Listen: 2forJoy – “Michaela”

An empty stage, busy and bustling waiters slip between tables as patrons laugh, drink, laugh some more, the volume of the chatter is deafening, the club is heaving and everyone is fighting to be heard. The lights dim over the floor. A single spotlight illuminates an exotic looking woman standing alone on stage. The noise was such that no-one even noticed her arrive. She sings and the chatter stops. Laughter subsides as conversations are left unsaid on the lips of the now transfixed audience. Her voice is the only sound, hypnotic it floats out across the audience, wisp like it dances amongst them as they hang on every note.

As a scenario it may sound far-fetched but when you are as vocally blessed as Ruth Ivo, aka 2forJoy, it must happen all the time. Her online releases so far, the spellbinding “Choke” and disarming cover of Tom Waits’ “Green Grass”, have sent a shiver of excitement across the blogoshpere already. With her formal debut single, “Michaela”, she threatens to send us all into convulsions.

Here her voice is a lover’s caress, but in a relationship that is on the turn. Soft, gentle, exciting but somehow distant, melancholy as she sings of a lost friend. Intermittent electronics and percussion build a perfectly brooding, wistful atmosphere for Ivo’s vocals to melt into. It’s a wonderful piece of low-key, haunting pop music and one that will be absorbed and enjoyed by all who hear it.

“Michaela” is due for release on 23 October.

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Listen: Summer Camp – “City”

As well as being crazy prolific (this is the third track from their forthcoming EP Always, which in turn follows hot on the heels of their fantastic debut album, Welcome To Condale) Summer Camp also have the capacity to surprise. Hands up who expected them to release a track featuring a rap from Odd Future’s Hal Williams (aka Pyramid Vritra)? Exactly, none of you.

Yet here we are, listening to the new song with a gaping hole on the side of our head where our mind has been blown. According to The Guardian Williams asked to remix one of their tracks and on receipt of “City”, he recorded a verse which they loved and kept.

To be honest, we are not 100% convinced by the rap, the swearing especially feels out of place but even without the guest verse, the track is brilliant. Elizabeth Sankey’s voice soars over the dark, evocative synths and is quite probably her finest performance so far. We have no idea where the video for this will go, and given recent form it could go practically anywhere, but we see Elizabeth on the dark streets of an 80’s era New York, surrounded by flashing neon signs, steam pouring up from the subway below and her vocal flying up into the night sky. We’ll be claiming royalties if that’s where they go with it.

Take a listen to “City” below.

Always is out 9 July via Moshi Moshi and you can pre-order signed copies on CD or blue vinyl

Read More
Listen: Summer Camp – “Life”
Welcome to the community: Interview with Summer Camp
Watch: Summer Camp covers Bombay Bicycle Club
Watch: Summer Camp – “Losing My Mind”
Albums Of The Year – Part 1
Watch: Summer Camp’s New Video – “Down”

Listen: Ronika – “Automatic”

Break out the glitterball, dust off your roller skates and grab your neon sweatbands and global hyper colour t-shirts; everyone’s favourite disco diva Ronika is back. Yet again she has brought with her a little droplet of 80’s kitsch and a bucketload of euphoric, funktastic discopop.

Written and produced by the lady herself, it is a glorious, utterly groovy little track. Once you’ve heard it, you can’t help but feel your day is a little bit brighter than before.

“Automatic”, which you can stream below, will be released on 9 April and is available both digitally and on 7″ single

Listen: Jack Robert Hardman – “Famous”

He may have given away “Sorry to George” as a free download last summer, but that doesn’t stop us counting “Famous” as being the first official single from melodious young folkster, Jack Robert Hardman.

The track is a delicate delight, reminiscent of Simon and Garfunkel in places, and Belle and Sebastian in others. It is due out on 13 February 2012 through Pleasant Pursuits / Essential Music and Marketing with an eponymous debut album to follow later in the spring.

“I’m going to be famous” sings Hardman in the chorus. With tracks as mature and eloquent as this, he may well be right.

Listen: New Version 4 Track – “Do It Now”

You may or may not recall that back in October, we shared the debut track from Version 4, “Photograph”. At the time, the band promised that follow up track “Do It Now” was on its way and lo and behold, here it is!

Unlike “Photograph”, which very gradually built up from an orchestral jazz influenced base, into slightly foreboding industrial electronica, “Do It Now” is much more upfront about its intentions. Those being, COME ON, GET MOVING! ENERGY IS GREAT! This is 8+ minutes of increasing, drum kit smashing, synth blasting intensity. Like a snowball picking up speed as it pelts down a hill, gathering in more snow (as well as beats, big hair, bigger shoulder pads and Duran Duran), going faster and faster until it becomes an unstoppable juggernaut ploughing through everything in its path until it ultimately crashes into a house or something and explodes everywhere. At least, that’s the PG analogy. The guys themselves clearly thought it was much more adult in its nature, as the inclusion of the unmistakably lusty breathing of a young lady partaking in coitus suggests.

This is a big tune, less cerebral than their debut perhaps but no less impressive. With its 80’s feel and determination to be played loud, “Do It Now” is a beast, and one that you’ll probably need at least three cans of Red Bull to keep up with.

Catch up with Version 4 on Facebook