Track Of The Day: Janette King (ft. Dijah SB) – ‘Cool Me Down’

‘Cool Me Down’, the second single in as many months from Canadian singer and producer Janette King, is a shape-shifting slow jam arriving just in time for summer. With a verse from Toronto-based rapper DijahSB lending extra weight, the track manages that rare trick of packaging a lyrically considered, musically inventive song in an immediately accessible form. 

King and producer Jonny Tobin play with genre to the extent that you could make musical comparisons to everyone from Tune-Yards to A Tribe Called Quest, Syd to Four Tet. Though the track is clearly rooted in an R&B tradition, ‘Cool Me Down’ embraces a more experimental approach to the genre, an approach which artists like Solange and Abra have recently utilized while still gathering streams in the millions – something it’s not hard to imagine King achieving in the not too distant future. DijahSB’s verse provides both contrast and complement – the styles of each vocalist, while different, seem well matched; similarly smooth and polished in a manner which throws the content of their lyrics into relief.

Following this single, King will release her debut album, What We Lost, in June this year. Recorded against the backdrop of the BLM movement and addressing loss and grief, the record promises more of the insight and invention on offer here. Having already picked up support slots for a range of artists including CupcakKe and Sudan Archives, we hope we’ll have a chance to see King on tour internationally before long.

What We Lost, the debut album from Janette King, is set for release 25th June via Hot Tramp Records.

Gregory Metcalfe
@gregorysparty

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ALBUM: Elsa Hewitt – ‘LUPA’

A captivating reflection on her own thought processes and an extended hand to those who are seeking a similar internal transformation, London-based experimental artist & producer Elsa Hewitt has shared her new album LUPA. Following on from her 2020 EP Ghostcats, the record shimmers with more of Hewitt’s magnetic synth loops and soft vocals, showcasing her truly eccentric spirit across nine fluid soundscapes.

“2020 forced me to look at myself on the inside and it helped me let go of some things and turn around negative patterns and understand how your thoughts and mind influence the way you feel,” Hewitt explains, echoing a sentiment many will be familiar with. For Hewitt though, this process of dismantling her own psyche began earlier in 2019 when she was asked to write a song in response to suicide, having lost a number of friends the same way. She confronted her own experiences of anxiety and depression in the process and channelled them into the ambient, reassuring sounds that form the backbone of LUPA.

“It was a long progression and a lot of other things had to happen at the same time and it really made me face things within myself that I hadn’t been willing to face before,” she confesses about the record’s conception. This compassionate nature permeates Hewitt’s album. Her reluctance to face these difficult emotions dissolves over the course of each track, soothing the stings of loss and confusion that informed them. As with many of her previous recordings, she improvised her way through vocals and synth textures on LUPA, often recording things in one continuous take. This method gives her music a lucid, dream-like quality, dipping in and out of consciousness but remaining rooted in the joy of the moment.

Her talent for reflecting mood fluctuations via breathy vocals and magnetic loops feels effortless, with ‘Howl’, ‘Lavender’ and ‘Squirrelx’ being prime examples of these skilled shifts – her delicate vocal delivery ripples with genuine emotion, underscored by ethereal electronics and tentative beats. Hewitt’s playful side emerges on ‘Car In The Sun’, ‘Inhaler’ and ‘Fuzzy Duck’, but these tracks are usually followed up with sentiments like the ones on ‘IFM’, which are underscored by compassion and a tender desire to absolve anxious thoughts.

On LUPA, Hewitt has constructed a woozy, poetic sublime headrush of comforting electronic sound that provides a pleasant distraction from the overwhelming nature of the world right now.

Follow Elsa Hewitt on bandcamp, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram & Facebook

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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Track Of The Day: Hussy – ‘I Tried’

A swirling guitar tune about self-assertion and facing adversity head on, Sophie Nicole Ellison aka Hussy has shared her latest single ‘I Tried’. Describing her style as “DIY with high ambitions,” the South London-based songwriter & producer performed drums, guitars, synth and bass entirely by herself on this track, which is lifted from her debut EP due later this year.

“I feel like people will instantly think this is a love song but it’s actually not,” Ellison explains about the single. “This song is more me standing up for myself and who I am and maintaining that through adversity. I wrote this pretty instantaneously in the moment, so it definitely has a dramatic ‘take it or leave it’ sentiment whilst landing on an acceptance over it.”

With her talent as a multi-instrumentalist and knowledge as a producer and professional sound engineer, Ellison has an incredibly self-sufficient approach to creating music under her Hussy moniker, which she adopted from a T-shirt slogan. On ‘I Tried’, her guitar sounds are polished, her vocal delivery is charming and the effortless way that she blends these two elements reflects the skill, confidence and resilience it must have took to self-record & produce her upcoming EP.

Listen to ‘I Tried’ below.

 

Follow HUSSY on bandcamp, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram & Facebook

Photo credit: Pooneh Ghana

Kate Crudgington
@KCBobCut

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Track Of The Day: Death Valley Girls – ‘Little Things’

Death Valley Girls’ new video for ‘Little Things’, a track from their recent album Under the Spell of Joy, provides a determinedly optimistic slant on life’s difficulties. The track was inspired by a friend of the LA band’s response to living with chronic pain and the lyrics emphasise allowing ourselves to take respite and pleasure where we can – a theme with particular resonance at the moment. The accompanying video recalls the work of Michel Gondry: charming, DIY, and pleasingly absurd – a dreamscape of homemade clouds and singing moons. Director Kelsey Hart has clearly succeeded in the stated aim of “reflect[ing] the unbridled hope and joy” of the track.

Musically, the track recalls some of the band’s West Coast contemporaries. The lead guitar line, a shimmering surf melody, is reminiscent of Seattle’s La Luz while the rhythm section drives the song along like a sunnier Chastity Belt. And sunny is certainly the word for a song like this; everything from the lyrics to the chord progression – even the lightly up-tempo rhythm – seem specifically designed to put a smile on the listener’s face and a spring in their step. The chorus, where the rest of the band join lead singer Bonnie Bloomgarden on vocals, is nothing short of delightful.

On this basis, the band’s cosmically inspired album, Under The Spell Of Joy, released last year on Suicide Squeeze Records, is certainly worth delving further into. 

Gregory Metcalfe
@GregorysParty

Photo Credit: David Fearn

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