Every Friday, we are adding three tracks to our Feel-Good Friday Spotify playlist. The aim? To create a definitive playlist featuring the best uplifting, feel-good tracks in the world!
Check here every Friday to check any additions!
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If you aren’t already familiar with Raleigh Ritchie (real name Jacob Anderson) in terms of music, chances are you’ll have encountered him as an actor. He has developed a name for himself starring in various high-profile roles over the last four years including Omen in the film Adulthood, Grey Worm in Game of Thrones and Dean Thomas in Broadchurch. He is now in the process of building a whole new side-career for himself as a singer-songwriter, set off to a promising start by single ‘Stronger than Ever‘ which has become something of a staple as dramatic background music on reality television in addition to receiving much airplay on the likes of Radio 1.
‘This is no p***-take’, sings Anderson on ‘Never Been Better‘. Indeed, ‘You’re a Man Now, Boy’ is a determined and well-crafted album which avoids filler album tracks, resulting in an intriguing album from start to finish. It’s an album which explores the pertinent and stimulating themes of confusion, depression and vulnerability through the on-trend genre of alternative R&B. Threaded together by sweeping strings, brass instruments, simmering synthesisers and fierce live percussion, it’s dramatic, bold and powerful, delving into elements of R&B, Soul, electronica and hip-hop.
The likes of ‘Stronger than Ever‘, ‘Bloodsport‘ and ‘Never Been Better‘ are explosive and emotive works which showcase Anderson at his best, featuring thunderous percussion and sweeping strings not dissimilar from Massive Attack’s ‘Unfinished Symphony‘. They are bold and soulful, breaking out from the norm yet remaining contemporary.
Elsewhere, the album possesses a lighter tone which punctuates the album nicely. Quirky and de-tuned synthesisers skip playfully on ‘The Greatest‘ and ‘A Moor‘ whilst Anderson’s love of hip-hop is evident on ‘Cowards‘, a buoyant track abundant with frolicking samples, programmed percussion and a gorgeous neo-soul middle-eight. Likewise ‘Young & Stupid‘ addresses the naivety and recklessness of youth through lyrics such as “I’ll be a star, I’ll be the boy who lived, Taking my car and driving it off the bridge” over hip-hop piano riffs. Then there’s the catchy dance-R&B of ‘Keep It Simple‘, a breezy collaboration with grime act Stormzy which provides some much-needed light relief.
The album is closed perfectly with the tender ‘The Last Romance‘, a mellow R&B ballad which documents an ‘us against the world’ relationship over driving, barely audible percussion, soulful layered vocals and gliding keyboards.
Anderson’s vocals aren’t necessarily the most powerful, yet they are a perfect match for the rich and luscious soundscapes featured here and at times are blissfully soulful.
As the album comes to a close, it is evident that the album is worth far more than its #32 position in the UK album chart. It may not be perfect, but it’s sturdy, compelling and fantastically-written, addressing powerful themes through contemporary alternative-R&B. Most importantly, it is an album with soul and a personality – a rare feat in today’s music.
Rating: 4/5.
Highlights: Stronger than Ever, Bloodsport, Keep it Simple, Never Been Better, Cowards, The Last Romance.
‘You’re a Man Now, Boy’ is available now on Columbia Records.
Here’s the mixtape for April! 20 songs old and new that we’re loving at The Music Box.
Every Friday, we are adding three tracks to our Feel-Good Friday Spotify playlist. The aim? To create a definitive playlist featuring the best uplifting, feel-good tracks in the world!
Check here every Friday to check any additions!
FOLLOW the Music Box to never miss an update again.
The american rapper throws a curveball on this neo-soul influenced hip hop track. Breezy, light and reflective, it’s a brilliant track and one of Lamar’s best.
Gentle electronic track which drifts effortlessly throughout its six minute duration.
Brilliant alt-R&B track with moody guitar riffs, an awesomely catchy chorus and polished production. It’s carried by buoyant beats and Zayn’s syrupy vocals. One of his best.
Buoyant house track with a brilliantly catchy hook.
Soulful and relaxed track with a retro vibe. Utilising little more than organic percussion, bright keys, jazzy riffs, funky bass lines and beautiful falsetto vocals, it’s a lovely track.
Chipmunk-esque pitch-moderated vocal samples, hip hop beats and reverberating soulful vocals carry this brilliant and powerful track.
Elusive producer SBTRKT teams up with vocalists D.RAM and Mabel on this jittery neo-soul track with elements of alternative R&B.
Sultry and moody R&B track which utilises steel pans and thunderous percussion. It’s a powerful track driven by Mattman and Robin’s tight production.
Quirky and brilliant Alternative R&B track with furious guitar riffs, funky bass lines and rock-influenced percussion. Jess Kav’s soulful vocals shine throughout.
Catchy pop track with funky guitar riffs, skipping bass lines and bright piano chords. Drawing upon disco and soul elements, it’s one of his best songs of his career.
The past year has been something of a roller-coaster for Zayn Malik. A year ago, he broke millions of fans’ hearts when he announced he would be leaving One Direction to pursue the life of a ‘normal 22 year old’. It later emerged that he had been secretly recording solo material and his animosity towards his boyband days was soon made crystal clear in numerous interviews in which he took multiple swipes at the band and their music. A shock split with fiancée Perrie Edwards soon followed in addition to multiple venomous and highly publicised Twitter spats. Still, these potential career suicide-moments have been long forgotten since lead single ‘PILLOWTALK‘ rocketed in to the top of the charts of over a dozen countries.
As expected, ‘Mind of Mine’ is a world away from Malik’s One Direction days. Gone is the pop-punk and stadium-pop and in is alternative R&B, catchy dance-pop and elements of Soul. It’s slick, polished, consistent and mature with reverberating vocal samples, hip-hop beats and effect-drenched vocals scattered throughout. It’s a natural transition into R&B music similarly to Justin Timberlake’s début ‘Justified’ fourteen years ago.
‘Mind of Mine’ excels from start to finish with barely a blip. Overall, it possesses a moody and brooding tone with sexualized lyrics and a deeply-textured sound, resulting in a cohesive catalogue of material on which Malik revels in his newly-found freedom. Lead single ‘PILLOWTALK’ remains a stand-out track with its its thunderous percussion, reverberating synths, wailing guitars and Zayn’s sweeping vocals. The rest of the album follows suit with the sullen yet dreamy ‘dRuNk‘ featuring Malik’s multi-layered harmonies boasting ‘I’ve been drunk all summer’ over unsettled R&B percussion, summery synthesisers and weeping electric guitars. ‘rEaR vIeW‘ is similarly a sulky progressive R&B track with sparse production and a Timbaland-like chorus. Then there’s the beautifully haunting ‘iT’s YoU‘ – a gentle downtempo ballad on which Zayn’s stunning falsetto soars over jittering synths, a droning organ, hip-hop beats and crunching piano chords.
Just when things need shaking up a bit, the Beatle-esque piano chords of ‘fOoL fOr YoU‘ arrive. It’s a pleasant piano ballad on which Malik’s vocals really glisten and are relatively free of the over-production the rest of the album is laden with. The track mirrors The Beatles in both song-writing and production and it punctuates the album nicely.
Malik also refreshingly incorporates his cultural heritage into the album in the form of haunting interludes. The opening title-track features soaring Qawwali-influenced melodies over piano chords and clonking synthesiser arpeggios. Similarly, one of the album’s unexpected highlights is ‘fLoWer‘, a gorgeous acoustic interlude influenced by Malik’s upbringing as a British Pakistani Muslim. He executes his voice in Urdu, his father’s native language and warbles over eerie synthesisers and gentle acoustic guitars. It’s an innovative and utterly unique inclusion on an R&B album which works perfectly.
The dance-pop moments also work well, implemented best on ‘sHe‘ with its brilliantly catchy hook, slick production and buoyant production. It is miles away from the stadium pop-rock One Direction produced and is a steer in the right direction (pun not intended), reminiscent of some of Justin Bieber’s best moments on ‘Purpose’. Then there’s the soulful ‘tRuTh’, a track reminiscent of 70’s Soul with giggling synthesisers, a retro-guitar sound and distorted production. Featuring a brilliantly sunny chorus with sugary falsettos, it’s one of the album’s understated highlights.
Malik always had the advantage of having the strongest voice in One Direction and he exhibits his syrupy vocals perfectly on the album. His vocals are sturdy and powerful throughout, whilst his falsetto is his real gift, fluttering delicately over meticulously programmed instrumentals.
A bold and compelling album which validates Zayn’s transition into a credible recording artist.
Rating: 5/5.
Highlights: ‘PILLOWTALK’, ‘dRuNk’, ‘iT’s YoU’, ‘sHe’, ‘fLoWer’, ‘tRuTh’
‘Mind of Mine’ is available now on RCA Records.
Moody, downtempo hip-hop track with an overall melancholic tone and brilliant lyrics.
[Because Kanye is a tool and won’t put any of his latest music anywhere where people may actually listen, this is the only clip available: http://bbc.in/1OmSlT4]
Fuzzy, spaced-out electro-remixes of three tracks from Shura’s forthcoming highly-anticipated début album ‘Nothing’s Real’. Reverberating vocal samples, frolicking synthesisers and eerie sounds all echo infinitely throughout this nine-minute sampler track.
Gentle but majestic 80’s-influenced synthpop track. Mirroring Fleetwood Mac at their peak, precarious percussion, dreamy harmonies and fluttering synthesisers drift beautifully through this brilliant song.
Lovely, breezy acoustic-based track with great lyrics.
Dream-like, heavily auto-tuned synthpop track from up-and-coming band Liss, comprised of clinking synths, a waltz-like bass line and a meandering rhythm.
Another brilliantly catchy R&B track with electro elements from West-London collective WSTRN. Sampling Evelyn King’s 1982 hit ‘Love Come Down’, the trio have created another smash record.
A beautifully chilled-out instrumental track from Canadian musician KAYTRANADA. Twinkling pianos, soulful and eerie synthesisers and fierce percussion drives this retro alternative-R&B track.
Brilliant track on which witty lyrics are growled over unsteady percussion and fierce guitar work. Haunting vocal samples evolve into a neurotic punk-pop track which perfectly captures losing your mind.
Dark and melancholic shoegazing track which is musically simple but incredibly powerful. Heavy, distorted electric guitar riffs and hazy synthesisers form the backdrop as frontman Matt Healy drones ‘And he said, I lost my head, can you see it, can you see it?’. It eventually climaxes in a brilliant orchestral track with percussion.
Jazzy and soulful track by electronic artist Patrick Gossi, under his working name of Active Child. Gentle percussion and jazzy pianos with Gossi’s beautiful falsettos all result in a beautiful song.
Funky indie-rock ballad which mirrors work by INXS & Duran. Slamming percussion, frantic guitar riffs and skippy synthesiser sounds provide the song’s instrumentation as Matt Healy sings of cultural differences between him and his American girlfriend. It’s brilliantly catchy and very witty lyrically.
Perhaps the best song on The 1975’s new album. The band demonstrate their impeccable synchronicity through layering gospel melodies, silky vocals, slamming percussion, driving bass lines and snarling guitar riffs. It’s a throwback to the new-jack-swing era in the late eighties and early nineties bought to popularity through producers Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis and Teddy Riley through musicians such as Bobby Brown, Janet Jackson and Michael Jackson.
Beautiful and mellow electropop ballad which imitates Yazoo’s ‘Only You’ to a point just before being eligible for a lawsuit. Sparse guitars, dizzy synthesisers and a gorgeous honeyed ‘again and again’ refrain makes this another of the album’s strongest tracks.
A proficient, cleverly-created instrumental which punctuates the album beautifully. Pretty and melodic piano particles flutter over driving electronica whilst Healy’s lusciously layered vocals beg his lover not to leave. The track is lengthy at six minutes but is split into two parts, evolving into an uplifting and exquisitely beautiful house track.
Giggling synthesisers and hiphop beats form the backdrop as Matt Healy half-raps his best lyrics to date; a cultural observation on the impact pop culture and celebrity have on youth.
Chilled-out neosoul track which carries a retro vibe. Gallant’s incredible vocals flutter into a rich falsetto over brass instruments, driving bass lines and twinkling keyboards.
Uplifting and euphoric pop-rock track which is this year’s UK Eurovision entry. Whilst criticised by many for its generic formula and chord structure, it’s a powerful and beautiful track.
Moody alternative-pop track which avoids over-production, instead focussing on using organic, pure instruments.
Catchy alt-R&B track featuring elastic synthesisers, synthetic percussion and a brilliantly sing-song chorus.
Quirky and brilliantly written track which utilised genres such as baroque pop, psychedelic pop and experimental rock.
Every Friday, we are adding three tracks to our Feel-Good Friday Spotify playlist. The aim? To create a definitive playlist featuring the best uplifting, feel-good tracks in the world!
Check here every Friday to check any additions!
FOLLOW the Music Box to never miss an update again.
We know this has been featured before but we’re including the studio version this time. Stunning downtempo R&B track which utilises a minimalistic feel. Zayn’s gentle flasetto soars over fluttering synths and wailing guitars.
Moody and powerful alternative-rock track with a huge chorus.
Innovative neo-soul track which utilises jazzy guitars, twinkling keys and sonic elements. It’s electro verses evolve into a breezy chorus which mirror ’70’s soul.
Another brilliant neo-soul/alt-R&B track from East Londoner Nao. Her vocals glide over industrious synthesisers and hip-hop beats, resulting in a chilled-out track.
Brilliant hip-hop/indie rock fusion with an incessantly catchy chorus. It does remind us somewhat of another song, however… *ahem The Beastie Boys’ ‘Body Movin’…*
Punchy bass lines, house beats and Azaelia Banks-influenced vocals drive this huge club smash.
Reminiscent of 90’s house with synthetic piano riffs and sweet vocals, this disco influenced club track is both uplifting and brilliant.
Catchy electro-track featuring elements of soul and rap. Comprised of funky bass lines, squeaky synths and slick vocals, this is underrated perfection.
We’ve wanted to include lots of material from The 1975’s latest album for a while but we’re waiting for it to appear on Spotify! We had to include this track, however so here’s a recent live version which is loyal to the studio one. Stunning and accomplished biblical track on which Matt Healy searches for and beseeches a higher power to curb his loneliness. It channels Prince and D’angelo, utilising organic percussion, spine-tingling gospel choir vocals, eerie electro elements and an understated horn solo to create the best track The 1975 have ever done. [Read our review of their latest album here.]
Stunning alt-R&B track from American singer-songwriter Christopher Gallant, under his stage name Bourborn. Syrupy vocals, including a stunning falsetto, coat dreamy 80’s-influenced synthpop instrumentation.
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