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The playlist: new bands – the Code, Mélat, Arkon Fly, ETML, Harriet Brown The playlist: new bands – the Code, Mélat, Arkon Fly, ETML, Harriet Brown
(35 minutes later)
The Code – 1/11The Code – 1/11
FKA twigs has been complaining about being narrowcast as a purveyor of “alt R&B”, unhappy especially about the “R&B” bit, suspecting that it is a way of diminishing her achievements and boxing her in. “Twigs is fiercely on-point when she notes that this segregation is racial,” agreed the Fader’s Aimee Cliff. But R&B hasn’t been “black” – either in terms of the artists making it or its signifiers (grit, gospel fervour, soaring intensity) – for decades. Since the 90s, it has been synonymous with futuristic production and vocals that are remarkable for their dispassion: almost the opposite of its original design. The point is, you wouldn’t know whether today’s R&B acts were black or white, but the appellation works for a broad range of darkly atmospheric electronic music bearing cool vocals, male or female. Take the Code, a production duo who it could be said are operating – in terms of sleek surfaces and crepuscular sorrow – in the realm of R&B, without wishing to constrain them in any way. Although rumour has it they’re British, which would make them the most successful homegrown exponents yet of the post-Weeknd/Drake school of bleakly emotional, broken-hearted modern blues. Their mixtape, 1/11, features Kaleem Taylor, KasFlow and G-Eazy, and is a consistent, crisply executed, lovely thing that further redefines R&B in terms of mood and sonic techniques.FKA twigs has been complaining about being narrowcast as a purveyor of “alt R&B”, unhappy especially about the “R&B” bit, suspecting that it is a way of diminishing her achievements and boxing her in. “Twigs is fiercely on-point when she notes that this segregation is racial,” agreed the Fader’s Aimee Cliff. But R&B hasn’t been “black” – either in terms of the artists making it or its signifiers (grit, gospel fervour, soaring intensity) – for decades. Since the 90s, it has been synonymous with futuristic production and vocals that are remarkable for their dispassion: almost the opposite of its original design. The point is, you wouldn’t know whether today’s R&B acts were black or white, but the appellation works for a broad range of darkly atmospheric electronic music bearing cool vocals, male or female. Take the Code, a production duo who it could be said are operating – in terms of sleek surfaces and crepuscular sorrow – in the realm of R&B, without wishing to constrain them in any way. Although rumour has it they’re British, which would make them the most successful homegrown exponents yet of the post-Weeknd/Drake school of bleakly emotional, broken-hearted modern blues. Their mixtape, 1/11, features Kaleem Taylor, KasFlow and G-Eazy, and is a consistent, crisply executed, lovely thing that further redefines R&B in terms of mood and sonic techniques.
Mélat – Move MeMélat – Move Me
Another mixtape of vaguely R&B provenance is the Move Me EP from Texas singer Mélat, in tandem with Delicious Vinyl producer Jansport J. If you like old-school boom bap and older-school soul, then you’ll love Move Me. Track one, Everything, samples from the Diana Ross and Marvin Gaye version of the Bell-Creed symphonic soul classic You Are Everything, over which Mélat extemporises angelically. On Good Morning she sounds like Brandy warbling over chopped and screwed disco. On the ravishingly pretty Fanclub, the remit is expanded somewhat – the sample this time is Michel Legrand’s Windmills of Your Mind. But it’s still – that mood, those sonic techniques – R&B.Another mixtape of vaguely R&B provenance is the Move Me EP from Texas singer Mélat, in tandem with Delicious Vinyl producer Jansport J. If you like old-school boom bap and older-school soul, then you’ll love Move Me. Track one, Everything, samples from the Diana Ross and Marvin Gaye version of the Bell-Creed symphonic soul classic You Are Everything, over which Mélat extemporises angelically. On Good Morning she sounds like Brandy warbling over chopped and screwed disco. On the ravishingly pretty Fanclub, the remit is expanded somewhat – the sample this time is Michel Legrand’s Windmills of Your Mind. But it’s still – that mood, those sonic techniques – R&B.
Arkon Fly – Back SeatArkon Fly – Back Seat
Arkon Fly – a pair of multi-instrumentalists, producers and singers from the UK capital – have been tied into the current garage and pop-house resurgence, but despite being issued by Locked On – the label that brought us Todd Edwards, Artful Dodger and Zed Bias – Back Seat has more in common with early 80s electro-funk. Filed next to Cameo and Peech Boys, their sound is a fabulous blast of synth bass-bouncing boogie, with a four-note keyboard riff that lodges in the brain and a vocal that is less London than Larry Blackmon. Through the Fire, another track of theirs, evinces their facility with a range of dance styles, tempos, and eras: it’s more Disclosure than D Train. But whatever the subgenre, they never forget to pack a melodic wallop and the track 4 My People is airborne-contagious. Unless something goes horribly wrong, that’s three hits and counting. Arkon Fly, a pair of multi-instrumentalists, producers and singers from the UK capital, have been tied into the current garage and pop-house resurgence, but despite being issued by Locked On – the label that brought us Todd Edwards, Artful Dodger and Zed Bias – Back Seat has more in common with early 80s electro-funk. Filed next to Cameo and Peech Boys, their sound is a fabulous blast of synth bass-bouncing boogie, with a four-note keyboard riff that lodges in the brain and a vocal that is less London than Larry Blackmon. Through the Fire, another track of theirs, evinces their facility with a range of dance styles, tempos, and eras: it’s more Disclosure than D Train. But whatever the subgenre, they never forget to pack a melodic wallop and the track 4 My People is airborne-contagious. Unless something goes horribly wrong, that’s three hits and counting.
ETML – Too LateETML – Too Late
On 13 September, at Sean Rowley’s Last Hurrah! in London, the mighty Kevin Rowland manned the wheels of steel for a superb set of R&B (60s variety) and 70s Philly proto-disco and funk, with the Commodores’ Brick House one of his few concessions to modernity. But he could easily have slipped in ETML’s Too Late and – I was going to say, “Nobody would have blinked”, but given the fanaticism of the crowd, comprising the kind of vinyl diehards who need forensic details of every note, the crowd would more likely have rushed the DJ booth and demanded to know what obscure 1972 classic it was. ETML is an 18-year-old singer, writer and producer from south London who has been working with Basement Jaxx and issued his debut single, the garage-licious Bind Me, this summer. Too Late, on the other hand, has the strings and the stomp of a northern soul heartbreaker. There there, my dears. The John Newman it’s OK to like.On 13 September, at Sean Rowley’s Last Hurrah! in London, the mighty Kevin Rowland manned the wheels of steel for a superb set of R&B (60s variety) and 70s Philly proto-disco and funk, with the Commodores’ Brick House one of his few concessions to modernity. But he could easily have slipped in ETML’s Too Late and – I was going to say, “Nobody would have blinked”, but given the fanaticism of the crowd, comprising the kind of vinyl diehards who need forensic details of every note, the crowd would more likely have rushed the DJ booth and demanded to know what obscure 1972 classic it was. ETML is an 18-year-old singer, writer and producer from south London who has been working with Basement Jaxx and issued his debut single, the garage-licious Bind Me, this summer. Too Late, on the other hand, has the strings and the stomp of a northern soul heartbreaker. There there, my dears. The John Newman it’s OK to like.
Harriet Brown – New MachinesHarriet Brown – New Machines
From Feel So Real, the label that issued the mystifyingly underrated Rare Times, comes this flamboyant character, real name Aaron Valenzuela. An LA-via-Oakland singer/songwriter/producer/performer, he’s obviously in hock to Prince up to his ruched elbows, but he does it so well, and makes enough advances from the purple blueprint, that you will do a double-take when you hear it: is New Machines Prince under a new pseudonym, perhaps an early leak from Art Official Age? His forthcoming New Era EP, with shades of Blood Orange and Toro Y Moi, is chock-full of such wondrous moments, a sumptuous funkadelic feast.From Feel So Real, the label that issued the mystifyingly underrated Rare Times, comes this flamboyant character, real name Aaron Valenzuela. An LA-via-Oakland singer/songwriter/producer/performer, he’s obviously in hock to Prince up to his ruched elbows, but he does it so well, and makes enough advances from the purple blueprint, that you will do a double-take when you hear it: is New Machines Prince under a new pseudonym, perhaps an early leak from Art Official Age? His forthcoming New Era EP, with shades of Blood Orange and Toro Y Moi, is chock-full of such wondrous moments, a sumptuous funkadelic feast.