A few days ago I had the bright idea of making this list to hold us over until Frank Ocean dropped his album. That day it did.
The reason I love Frank so much, and why I’m overshadowing all these other artists for him, is because there’s a difference between him and them, for me. All of these singers have at least one good song, but it’s the song, not their singing, that I love. With Frank it’s different. I just love hearing his voice. On anything. Few other singers do that for me.
Not to discredit any of these artists. All of them have that potential, especially Breezy Lovejoy. Now known as Anderson .Paak. It took me two years to come out with another list of favorite male singers. Still got a lot of catching up to do compared to my favorite females.
My first recollection of Flamingosis is not a good one. For me his name is tied to the reshare scheme [trading reshares] I saw a bunch of decent and not-so decent producers doing on SoundCloud sometime back, even if I’m not 100% he was doing exactly that.
Recently, I caught his song Next To You and gradually fell in love. I love how he plays with the vocals on it. It always feels like a surprise.
So naturally, I went through all of his SoundCloud and found plenty more music to speak about. His music is like that Late Night vibe I love, but with good old soul singers on top.
In the over 100 tracks I listened to of his, the hardest thing to do was to cut some of the good ones. That’s always the hardest thing to do in making a mix. “Good is the enemy of great.” And Flamingosis has plenty of greats.
So many of Prince’s predecessors show a glimpse of his depth, only to keep sticking on the same track. It’s hard to get one sound down in this life, let alone two (don’t even get me started on three), but Prince did. So fuck the fans and go off on your own. It’s all yours until you make it theirs.
Here’s a good glimpse at Prince’s legacy from one of my favorite shows in music, Pharrell & Scott Vener’s OTHERtone on Beats 1.
We’re starting to break our remix playlists into genres. Our first was relaxing hip hop remixes and now we’ve got soulful R&B, and some just soulful (we did have a tropical remix list in between).
The list of soul started off as general relaxing remixes, but it was pretty much all some sort of soul so we trimmed it down to that. Apparently I only like hip hop and soul now.
I Do Love You (It’s Alright) reminds me of Forest Gump. It’s like three movies in one. Going from trap to soul to disco, SO:DF changes up the key more times in one song than techno has in its 30 years plus.
I gotta figure out who they sampled on here, specifically in the disco interlude. 2:37 hits on all sorts of sexy.
I sent a friend Zhu’s Automatic yesterday. She seemed to like it.
It didn’t show the artist & title though, so she wanted to know who it was, but I thought why not keep it a mystery. That’s what Zhu would do. Hopefully she reads this post and gets her answer.
Automatic is the start to Zhu’s next project, Genesis Series. It’s just as mysterious as his first, but that whole no-persona persona seems like a gimmick compared to the sounds he’s creating. Automatic is a small progression from his earlier work, but it’s still a hit meant for mainstream. Or ideally for mass consumption. Just not as redefining as his first EP, Nightday.
The string work at the start and the deep toned piano three verses in were definitely a step up in sound. He makes sounds out of instruments with clarity I’ve never heard before. The high hat trap at the end was a nice touch, along with the sax solo, but that could have been hinted at towards the beginning. Would have tied it all together better.
AlunaGeorge’s vocals fit into Zhu’s sound almost better than Zhu himself, but his ghostly vocals make for a good backdrop. Wonder what other collaborations are in store for Zhu’s Genesis Series. I’m sure it’ll be top talent.
I need a good playlist for reflecting on. Especially when traveling long distances. Music that sounds like Toy Box’s Catahoula.
I know alotta people can’t stand a good kick drum when trying to relax, but I almost need it. There’s a lot of little things in Catahoula that doesn’t make it some basic electronic track. Something you should listen for, for the subtleties. The track has heart, texture. And those vocals chops, woof. Wonder where he got em.
The first time I ran into Madelyn Grant’s name was on Odesza’s Sun Models. I had recently uploaded the track to SoundCloud and she had contacted me about including her name in the title. The only reason I hadn’t in the first place was because they really chopped and skewed her vocals, making her voice barely recognizable. But she was real nice about it and it seemed more than fair.
About two months later and I see Madelyn Grant on FKJ’s Waiting. I didn’t remember she was on Odesza’s track at first, but once I did I was all the more in love. Madelyn has a breathtaking voice, but even better she knows how to use it – a much bigger problem with most vocalists.
Since then Madelyn has collaborated with a favorite of mine, Emancipator. I asked her how she got to collaborate with all these legitimate producers and she said, I sent them my demos.
That’s it. In Odesza’s case they were requesting female vocalists, but the other two she just sent them a sample. That’s all it took. How the fuck does that happen? Oh wait, that doesn’t. Minus with Madelyn.
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I’ve put together a playlist of my favorite songs of her’s as well as another list for producers she should also send her music to. Although, this time I think they should be doing the reaching out.
When I first saw Bishiclet remixed Janet Jackson, I was like naaahh, he ain’t gonna top his Miguel remix or the other Janet remixes I collected. He did both. Well, this might not have the longevity of his Miguel remix, but we’ll see about that.
His So Excited remix was so unexpected. It’s so hard for any producer to be consistently good, let alone come up with something borderline trendsetting. What he did to Janet’s voice, pitchin em on high like that, is best described as sounding like Yolandi Visser of Die Antwoord, except not having to deal with her rap Ninja.
The first night I had with this, I played it over & over at least a dozen times.
You know this guy can play guitar when he’s got me off my ass dancing better than any edm. Most music takes vocals for me to connect, but Josh J’s guitar talks wonders.
Just listen to Babble’s Sundazin for me, all the way through. That ending! Woof.
But he’s got much more than that. That’s what’s so amazing about him. Consistency. And he sets up his guitar well (he can produce).