding remarkably contemporary and retro-futuristic; in fact, to my ears, their sound sometimes sounds as though it were influenced by slick and sleek 80s synth-baesd R&B and pop.  And that sound is paired with St. Juste’s soul-baring lyrics drawing from both her own personal experiences and her imagination as the material typically explores femininity, power, illusion and loss. With the release of their 2012 self-titled debut, which was released through Bandcamp, the Bay Area-based octet quickly built a devoted local fanbase. And by 2014, they signed to renowned indie label Tru Thoughts Records, who releaed their critically applauded 2014 EP Unravel, an effort that quickly became a favorite of well-known and highly-regarded DJs and tastemaker media outlets and personalities including  BBC Radio 6‘s Tom Ravenscroft, OkayPlayer, Earmilk and The Line of Best Fit. Building on the growing internationally received buzz, the Bay Area based act released the Unravel Remixes EP, which featured remixes from AK/DK, Astronauts, etc., Uhuru Peak, Tru Thoughts Records’ Jonny Faith and Lost Midas; in fact, the Unravel Remixes EP received airplay from BBC Radio 6’s Lauren Laverne, Nemone, Steve Lacmaq and several others.

The band’s highly-anticipated sophomore, full-length sophomore effort is slated for an October 14, 2016 release through Tru Thoughts Records and the album’s material reportedly reflects a band expanding upon their sound and lyrical content; St. Juste sings lyrics in a stream of consciousness fashion and as you’ll hear on the album’s first single “Distant Heart,” the group pair cascading layers of ambient, squiggling and shimmering synths with stuttering and off-kilter percussion with St. Juste’s plaintive and ethereal vocals to craft a sultry, sensual song that possesses an underlying heartache at it’s core – and in some way the song manages to gently nod at 70s and 80s synth funk and R&B.