Tag: Wolkoff

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

If you’ve been frequenting JOVM over the past couple of years of its seven year history, you’ve likely come across a handful of posts featuring the work of Stockholm, Sweden-based electronic music producer, electronic music artist and Labrador Records label head Johan Angergård, who’s best known for his work with Karolina Komstedt in Club 8, with Rose Suau in Djutstin and his solo recording project The Legends. Now, Club 8 Angergård’s collaboration with Komstedt has a long-held reputation for a being difficult to pigeonhole sonically or aesthetically.  The duo, which initially formed in 1995 began as a Bossa Nova-inspired act with the release of their debut effort, Nouvelle; however, their 1998 sophomore effort The Friend I Once Had, the duo went through a complete and radical change in sonic direction, with the album’s material being entirely electronic and electronic dance music-leaning. Further cementing a reputation for being musical chameleons, the duo’s next three albums, released between 2001 and 2003 were featured old school soul-leaning material.

Throughout the bulk of Club 8’s catalog, Angergård had been the taken up all production duties — until 2013’s Above the City, which had the band working with an outside producer for the first time. However, Angergård returned to producing the duo’s work with 2015’s Pleasure, an album that Karolina Komstedt explained was about “love, sex and jealousy.” And you may recall that I wrote about album singles, “Late Night” a melancholic look at a love affair that starts off passionate before eventually cooling off; “Skin,” a decadent song that channeled Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love.”

2017 has been an extremely busy year for Angergård. His solo project The Legends released a solo album earlier this year, Djustin released their long-anticipated full-length debut Voyagers last month and Club 8 released their ninth, full-length effort Lost yesterday.  Lost‘s latest single, the slow-burning and moody album title track “Lost” pairs Komstedt breathily tender vocals with a production featuring chiming percussion and a chopped up and distorted vocal sample. As Komstedt explains in press notes “We’ve tried to step away from standard instrumentation and perhaps sound a little less typically western on ‘Lost.'” In fact, because of its chiming and propulsive percussion, the song possesses a hypnotic and Eastern-inspired quality reminiscent of Wolkoff‘s work with Icarus Moth — but a chilly yet sultry vibe.

 

 

 

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

 

If you’ve been frequenting this site over the past couple of years, you’ve certainly been very familiar with Toronto, ON-born, New York-based singer/songwriter and electro pop artist Joanie Wolkoff, who has long been a JOVM mainstay, thanks to her work in a number of attention-winning projects including Her Habits, her solo work as Wolkoff, collaborations with The Hood Internet and others, as well as Gemology, a project Wolkoff began with the then-New York-based multi-instrumentalist and producer Natasha Chitayat, who has since relocated to Los Angeles. Now, it’s been a while since we’ve last heard from the duo as a writing and recording unit, as the aforementioned Wolkoff and Chitayat have been busy with a variety of other creative pursuits; however, the duo recently reconvened to write and record their latest single “Come Again.”

As for “Come Again,” Wolkoff’s ethereal vocals float over a dramatic and slow-burning production consisting of shimmering  and twinkling synths, tweeter and woofer rocking boom-bap like beats, stuttering and skittering drum programming, warm blasts of guitar and a sinuous bass line.  Underneath the shimmering surface is a slowly swooning and euphoric giddiness over stumbling on to someone (whether as a friend or a lover) with whom you speak the same language, and with whom you find an instant and profound connection — and it comes about easily, frequently without explanation; it just is and always will be. But there’s also an underlying uncertainty that comes from the fact that relationships can be endlessly frustrating and short-lived; that sometimes there are moments in which you feel that maybe you’re not quite ready to give yourself — and you find that you’re freely and happily giving yourself. But no matter what, considering how frustrating and confusing relationships of any sort can be, lucky and are are those who find such a profound connection.

 

 

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Ixra Divide Returns with a Madlib and J. Dilla-Inspired Instrumental Beat Track and Surreal Visuals

Towards the end of last year, I wrote about Virginia-based producer and emcee Ixra Divide, who has collaborated with JOVM mainstay artist, Toronto, ON-born, Brooklyn-based Joanie Wolkoff, who has recorded with Her Habits, Gemology and as […]

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

 

 

Originally known for her work in electro pop projects Her Habits, Gemology and others, Toronto-born, Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and electro pop artist Joanie Wolkoff has been a JOVM mainstay artist before striking out on her own last year with her solo recording project Wolkoff. In fact, last year was a very big year for the Canadian-born, Brooklyn-based artist — she collaborated with renowned electronic act The Hood Internet on “Going Back,” a single released to massive praise across the blogosphere, including several major media outlets, including Vice Noisey and Billboard — and as you can imagine resulted in a growing national profile for Wolkoff.

Interestingly, Wolkoff’s previously released work channeled the contemporary electro pop sound of acts like Beacon, Seoul (both of whom are also JOVM mainstays) and others — in other words eerily minimalist productions consisting of icy synth stabs and woofer and tweeter rattling bass paired with plaintive vocals. However, her ongoing collaboration with young, up-and-coming producer Icarus Moth, which started with the release of the Talismans EP has set the duo apart from the pack as Icarus Moth’s production reveals a deliberate and painterly approach. While drawing from contemporary electro pop and world dance music, the young producer has developed a reputation for pairing big beats, swirling electronics and lush layers of synths with medieval-sounding instrumentation in a way that evokes brushstrokes across a canvas — as you’ll hear on EP single “Curve Appeal,” and others.

Building upon the buzz the duo received last year, Wolkoff and Icarus Moth are set to release Wolkoff’s full-length debut Without Shame on April 15. Lyrically and thematically, the material on the album explores the role shame has in our lives and perhaps more importantly the possibility of sidestepping its grip on us through breaking rank and venturing into the unknown. And as a result, the material on the album may be among the most deeply personal — and yet profoundly universal — material she’s released to date. Without Shame‘s first single “The Homecoming” pairs big tweeter and woofer rattling bass with skittering drum programming, swirling and ambient electronics, Eastern-tinged instrumentation and Wolkoff’s coquettish cooing, and in some way the song possesses the dreamy and ethereal feel of Swedish dream pop — think of Moonbabies‘ excellent Wizards on the Beach and The Knife but subtly filtered through chip tune and old school house music.

Without Shame‘s second and latest single “Kings Highway” pairs Icarus Moth’s painterly production style consisting of swirling electronics, layers of cascading synths, chiming synths, boom-bap beats and ambient electronics with Wolkoff’s husky and coquettish vocals singing lyrics that are both surreal and Romantic in a song that’s sensual and seductive  — while sounding as though inspired it were by electro pop, R&B and house music. And although radio friendly and accessible, it’s challenging and  possesses an art school sheen. Certainly, from the first two singles Icarus Moth should be an in-demand producer as he has a unique sound — and it suggests that Wolkoff and Icarus Moth’s collaboration may be one of the most exciting and unique collaborations in contemporary pop.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Originally known for her work in electro pop projects Her Habits, Gemology and others, Toronto-born, Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and electro pop artist Joanie Wolkoff has been a JOVM mainstay artist before striking out on her own last year with her solo recording project Wolkoff. In fact, 2015 was a very big year for the Canadian-born, Brooklyn-based artist — she collaborated with renowned electronic act The Hood Internet on “Going Back,” a single released to massive praise across the blogosphere, including several major media outlets, including Vice Noisey and Billboard — and as you can imagine resulted in a growing national profile for Wolkoff.

Interestingly, Wolkoff’s previously released work channeled the contemporary electro pop sound of acts like Beacon, Seoul (both of whom are also JOVM mainstays) and others — in other words eerily minimalist productions consisting of icy synth stabs and woofer and tweeter rattling bass paired with plaintive vocals. However, her ongoing collaboration with young, up-and-coming producer Icarus Moth, which started with the release of the Talismans EP has set the duo apart from the pack as Icarus Moth’s production reveals a deliberate and painterly approach. While drawing from contemporary electro pop and world dance music, the young producer has developed a reputation for pairing big beats, swirling electronics and lush layers of synths with medieval-sounding instrumentation in a way that evokes brushstrokes across a canvas — as you’ll hear on EP single “Curve Appeal,” and others.

Building upon the buzz the duo received last year, Wolkoff and Icarus Moth are set to release Wolkoff’s full-length debut Without Shame on April 15. Lyrically and thematically, the material on the album explores the role shame has in our lives and perhaps more importantly the possibility of sidestepping its grip on us through breaking rank and venturing into the unknown. And as a result, the material on the album may be among the most deeply personal — and yet profoundly universal — material she’s released to date. Without Shame‘s first single “The Homecoming” pairs big tweeter and woofer rattling bass with skittering drum programming, swirling and ambient electronics, Eastern-tinged instrumentation and Wolkoff’s coquettish cooing, and in some way the song possesses the dreamy and ethereal feel of Swedish dream pop — think of Moonbabies‘ excellent Wizards on the Beach and The Knife but subtly filtered through chip tune and old school house music. Thanks to its accessibility, the song manages to be both radio-friendly and club-friendly — but it also reveals Wolkoff and Icarus Moth’s collaboration to be one of the most unique sounding collaborations I’ve come across in some time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Kine Sandbæk Jensen is a producer, multi-instrumentalist and electronic music artist, who has spent time in a number of musical project; however her latest solo recording project Pieces of Juno has Jensen exploring new musical territory. Her latest single “Valentine,” which she dedicates to “all the people who there who chose to be alone” and are “spending this day doing their own thing” pairs a gorgeous and cinematic melody created by chiming and shimmering synths with swirling electronics and tweeter and woofer rattling boom bap drum programming in a subtly Eastern-tinged production reminiscent of Icarus Moth‘s work with JOVM mainstay Wolkoff but with a house music sheen.