Here’s the latest track and video showcased from Chromatics forthcoming new album ‘Kill For Love’.
‘Back From The Grave’ was, again, directed by Alberto Rossini and despite the title and content, is a lot Poppier and catchier than it sounds.
‘Back From The Grave’ is taken from Chromatics’ forthcoming second Italians Do It Better album, ‘Kill For Love’.
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Vancouver Chillwave/SynthWave crossover producer Teen Daze will be releasing his début album ‘all Of Us, together’ in May. This new track, ‘Treten’, is just a taste of what’s to come.
‘Treten’ is typical of Teen Daze’s sound. Lush synthesizer atmospheres layered thick over retro synth bass and melodies. A tack that’s both dancefloor friendly and hypnotically ambient. When you focus in on the tracks core it’s a sweet, nostalgic peice of ElectroPop, playful with shifting arpeggios and a soaring lead line. Then the track is washed with heavy synth pads it give it a hazy, dreamlike quality. The album should be the perfect summer accompaniment.
Teen Daze’s ‘All of Us, Together’ is released 22nd May on Lefse Records.
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With over 24,000 ‘likes’ on Facebook I feel kinda’ like I should know who Benjamin Francis Leftwich is. but I don’t. On fist glance he appears to be a reasonably talented, but dreary, Folky singer, the kind that is hard to get away from these days. No matter, Cosmonaut Grechko to the rescue as he takes BFL’s track of last year ‘Box Of Stones’ and makes it something exciting and beautiful.
Grechko’s talent consistently amazes us, this reMix is just inspired. Francis Leftwich’s vocals take on a whole new lease of life in Grechko’s hands, giving the an injection of adrenaline and and IV drip of emotion. A smooth summer Dreamwave groove and some shiny synth flourishes weave in and out of the cut-up vocals to create the perfect sunshine track. Full of feeling, full of optimism, Grechko nails it once again.
♫ Benjamin Francis Leftwich – Box Of Stones (Cosmonaut Grechko Discoteque Mix)
Grechko’s main reMix is available of the deluxe version of Benjamin Francis Leftwich’s album.
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Little Boots – Into The Future Mixtape = Here’s yet another mixtape from ElectroPop queen Little Boots. She’s on a roll with them these days! Expect forty minutes of slammin’ electronic dance with an unexpected darkness.
♫ Little Boots – Into The Future Mixtape
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Prepare for some stormy night moods of epic proportions from French producer Awkoder.
His latest tune, ‘Nightrain’ is pure midnight. A peice of moody SynthWave that sounds exactly like it says on the tin. this is the sound of electronic night-time rain. A dark soulful track with a deep Italo bassline and enigmatic chords that conjure up that midnight feeling. ‘Nightrain’ is just the latest of a string on amazing tunes from this Frenchman who’s jams have such a soul and passion to them. The moment in ‘Nightrain’ when the distant vocals and lead come in is a beat of pure power.
Awkoder’s ‘Lovely Eyes’ single will be out soon.
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The deep Disco of Escort’s ‘Why Oh Why’ finally gets itself a video clip.
The single’s been out a while now and the clip portrays the live version of Escort, a seventeen peice Disco orchestra.
Escort’s self-titled début is out now digitally and 31st January on CD and Vinyl.
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Riding high on the success of his current single ‘No One Cries For Me’ Figure Of 8 has dropped a couple of new tracks to keep the momentum going.
First up is ‘Bittersweet’ featuring the soulful vocals of fellow Irishman Jonny Nutt. If you add this to ‘No One Cries For Me’ you can defiantly see a Figure Of 8 ‘sound’ evolving. There something about his tunes that don’t try to impress, and also doesn’t pigeonhole itself into any electronic genre. It’s music that does it’s own thing, it’s got a bit of a laidback vibe to it. SynthPop that is so slickly produced to seems to just slip from the speakers into the room. ‘Bittersweet’, like ‘No One Cries’ is deeply emotional too, but in a particularly genuine way. Oh, did I mention the rockin’ guitar solo? ‘Blind Mice’ is more of a dark SynthWave track, but still retaining that Figure Of 8 warmness to it. A Vangelis-esque sweeping soundtrack peice that manages to merge retro synth music with that Irish SynthPop rich production.
♫ Figure of 8 (Feat. Jonny Nutt) – Bittersweet
‘No One Cries For Me’ is out now on On The Fruit Records.
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This weeks capsule of Synthesizer Zen, to carry you into the weekend, comes in the form of DâM-FunK working the Roland Axis-1 Keytar hard!
Video courtesy of YouTube user scarnsworth.
In the early hours of the morning, when the only folk out and about were the nighthawks and the freaks, SynthWave legend Miami Nights 1984 released his sophomore album, his follow up to 2010’s ‘Early Summer’ on Rosso Corsa Records.
Titled ‘Turbulence’ this is one release that has been eagerly, eagerly, awaited around electronic rumors towers and from the intro peice of ‘MN84 theme’ onward it doesn’t disappoint. The albums first track proper, ‘Clutch’ is the prefect opener, and the perfect signpost for what to expect within the rest of the record. Robotic Italo grooves layered with lush emotional, synths, tracks that tell a story and take you along on that narrative and soaring synth solos that take tracks stratospheric. This is the ‘80’s repacked to rock both modern dancefloors and modern minds. It would be hard to pick standout tracks amongst the 12 that make up ‘Turbulence’ as they are all stormers, and there’s a variety of moods contained within. You’ve got your big power driving tracks like ‘Ocean Drive’ and ‘ Phone Tag‘ that truly exemplify Outrun Electro, there are ‘get in the car and drive into the night’ tunes. Then there’s the quitter, more atmospheric peices, such as ‘Astral Projection’. Where this album differs from the SynthWave classic ‘Early Summer’ is the injection of late 80’s, early’90’s dance music influences in the form of FM post-House basslines and orchestral hits on tracks like ‘Streets Of Fire’, we’ve made no apologies in the past about being orchestral hit lovers ,so this new facet of Miami Nights 1984 is definitely welcome. For me, the album centrepiece, ‘New Tomorrow’ sums up what ‘Turbulence’ is doing, it’s an evocative, rich peice in the place where Italo and ‘80’s electronic TV music meet. Emotional, yet danceable. Nostalgic, yet contemporary. The Germans call it SynthWave, The Rosso Corsa crew have always called it Outrun, In LA they invented Dreamwave just to be able to call it something. The retro synth scene has never really found a tag that has stuck, but I don’t think they care, but if there isn;t a name that expresses the scene as a whole, then at least there is an album, ‘Turbulence’ is the archetypal SynthWave album, it just sums up everything about retro, soundtrack influenced, synth music now, and where it;s headed in the future.
♫ Miami Nights 1984 – High Beams
♫ Miami Nights 1984 – Ocean Drive
♫ Miami Nights 1984 – Saved By The Bell
‘Turbulence’ is out now.
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This May Portland ElectroPop duo Soft Metals, who crafted one of our favourite albums of last year, are releasing a collection of reMixes from the aforementioned, self-titled, album on 12” and digital.
‘The reMixes’ contains five varied and interesting (8 on the digital release) interpretations of tracks from the album. Amongst the talent brought in to provide versions are VALIS, Yard, Waves, and The Drum who all deliver some stunning listening alongside out picks from the EP. Xander Harris’ take on Soft Metals best known track, ‘Psychic Driving’ presents us with an old school EBM beat against some sharp synths that threaten to veer off into Italo territory at times. The version of ‘Eyes Closed’ from Copy is a deep early 90’s House track with a lush square wave bass. A definite highlight of the EP. Casa Del Mirto turn ‘Do You Remember?’ into a beautiful, almost Balearic, ElectroPop track that evolves into some full-on sunrise Acid. The last of our picks is from The Soulless Party, who also take on ‘Psychic Driving’ and give it a dreamlike retro SynthPop makeover. As an added bonus, a big chunk of the proceeds from sales will go to Doctors Without Borders. Excellent electronic music and helping a worth cause, that’s a win/win!
♫ Soft Metals – Psychic Driving (Xander Harris reMix)
♫ Soft Metals – Eyes Closed (Copy reMix)
♫ Soft Metals – Do You Remember? (Casa Del Mirto Extended reMix)
♫ Soft Metals – Psychic Driving (The Soulless Party reMix) (Digital Only)
Soft Metals ‘The reMixes’ is released on 12” and download on 15th May via Sweating Tapes.
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