Blu - Everything'sOK (ft. Jack Davey) (prod. by Flying Lotus)

Ahh fruition.  It's always nice when a plan comes together perfectly in the end.  In this case, it took me several months to finally bring you the total presentation I had imagined, but here it is.

For a while now, I have been pleasantly surprised by the steady stream of talent coming out of the west coast music scene.  I've found myself developing favorites from the Pacific Northwest, the Bay area, and Los Angeles.  As a bit of background, I had originally been intending to dedicate a single post to several L.A. artists that have captured my attention over the past couple years.  Those artists were Blu, J*Davey, and Flying Lotus.  Each one of them has impressed me in different ways recently, and have demonstrated the health of that local music underground.  As I was contemplating how to feature them all at once, an answer dropped into my lap.  Sometime in March, Blu let a tweet fly that contained a download link to a song done by himself, and with the assistance of none other than Miss Jack Davey and FlyLo.  It was a Godsend.  I knew then that I had to devote a post to each individual musician in order to properly culminate with the excitement of this release.

So here we are.   I have shown you the lyrical skills of Blu.  You have heard the distinct voice of Jack Davey. Flying Lotus's video game-like production is instantly recognizable.  This track is off Blu's forthcoming No York! album.  Enjoy.

Listen/Download at Okayplayer.

SBTRKT - Wildfire (ft. Yukimi Nagano of Little Dragon)

I've had this song on repeat for a good 24 hours now.  It has literally consumed my music listening like a wildfire.

Listen at Live For The Funk.

The track is by SBTRKT (as in 'subtract') and features the lead vocalist of the band Little Dragon.  SBTRKT is an enigmatic British artist who specializes in drum and bass (DnB) and U.K. style dubstep music.

It's education time for all you triggas and snitches.  Dubstep isn't defined by face melting bass drops.  It can be traced to London producers during the mid 90's blending features of Jamaican dub, drum and bass, and British 2-Step into a new, creative style of music.  This is one of the earliest examples of dub music.  It has a sparse drum line; instead, the song's bass line drives the track.  Ultimately, dub gave rise to DnB music which is much more up-tempo and frantic.  A prime example of this style is seen in the opening scene of Ali G in da House.  Classic.  And finally, 2-Step garage music grew out of DnB, and is more or less dubstep's cousin.  Here is a sample of 2-Step that displays an increased use of electronica as well as more vocals.  It should be apparent by now how we arrive at music like that from SBTRKT.

Still reading?  Then you're also probably still playing 'Wildfire'.  SBTRKT has really shown us why less is more both in a name and in music.  The light drum beats, heavy bass melody, and nice topping of female vocals make a simple, yet perfectly constructed song.  He has said that he is a fan of FlyLo's Cosmogramma album, and those influences are obvious in his production.

Apart from deleting vowels, SBTRKT shares several more similarities with Toronto based singer The Weeknd (seriously, if you don't have his mixtape yet, you might be homeless).  They both inspire this sort of late night swagger and confidence that is difficult to put into words, but easy to feel when listening to their music.  Drizzy Drake has placed his approval on both artists, if that means anything to you.  His tweets were partially responsible for the buzz around The Weeknd and he was so kind as to drop some bars on 'Wildfire'.  Also, for all the secrecy surrounding The Weeknd's identity, at least we know his name is Abel Tesfaye.  SBTRKT may or may not be multiple people, and he only performs publicly while wearing a signature tribal mask.  To be honest, I didn't notice the eyes behind the mask when I first saw the picture above.  It kind of freaked me out when I realized it, and made the song that much more haunting, but awesome.