Electro – Page 12 – 7th Level Music

Review: Rochelle Jordan – Play with the Changes Remixed

As if Rochelle Jordan‘s excellent album, Play with the Changes, wasn’t cool enough, now she’s released Play with the Changes Remixed, which is just what the title implies – a full remix of the album by some of the top producers and DJs in today’s music scenes.

&ME‘s remix of “Situation” ups the synth-bass to levels that make you go, “Oh, damn…That’s hot.” DJ Minx turns “Dancing Elephants” into an after-party house jam. Sango somehow turns “Got Em” into a sexier track. KLSH speeds up “Count It” into a playful cut that borders on industrial music. Kaytranada bumps up the funk on “All Along.”

Kingdom softens “Nothing Left,” almost putting us into a happy dream so Machinedrum can wake us with wicked beats and happy thoughts to start our day on the remix of “Lay.” LSDXOXO remixes “Love U Good” into a bit of a dancehall bumper that will have your hips moving. Sinistarr, meanwhile, turns “Next 2 U” into a full-on mid-1990s rave track that is only missing a strobe light and whistles blown by scantily clad, somewhat dehydrated people.

The Things You Say remix of “Already” is sure to fill dance floors just from the bouncy bass and bartender-shaking-a-cocktail percussion. Soul Clap brings in popcorn popper drum and bass on the remix of “Broken Steel.” Byron the Aquarius sends us out on a somewhat trippy vibe with his remix of “Something” at the end of the album.

There isn’t a bad mix on here. You can slip any of these cuts into a DJ set and everyone will love you for it.

Keep your mind open.

[I’d love you good if you subscribed.]

[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Angélica Salvi releases “Crina” ahead of her upcoming harp-based album, “Habitat.”

Today Porto-based harpist Angélica Salvi has announced details of her forthcoming album ‘Habitat’ for release on November 4th via Lovers & Lollypops.

Since releasing her debut record ‘Phantone’ in 2019, Salvi has worked across multiple projects, both solo and in collaborations in the fields of cinema, dance, theatre, photography and music, working with names such as Valentina Magaletti, Lafawndah, The Pyramids, Natural Information Society,Evan Parker and more.

On ‘Habitat’ she continues to deepen her sonic exploration across eight songs with the harp at the centre, supported by the use of real-time audio signal processing tools to create complex textural works – each one evoking a specific sensory memory.

Today she shares the brisk, breathlessly racing first single and accompanying video, “Crina”. “Crina” means mane or horsehair in Portuguese, and Salvi describes the song as “The feeling of riding a horse… A journey into the unknown.”

The accompanying video, directed by award-winning Portuguese filmmaker André Gil Mata, was inspired by the album’s cover. “He said he really enjoys to look at my hands when I play. He says it is like a dance” Salvi explains. “He imagined my hands mimetized with a natural habitat. I told him I was imagining a mimetic atmosphere in the whole album: with water, plants, sand… so he chose plants, moss and water.”

“Crina” on YouTube: https://youtu.be/rj5T-CvCJsU

On ‘Habitat’, Angélica is inspired by the habitat of her own, and the way in which she relates to it in her daily life. Each of the songs is a sensory memory that can be relived over and over again, with changing nuances and subtleties. It’s a set of moments of interaction with the elements that are, or have been, part of her routine and are transformed or modified with her actions. Memories captured and reproduced infinitely through labyrinthine patterns and sound textures, ambiguous melodies and flourishing harmonies that fluctuate, coexist and interact with other beings or elements in their universe of minimal language.

The album was created and recorded in her home studio with the aim of being fully possible to reproduce and process the sound in real time, in the context of live music. On the album there is almost no post-production. All sounds that appear on it come out of the harp and the affiliated pedals.

Keep your mind open.

[Why not subscribe while you’re here?]

[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Miss Grit releases industrial-tinged new single, “Like You.”

Miss Grit, the New York-based, Korean-American musician Margaret Sohn, returns today with a new single “Like You,” via their new label Mute. Sohn (they/she) created Miss Grit to function as an outlet for their own analysis and expression of self. They are meticulous and introspective, and with “Like You,” they wrestle with listening to one’s inner voices. Which voices are leading to self-sabotage and which are leading towards liberation? What part of ourselves has been forced upon us by the outside world, and what was there to begin with? The magnitude of these questions and musings are reflected in Sohn’s precise, slowly building electric guitars and bold basslines (performed by Zoltan Sindhu), as her voice resonates over: “Bore new, everything is see-through. Confused, they might see they’re like you.” Sohn elaborates: “I had the character of Ex Machina in mind as the voice I was singing from. Her arc in the movie felt really beautiful to me, and I wanted to reach the same ending as her in this song.”

She adds about her recent signing: “Mute is one of the labels I put on a pedestal in my mind, so the fact I was even on their radar was really flattering. And then to think they believed in my music enough to want to work together made me so happy.”

Miss Grit has released two acclaimed EPs over the past three years, Talk, Talk, about the complexities of relationships, and Impostor about their grappling with identity. As a mixed-race, non-binary artist, they have always rejected the limits of identity that are thrust upon them by the outside world, in favor of embracing a more fluid and complex understanding of the self. Produced and recorded by Sohn, “Like You” presents Miss Grit as an artist intent on creating a way of being that is fully and completely their own.

Watch Miss Grit’s Lyric Video for “Like You”

Miss Grit Tour Dates
Wed. Oct. 26 – Paris, FR @ Super Sonic Records
Thu. Oct. 27 – Antwerp, BE @ Trix Club
Sat. Oct. 29 – Amsterdam, NL @ London Calling
Tue. Nov. 1 – London, UK @ Amazing Grace

Keep your mind open.

[Why not subscribe while you’re here?]

[Thanks to Jaycee at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Alf Champion and MDHNTR send us into a “Midsummer Day’s Nightmare.”

Mexico’s ALF CHAMPION and MDHNTR take us on a wild journey through the subconscious with two spellbinding tracks, packed with distorted organic beats and technical wizardry on Midsummer Day’s Nightmare.

The introspective opening track “Gnic Nad” (Drum Version) is filled
with wonder and promise, the synth’s overtones opening you out
into a world you’ve never seen before. Self reflection and mystery
shroud the humming chords while the percussion is precise and insistent, cutting through the reverie.

From the first beat, the tribal drums and meticulous rhythms in
“Alaib Do” (Dream Version) grab you by the shoulders and implore
you to dance. The trippy, almost demonic voices and the
relentlessly pulsing bass lines transport you to a cave in the middle
of the Mexican wilderness, your surroundings ever changing and
morphing with the music. Stabs of jazz infused chords jolt you to
focus just for a second, before squealing synths and relentless
percussion pull you back into the trance.

TRACKLIST

1. Gnic Nad (Drum Version)
2. Alaib Do (Dream Version)

Midsummer Day’s Nightmare was released on the 10th of June,
mastered by Sam at The Green Door and is distributed digitally
on all major platforms by EPM.

Keep your mind open.

[I have nightmares when you don’t subscribe.]

[Thanks to Aaron at Paradise Palms Records.]

Kaytranada remixes Rochelle Jordan’s “All Along” for her upcoming remix album.

Today, Los Angeles-based artist Rochelle Jordan presents the Kaytranada remix of “All Along” from Play With The Changes Remixed, a reimagination of her acclaimed 2021 album Play With The Changes, out this Friday on Young Art Records. “All Along” (Kaytranada Remix) sees the former tourmates joining forces for a sleek reshaping of Jordan’s futuristic sonic landscape. Play With The Changes Remixed doubles down on Jordan’ original thesis: without experimentation, innovation is impossible. Along with Kaytranda, Jordan taps LSDXOXO, Sango, Byron The Aquarius, Soul Clap, and more for the remix album.

Listen to “All Along” (Kaytranada Remix)

Defying categorization to create a project full of slinky, dancefloor-packing burners that channel her U.K. roots, Play With the Changes is reminiscent of Jordan’s childhood nights spent listening to her brother’s 2-step hymns from the other side of the wall. Garnering year-end praise from Billboard, Bandcamp, and more, Play With The Changes presents Jordan as a modern heir in a lineage of powerhouse vocalists with style and imagination. Play With The Changes Remixed precedes Jordan’s upcoming North American tour supporting Channel Tres, which begins September 27th, and includes stops at New York’s Bowery Ballroom, The Fonda Theater in Los Angeles, and more.

Pre-order Play With The Changes Remixed

Listen to “Love You Good (Remix)” ft. LSDXOXO
Listen to “Got Em” (Sango Remix)
Listen to “Something” (Byron The Aquarius Remix)

Watch Rochelle Jordan’s KEXP Performance

Rochelle Jordan Tour Dates:
(all dates supporting Channel Tres)
Tue. Sep. 27 – Phoenix, AZ @ Crescent Ballroom
Wed. Sep. 28 – Albuquerque @ Electric Playhouse
Fri. Sep. 30 – Austin, TX @ Emo’s
Sat. Oct. 1- Dallas, TX @ The Echo
Sun. Oct. 2 – Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live – Studio
Tue. Oct. 4 – Atlanta, GA @ Variety Playhouse
Thu. Oct. 6 – Detroit, MI @ Leland City Park
Fri. Oct. 7 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Hall
Sat. Oct. 8 – Montreal, QC @ S.A.T
Tue. Oct. 11 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts
Thu. Oct. 13 – Washington, DC @ Culture
Fri. Oct. 14 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel
Sat. Oct. 15 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel
Tue. Dec. 6 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda Theater
Wed. Dec. 7 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Fonda Theater
Sat. Dec. 10 – San Luis Obispo, CA @ The Fremont Theater
Wed. Dec. 14 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
Thu. Dec. 15 – Seattle, WA @ The Showbox
Fri. Dec. 16 – Vancouver, BC @ Celebrities Nightclub

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe.]

[Thanks to Sam at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Don’t be a “Stranger” to Ruth Radelet’s new single.

Today, Los Angeles-based artist Ruth Radelet announces her debut EP, The Other Side, out October 7th. Today, she presents its lead single/video, the cinematic ballad “Stranger.” Best known for fronting the influential and beloved group Chromatics, Ruth solidifies her next chapter as a solo artist with The Other Side. Written over the course of two years and recorded with friend and producer Filip Nikolic (formerly of Poolside), The Other Side showcases Radelet’s timeless voice and classic take on songwriting.

Following the single “Crimes,” “her ethereal and poignant debut” (Gorilla vs. Bear), “Stranger” is a love letter to LA. The stark black-and-white video, directed by James Manson and shot on 16mm Kodak film by Freddie Whitman, features Ruth exploring the city alone. “Stranger” is about a specific kind of loneliness that I have only felt in Los Angeles. Although the song is very much about longing, it’s more about a place than a person,” she elaborates. “The lyric ‘I could never hold you in my hands’ is about the feeling of always being on the outside looking in, of the city never fully opening its doors to me.”

Watch Ruth Radelet’s Video for “Stranger”

Exploring themes of love, death, and rebirth, “The Other Side represents a side of my personality as an artist that most people haven’t seen until now,” explains Radelet. “It also represents my coming out the other side of a traumatic experience, gathering what I could from ‘Before’ and figuring out how to exist ‘After.’ This record was forged in the fire of a transformative two-year period during which I lost almost everything, including my father who was a huge influence on me. Most of the songs were written just before I was caught up in a storm of big changes, and they were all finished just as life started to feel sweet again. It feels right to share some of the last chapter before moving into the next, and though it’s a melancholy record, for me The Other Side is a step into a bigger and brighter future.”

Radelet is a singer, songwriter, and musician with diverse influences ranging from Joni Mitchell to Frank Ocean. She has been performing and releasing music for over a decade since joining Chromatics in 2006 for their acclaimed album Night Drive released the following year. Chromatics’ music and aesthetic has notably been used in numerous films, television series, and fashion shows. The band appeared on screen in multiple episodes of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The Return while Radelet was recently featured on a Chromatics’ 2020 remix of the Weeknd’s #1 hit single, “Blinding Lights.”

Listen to “Crimes”

The Other Side Tracklist
1. Stranger
2. Sometimes
3. Crimes
4. Be Careful
5. Youth

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t be a stranger to the subscription box, either.]

[Thanks to Yuri at Pitch Perfect PR.]

rRoxymore releases sharp new single – “Fragmented Dreams.”

rRoxymore – the project of French-born, Berlin-based artist Hermione Frank – announces her new album, Perpetual Now, out November 4th on Smalltown Supersound, and shares its lead single “Fragmented Dreams.” Armed with a disdain for pastiche and a penchant for experimentalism, rRoxymore has spent the last decade expanding the boundaries of what constitutes club music. On Perpetual Now, her sophomore album, she again displays this propensity for pushing the sonic envelope by blurring the lines between the electronic and the organic. Subverting the traditional album format, Perpetual Now is made up of four extended soundscapes, each taking the listener on a journey through tempo, texture and emotional state. Today’s “Fragmented Dreams,” with its pulsating rhythms and fractured melodies, sees the album fleetingly burst into life.

Listen to rRoxymore’s “Fragmented Dreams”
Across a steady stream of releases, rRoxymore has continually reinvented her sound, shifting from hypnotic leftfield techno to UK bass mutations, genre-eschewing dub oddities and more. She first emerged on the scene with “Wheel of Fortune,” a ten-minute epic released on Planningtorock’s Human Level label in 2012. She has since put out music regularly, dropping her acclaimed debut album Face To Phase in 2019, and more recently I Wanted More, a four-track EP that veered from downtempo ambience to lush deep house. A daring, unconventional album, Perpetual Now is everything we’ve come to expect and more from one of electronic music’s most unique producers.

Pre-order Perpetual Now

Perpetual Now Tracklist
1. At the Crest
2. Sun in C
3. Fragmented Dreams
4. Water Stains

Keep your mind open.

[I dream of you subscribing.]

[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

The National remix NEU!’s “Im Glück” for tribute album.

NEU!, the legendary Krautrock duo of Michael Rother and the late Klaus Dinger, celebrate the 50th anniversary of their self-titled debut album with the NEU! 50! box set, out September 23rd via Grönland. NEU! 50! includes albums NEU!, NEU! 2!, and NEU! 75, plus the brand new NEU! Tribute Album, a NEU! stencil and booklet. As one of the great, belated success stories of rock music, NEU!’s influence continues to be internationally widespread. Since paving their own road ahead, they’ve created a model of forward propulsion away from conventional rock clichés. The NEU! Tribute Album shows how much there is for subsequent generations to unpack in NEU!, how much is buried, implied in their sound. It features reworkings and NEU!-inspired originals by Idles, Guerilla Toss, Stephen Morris (New Order, Joy Division) and Gabe Gurnsey (Factory Floor), Man Man, Mogwai, Alexis Taylor, and more, including today’s new remix of “Im Glück” by The National. In their remix, The National pull back and reveal the latent colors, rhythmic potentials and mental freeways of “Im Gluck.”

Listen to “Im Glück (The National Remix)”

NEU! are a product of Düsseldorf, Germany, home to Kraftwerk’s Klingklang studios, as well as galleries, graphic designers and advertising agencies. Rother and Dinger drew on all of this and their impeccable musical training to create the overall concept of NEU!. They intended to create a previously unheard new music, aping the processes of commodification while remaining resolutely hostile to the commerciality of the music industry. Like other experimental bands of the late 60s and early 70s gathered under the Krautrock banner, NEU! were driven by a mixture of political and artistic imperatives to reject the clichés and conventions of orthodox, blues-based Anglo-American rock and create a music that was, formally, West German in origin.

Pre-order NEU! 50!

Watch “Hallogallo (Stephen Morris and Gabe Gurnsey Remix)” Visualizer

Listen to “Weissensee (Fink Version)”

Listen to “Zum Herz” by Guerilla Toss

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe while you’re here.]

[Thanks to Jessica at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Jon Hopkins and ANNA team up for a “night version” of “Deep in the Glowing Heart.”

Jon Hopkins has revealed a transcendent new collaboration with Brazilian techno producer ANNA, “Deep In The Glowing Heart (Night Version).” The original version of “Deep In The Glowing Heart” is found on Hopkins’ Music For Psychedelic Therapy, released last November on Domino. Talking about the original, Hopkins said there is a feeling that “music can cleanse you, music can guide you through.” Today’s “Night Version” takes you on a very different journey. Evolving over a month-long trans-Atlantic collaborative process, “Deep In The Glowing Heart (Night Version)” feels like an explosive release of energy, inspired by Hopkins’ return to regular DJing this year. With early versions of this track being premiered to huge crowds by both artists at their DJ sets across the world – including ANNA at Coachella and Hopkins at Fabric – “Deep In The Glowing Heart (Night Version)” is now available to hear widely for the first time.

Of the collaboration, Hopkins says: “I first came across ANNA’s music through her track ‘Hidden Beauties’, which I found myself playing in DJ sets all the time and always goes down so well. I then asked her to remix ‘Singularity’ and the results were so amazing I was super keen to work with her again but in a more collaborative way, rather than just handing over stems. We went back and forth a lot and it flowed really well. I love how this one turned out, it’s such a meeting of our two styles.”

ANNA adds: “It is a big honor to be able to create music together with Jon. His music is part of my daily life, part of my meditations, my long walks and contemplative moments. My remix for his track ‘Singularity’ had a huge impact on my career and getting to know Jon better since then, and collaborate on this version of DITGH, it feels like our relationship has come full circle!”

Listen to Jon Hopkins & ANNA’s “Deep In The Glowing Heart (Night Version)”
Music For Psychedelic Therapy was Hopkins’ first full-length since the release of sister albums, the GRAMMY-nominated Singularity (2018) and Immunity (2013), and it was a departure in sound from these records; “an album with no beats, not one drum sound, something that is closer to a classical symphony than a dance / electronica record.”

Listen/Watch/Purchase:
Purchase/Stream Music For Psychedelic Therapy
Watch “Sit Around The Fire” (with Ram Dass, East Forest) Visualizer
Watch “Music For Psychedelic Therapy (Excerpt)” Visualizer

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe while you’re here.]

[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

October and the Eyes shares a “Tit Pic.” It’s a single! A new single! What were you thinking?

Following the release of her recent EP ‘Who Upset You?‘, New Zealand-born, London-based singer & songwriter October and the Eyes is sharing her new single “Tit Pic.“

Speaking about the track, October said “We destroy the earth because of our innate sense of self importance – that we have a god given right to rape, pillage and exploit the earth for our own consumption. We simultaneously distract ourselves from the worsening repercussions of our destructive hand via narcissistic pursuits of social media exhibitionism and sterile lit bathroom selfies. It’s a great picture though and successfully garnered 237 likes which is a huge relief.”

Listen to “Tit Pic” via Youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiSZVMUBR5I

Listen via other streaming services here: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/octoberandtheeyes/tit-pic

October is no new-comer to music, the New Zealand born musician has been involved in musical pursuits since she was a child. Heralding from a musical family, the prospect of pursuing music in one form or another was almost inescapable: A classical pianist mother, fanatic music fan father, and two older multi- instrumentalist brothers who were always holding their band practices in the family playroom. October’s childhood was that of a humble upbringing; having grown up in a small rural town in New Zealand’s wine country, she turned to songwriting as a means to stave the boredom away. She taught herself how to record and produce her own music aged 12, locking herself away in her bedroom for hours on end, and hasn’t looked back since. Claiming the internet raised her, it’s clear she had her sights set on broader horizons and bigger cities.

Having moved half way across the world to her new home in East London, October has remained true to her traditional isolated writing style by holing up in her East London flat for several months and writing a small collection of songs that can be described as dizzying, darkly kaleidoscopic, and dauntless above all. October describes her musical style as ‘collage-rock’ (not the be confused with college rock). Pulling musical inspiration from the likes of Bauhaus, Bowie, Siouxsie Sioux and Suicide, she then squeezes her influences through the gauze of modernity and electronics, thus creating something entirely of her own.

With nods to acid rock, psychobilly and post-punk, October and The Eyes’ music is equal parts nostalgia-drenched as it is future forward, employing layers of ambient synth drones to anchor the crunched guitars and jagged organ parts. Delivered with a twisted theatricality, her vocals pendulum between commanding chants and soothing coo’s, proving that not only is she a versatile songwriter and producer, but a versatile vocalist too.

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe before you go.]

[Thanks to Frankie at Stereo Sanctity.]