2015 was the year of live music for us. We covered eight festivals. I don’t think I’ve been to that many before in my life.
Hip hop seemed to make a return on here. That’s what we started on, but hit a major dip from 2010 to 2013. It started back up in 2014 with Kendrick Lamar, and predecessors have been poppin’ up all over the place since. Some with possibly more potential than Kendrick himself. One at the top of this list.
Other genres in electronic dominated the year even more. We got out a good amount of Kawaii in the first half, but future & trap took over the second. And of course house has been most dominate. Going from the deeper, heavier side and splitting into future & chill house near the end, as well as the funkier side of house music to jack to.
The amount of new singers seems to have dipped compared to past years, but the quality hasn’t. Anderson Paak, Madelyn Grant, Liz Vice & Joey Dosik to name out of the dozen others with clear personalities in their voices.
We’ve collected 29 tracks in total and a list of our 12 musicians with the most potential. Plus our biggest accomplishments of the year below that, the playlists. We put together 35 in total! That’s up from 25 last year.
I was introduced to The 13th Grade by way of One T. I don’t know how I picked up on his Audible, but I never would’ve guessed the treasures I’d dig up because of it. Shortly after looking into him I looked into his collaborators. Most notably Josh J the freakin guitar wonderist and the rest of the honeypot collectively known as The 13th Grade.
The supergroup is based out of LA and houses 14 musicians, though a few are based in San Diego, Vegas or London. Not only do they have incomparably talented producers, DJs, instrumentals and vocalists, but their music ranges greatly. And they’re well on their way to making a label as sexy as any of their musicians.
So in good fashion we did what we try to do best, made a playlist out of ’em. Unfortunately we couldn’t get all 14 on here for one reason or another, but managed to get most. The list starts off with some funk n soul into jazz and half way through gets into the harder stuff. We end it where we started off, ’cause there was way too much soulful shit to only feature one from each artist. Like I’ve said already enough, there’s a lot of talent in The 13th Grade.
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.
I was talking to my coworkers about the music in my Late Night Jazz list. While it’s definitely not the music of the early turn of last century, it still gives me that feeling of jazz for the evening, unconventional as it may be. It’s all covered in electronic sounds and that’s where our opinions stray.
Same goes with our funk-infused playlist, The Funk Shall Be Within You. It may go off into electro at times, but the feeling of funk is strong throughout and I don’t think any word could describe it better, especially electronic. Other than nufunk or any other made up offshoot, but that’s a whole other debate.
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).
Our electro funk from last year grew so much we decided to break it up & section it into a few playlists. First up comes from the groovier side.
I wanted to call this Groovewit hits, but Lauren talked me out of it. Generally speaking it lies in the mid-range of electro music with heavy synth influence and a whole lotta funky bass.
Let us know how well the songs flowed together for you.
It’s important to us.
A lotta hip hop I love right now is sounding like Kendrick and I haven’t been this exciting about it since our start. We built this blog on hip hop about five years back, but electronic took over up until a year ago when hip hop caught up — or more likely we caught up with it.
Most of it you’ll love, but most of you aren’t going to like the last track, understandably. Give it a couple years.
Well, funk is back, at least for us. One T’s Audible took our interest in electro funk and pushed it into something more funk electro (emphasis on the funk).
Audible is actually a reinterpretation of One T’s collaboration with Kentaroxiii & Toma Love Child. One T pitched down his verse from the original and brought in Josh Jar’s guitar. And damn if that guitar don’t make this funk, on the highs & the lows.