Track of the Weekend #126: Woodkid ft. Lykke Li - “Never Let You Down”

The end of another week and another weekend is almost upon us in the waning weeks of winter. The buds are on the trees here in Paris, and the tulips are ready to burst. Just like the cycles of seasons, music is cyclical too. We knew it would only be a matter of time before the velvet-voiced provocateur Woodkid would be back on the world scene. He’s already had one track of the weekend, and now he claims #2 alongside indie favorite Lykke Li with “Never Let You Down.” The tone is bleak, sad, like something has been lost. And yet despite this dark environment hope still exists. 

Do you remember all the sounds, when I found you by the lake? And how the water seemed to call your name?” 

Thanks to the unassailable Radar Bazaar for nailing this one! 

EP Review: Kagu

image

A few weeks ago we featured a talented producer from Sudan, and now, our focus on emerging music turns to the land of red sand and open spaces, known for barrier reefs and unending beaches. Australia’s Sean Heathcliff has become the musical entity Kagu, releasing his first eponymous EP this week out on Humming Records

Released: March 10, 2015

Genres: singer-songwriter

Tracks: 4

Who would like this EP?

Fans of Bon Iver’s vocals, people who like Beck’s guitar arrangements.

Our thoughts:

Singer-songwriters are a nickel a dozen these days. As a songwriter, It’s easy to fall into a trap that people will be carried by your lyrics alone. Yet poetry does not command the influence it once did (unless it’s clever hip hop). To be successful, this style of music needs to become more, it needs to be delicate and luscious at the same time. It has to feel full, with a combination of seductive vocals and layers of complexity, the more surprising the better. Kagu does exactly this: managing to walk the tightrope between annoying angst and overproduced orchestras. The result is an honest, delightful, and highly pleasing EP that signifies a powerful career to come. Just one listen to “Shadow of the Wind" and you’ll understand why. 

Listen to Kagu’s EP here

Surf Sound Pop, a New EP and The Hope of La Voyage: Interview with Amarillo

image

March is a hot month for new music in Paris, with exciting acts understanding the mechanisms of launching new projects with the hopes of conquering their future fan bases around the world. It’s precisely this spirit, hope carbonated into a long neck bottle to be opened on a hot, dry day, that we encounter at Le Fée Verte, one of the most friendly Parisian bars nestled along the raucous Rue de la Roquette. 

If this hopeful spirit has a color, it would be yellow: the color of the sun, the color of energy. In Spanish, it’s “Amarillo.” In Paris, it’s the band, releasing their first EP today entitled “Tomorrow We’ll Be Long Gone.” We’re joined by Noé, Amarillo’s sombrero y corazon, and Dylan, the lead guitarist for the 5-member group. Over coffees and Perrier, the mic clicks on. 

The following is translated from French. Bold is Tony Hymes for Whyd

How many are you guys in Amarillo?

Noé: We’re 5 musicians for the stage. Dylan is the lead guitarist while I do the rhythm guitar and the singing.  

Who is responsible for the creation of music?

Noé: At the beginning I wrote everything in my room alone. Since I play a lot of instruments, not all very well, I recorded the songs and from there the tracks were able to grow. That gave me the desire to put the music on the stage, to call on friends that I’ve known for a long time. 

Had you already played music together with the other member of Amarillo?

Noé: It’s been about a year that we’ve been playing together on the stage. 

So you guys already have a vibe of what it’s like to work together? Your respective strengths and weaknesses?

Dylan: Before Amarillo we’ve already had other projects together. Like Caandides

Noé: Yeah we know each other so the ideas come faster, we get mad at each other faster, and of course the problems are resolved faster. 

It’s just like a family!

Noé: Yeah!

Your music has been described as psychedelic surf pop. I imagine you don’t do a lot of surfing in Paris. Does this mentality come from a particular geography? The idea of the coast?

Noé: I don’t know if surf music for French people is tied to actual surfing, it’s more of a sound. Or at least it’s become a sound, a guitar sound, very Tarantino-esque. And for me that’s sort of surf music. And it’s an influence. 

Is that the center of your music? Or is your music more of a mix of a lot of different styles and that’s just what people tend to take from it?

Noé: When I write songs I never ask myself what the music is supposed to sound like. I like a lot of different music. I’ve played a lot of classical music and blues. I’m really a fan of pop music in general too, and so when other people listen to my music, they tell me other bands that they think it sounds like and so I say “cool!” It’s a good way to discover new music too! 

And then afterwards when we are 5, everyone brings their own personal touches. That’s also part of the idea, for example, Dylan works his sound with the effects pedals, so I trust him a lot with the sonic texture, the timber of the music, things that I normally wouldn’t have thought of. 

You mention blues, pop, are there other big styles for you on the level of your influences? 

Noé: On a songwriting level I’m very into Americana, Neil Young, or Leonard Cohen. Pop songs, those are my biggest influences. Tom Waits too. 

Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen are influences that often go together!

Noé: Oh merde!

No! It’s a good thing, because Leonard Cohen is a giant, he’s still producing music today! Either people tell me Leonard Cohen/Jeff Buckley, or Leonard Cohen/Tom Waits, and that gives me the immediate idea of the direction. That’s a public marker so people can understand. 

And Dylan, as a guitarist, do you have major influences?

Dylan: I’ve never really been able to identify direct references between my personal style and the music that I listen to. But there are guitarists that I love for their textures. 

image

The name, Amarillo. Texas?

Noé: Also. 

Did you choose the name before or after you started making the music? 

Noé: Well, I have Chilean origins through my mother. I speak Spanish at home, so it was all about the color. Afterwards I searched and I found out that it was a city in Texas, which doesn’t have a very easy history. That gives me more things to talk about but…

It’s more about the color. 

Noé: Yeah, I like how the word sounds, there are a lot of vowels, and yellow for me is also hope, sunshine. 

For this EP, there are 4 tracks. Do the tracks tell a story together, or did you just pick four really strong tracks to lead with?

Noé: The idea that I proposed to Antoine from our label Microqlima, was to have 4 strong tracks, and we chose the tracks together. Then afterwords we realized that with the track titles and the themes, that they could in fact be a story. Songs like “Tomorrow” and “Long Gone.” In the end it has a sense, adding to the feeling to voyage, the promise of the future, what’s going to happen soon. 

Do you share this feeling of voyage Dylan?

Dylan: In fact very early on we got this idea from Noé, when he told us about the tracks and how he explained them to us. Also on a graphic level too. So as a good student I entered into his idea of voyage, and I feel like we approached the songs with respect to the idea of travel. 

You can easily get that idea of voyage, but also on a temporal level. 

Noé: It’s even more that. The idea of traveling is not always about the destination, but the voyage, and everything that is going to happen on the voyage. That’s really what we tried to develop with the themes, the graphics, the idea of “what we are going to do.” It’s not important where we are or what we’ve done. It’s hopeful, rejoining the theme of “amarillo.”

Who would you be proud to be classified with, in terms of similar styles of music?

Dylan: I love Sufjan Stevens, personally. 

He definitely aligns with your style, his focus on geography, voyage. 

Noé: I would add Mac Demarco too. I like how he write songs, very simple but great.

You can go see Amarillo perform around Paris over the next few weeks, and make sure that you attend their official launch party slated to coincide with the start of Spring, on March 21st at Le Perchoir. 

Speaking With Your Hands, a Serendipidous Flower, and the New Album “Digital Pourpre” - Interview with Turnsteak

image

How did you start making music together?

Our first meeting was at a concert where we were playing with our own, different rap groups, each of us on the turntables. We started to exchange tips, scratch phases, our little ticks, and that was it! 

At the beginning we would mess around and often our challenge was to choose a second-hand disc randomly, then we had to create a plan in 5 minutes. We laughed a lot! Then we passed through numerous different phases and musical aesthetics before arriving where we are today. 

We also bought some materials, a loopstation, pads, and a few synths to evolve our music along the direction of our projects. 

Who do you count among your influences? 

Being first of all DJs, we have the habit of listening to a lot of different, varied musical styles. There are tons of cult albums that have changed our way of seeing things. In terms of electronic we can cite Modeselektor, Edit (GitchMob), Rustie, Lorn, Eprom, Slugabed, Salva, Ta-Ku, Machinedrum, Flying Lotus, Flako, Kaytranada, and also some of the artists from Soulection…

Where does the name of your group come from? 

Turnsteak originally comes from “Turntable Speakers.” At the beginning it was 100% turn tables, the turntablism. The concept of “speaking with our hands” represented what we were doing at the time. 

Then the name was shortened to Turnspeak, and it’s been changed from there, but I won’t say anything else :) 

What is the genesis of your LP “Digital Pourpre” which comes out tomorrow? Does it tell a story or is each track independent from the others?

Having the habit of always working on short projects, even the concept of an album was already a lot of pressure. The idea wasn’t to do a series of tracks without coherence. We wanted to go farther. So we imposed certain directions, constraints, and limits on ourselves, to not fly off in every single direction. 

At this level, our friend Olivier Vasseur who mixed the album, did a great job of artistic direction and he gave us a lot of advice around the conception of the album. We worked the sound and the textures with him and added an organic dimension to the tracks. That let us bring in other sensations, images, and have the listener dive deeper into the heart of our music. 

The balance between the light synths and the deep bass let us bring energy and power. The voices are also key elements on the album. They bring a color and different environment to each track, like on “High Line” for example where the voices come from a Vietnamese comic theater! 

Finally, getting back to your question about the genesis of the LP, the first brick was the title. For the anecdote, we were at a rest stop off the highway during a tour and we stumbled upon a description of a flower that was growing in a corner, the “digital pourpre.” We were looking at it saying to ourselves that would be an awesome name for an album. All of the universe connected to this flower immediately spoke to us: its history in relationship with white magic, its medicinal side and its pathological and cardiovascular benefits (which we immediately connected with the rhythm, dance) the connection to digital, to fingers, to scratch… a name that’s full of mystery and subtleties. It’s exactly what we wanted to bring with the first long format. That’s to say make an album that’s rich and subtle, without falling into easiness, and with the idea of a voyage.

Urielle, the artistic director at With Us Records agreed with us and oriented it the best possible way while staying within the scope of the project. We had also worked on a moodboard together that let us see everything more clearly, the progression of the tracks and the history of the album. 

Where can your fans come to see you live?

A little bit all over France! Find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Bandsintown to find our latest concert dates. 

You can even send us a little private message and we can invite you if there are places left! 

Track of the Weekend #125: Action Bronson - “Actin Crazy”

image

The sun is out in full force in Paris for what promises to be a weekend where the shivers are warmed away. Plus the Whyd team expanded this week with the addition of Laurent and the promise of 2015 is starting to feel stronger. Reflecting this, there is an extra jump in the rhythms of the music trending across Whyd, like this week’s track of the weekend from the ex-gourment chef born in Queens, New York: Action Bronson. His latest single off his forthcoming album Mr. Wonderful is “Acting Crazy,” an extremely quotable hip hop anthem that reflects how large his out-sized personality has become to take advantage of the huge potential of (presumably) his hip hop career. Because, after all the swagging and bragging, he’s still his “mama’s little baby.”   

"Opportunity be knockin’" 

Thanks to LR for getting it to us! 

  • March, 4 2015

Roots Rock Reggae: Playlist of Reference

Our latest edition in our Playlist of Reference series goes tropical, down to the heart of the Caribbean and a world of dreadlocked rastas. A most recognisable music subgenre, this Roots Rock Reggae playlist is curated by Aline, one of our most passionate music lovers who has been with us since the beginning. Let’s get the story behind the curation:  

When did you start listening to RRR?

Probably like a lot of people, I started to listen to reggae when I was a teenager. Thanks to Bob Marley and the Wailers, Jimmy Cliff, Alpha Blondy, etc… Reggae music became popular all over the world, and during the 90’s you could find a lot of compilations.  Unfortunately it was far from being relevant to what Reggae music is: all the symbols, culture and history that is intrinsically tied to this music.

Did you ever have a moment when you felt like RRR started speaking to you?

I started to go to Parisian sound systems where I found people passionate about reggae music, I used to go to “La poterne des peupliers,” “l’espace Massena,”  ”La boule noire,”and it was fantastic. I had the chance to see lot of good “sound systems” and “selectas”, MC’s, sometimes coming from Jamaica or UK. I’ve been to a loooooot of gigs also. I was interested to know more about this music and its history: the musical influences (Calypso, Mento, Rock Steady ..), the famous reggae producers (Coxsone, Lee Scratch Perry etc..) history and politics in Jamaica where Bob Marley played some role with the revolutionary attitude and “propaganda” in his music, Rastafarism, Africa and the 400 years of slavery… There are so many things to know about Reggae music. When you get interested in all this, Reggae music becomes really meaningful.

What are some example situations when you would listen to this playlist yourself?

I love to listen reggae when I’m at home, relaxing, or with my friends … or sometimes when I work.

If you had to choose just one track from this playlist, which one would be your favorite?

It’s difficult to choose…. I would say “Cool Breeze” by Big Youth. I saw him live 2 weeks ago with U-ROY. It was Huge !! Every time I go for a show, I’m always waiting to hear if the singer still has the same voice, because most of them are more than 70 years old now (the best reggae songs were recorded approximatively between 1965 and 1975, according to me!) 

Most of the time I am not disappointed!

Thanks Aline! 

Say Hello To Laurent

image

The situation is getting more exciting every day here at Whyd, as we power onwards towards the realization of our vision. In order to reach this harmonious vision, we need some extra help. Please give a big hello to Laurent, or new techno-lumberjack who is going to play a key role in our top-secret development. 

Laurent comes from the town of Muret, near Toulouse in south-west France. He is a lover of beards and music. He loves beards and music so much that he actually produces electronic music under the name Les Petits Barbus. He is a perfect match for the Whyd team. 

In addition to his music passion, he loves nature, mountains, and the mechanic side of do-it-yourself projects like fixing bikes. He also spent six months in Australia on a surfing road trip making him officially a hipster, and now officially a Whyd team hipster. 

Welcome, and never stop jamming Laurent! 

Emerging Metal From Italy: Interview with BBHells Records

image

Hello BBHells! Can you introduce yourselves? Where are you from and how did you start your net label?

Hi, BBHells Records was born in Perugia (Umbria,Italy) in January 2014. Our label consists of four components: Max Braccianti (Director), Gabriele Bico (Collaborating Sound Engineer), Gianluca Benedetti (Consultant) and Roberta Melana (Public Relations).

We deal not only in making contracts with our bands but we do real training. We decided to take this road because of our passion for metal music.

What kind of artists do you represent and how did you start working with them?

We represent emerging rock bands. We listen to their material and decide how to work together.

Which types of music lovers should listen to their music?

Generally fans of rock metal, and we like to work with electronic music too.

What are your plans for 2015?

For 2015 we have many new collaborations and events to be organized. We hope to always be busy with work, and we have the target of being able to help bands work in the world.

Follows us on our website for news! Stay rock \m/

Track of the Weekend #124: Florence & The Machine - “What Kind Of Man” (Nicolas Jaar Remix)

image

Ah, what good the sun can do! After hiding behind rain clouds all week, dampening our moods in the wake of the official departure of our beloved Dr. Joly, the sun is a-blazing on this Friday. And it’s pizza day. Fuck yeah. 

Around the corner is March, and that means spring will soon be in the air. But before we enjoy the budding flowers and warmer breezes, winter is not over. It’s not done yet, which is exactly what can be said about the most popular track on Whyd this week, Nicolas Jaar's epic remix of Florence & The Machine's “What Kind Of Man.” For more than 12 minutes the song bounces from Florence’s voice to deep house echoes to the classic mix of odd percussion sounds that has come to characterize Mr. Jaar’s prolific career. It’s a veritable banger of a track from someone so used to exploring the quieter parts of our musical mind. 

Thanks to Maxime M for getting it to us first!