Welcome all to 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝗻𝗼𝗹𝗹𝘆’𝘀 𝗖𝗼𝗿𝗻𝗲𝗿, a series of weekly reviews by Charles Connolly – an artist in his own right. Here, Charles delves into the greatest brand new singles brought to you by the best unsigned artists on our electrifying and eclectic set of 𝙉𝙚𝙬 𝘼𝙧𝙩𝙞𝙨𝙩 𝙎𝙥𝙤𝙩𝙡𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 playlists.
𝙒𝘼𝙆𝙀 𝙐𝙋! (& 𝙎𝙢𝙞𝙡𝙚) – 𝙁𝙧𝙖𝙣𝙠𝙡𝙞𝙣 & 𝘽𝙚𝙡𝙡
Charles loses an idol…
Monday morning. For Mondays are when I write these things. I woke up – an achievement in itself. Quick scan of the phone before making breakfast. A sensible person would perhaps make breakfast first, but ya know – I’m just so young and modern! Bleary eyed and stumbly (I would say zombie-like, but those scary days are behind us), I look at the messages that I know I will have to read again when I am awake enough to reply. Get rid of the red dots all over the screen (those with iPhones will know the curse), and so to the ritual of the coffee. Quite amazing what that smell does for one’s soul. NOW I am ready to start the day. Time to look at the “paper”. It’s an app (ugh). What news lurks in store for me? What shenanigans have people been up to? What catastrophes have encroached on our peaceful land? Ugh: Trump, Harris, Harris, Trump. NEXT! Politics politics. Economy economy. NEXT! Baby switched at birth. NEXT! Oh come on, there must be something. Oh JESUS!! Ah gawd. And I am stopped mid slurp. That hollow feeling, as if my chest holds only lungs and nothing more. Our great gilt past continues to evaporate, leaving little but a plastic, mediocre present. Quincy Jones has died. He was 91.
While it is hardly shocking for a 91-year-old to die, it can still be very affecting. In this case, for several reasons. I will start with the obvious. For those unaware, Quincy Jones was (God, WAS!) a music producer. But to say he was a music producer is like saying The Beatles were a band. Hang your head in shame if you don’t know who Quincy Jones was. IS, damn it! Enough damning. You know now. Anyway, this is of course particularly affecting to me, because I am a producer. Just like when Eddie Van Halen died, our very own Ed Eagle was in such a state, because Ed is a guitarist and a massive fan (with the same first name). Van Halen was a guitarist, by the way! Don’t you people know ANYTHING?? Sorry, I’m a little befuddled right now. I might be prone to snap due to this funny feeling of loss. But this is the thing. Loss. Quincy (may I call you Quincy, Quincy? I think he’s fine with that) is more than a producer. He is an icon and a symbol of the great old days. Although he may now be known as “the man behind the sound of Michael Jackson”, his career started LONG before the 80s. Remember, he was born in the 30s, for God’s sake! He has worked with Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Count Basie, Aretha Franklin, Herbie Hancock, and perhaps most notably Frank Sinatra. So, this lossy feeling that coats me, is mainly because it is rare people like Quincy Jones that made this world a better place. And these people should never die. It’s just not fair. Sod knighthoods; they should be given immortality! But alas, we haven’t invented that yet. Probably just as well. Anyway! In recent years, he had taken on a young inventor by the name of Jacob Collier. Quincy realised Jacob’s genius and simply HAD to be involved. More than involved. It was Quincy and his team who rocketed Jacob to stardom. To the public eye. I have often thought that Jacob sees Quincy as a great uncle or grandfather; always there to watch over him and guide him. This was far more than a business arrangement, you see. Quincy evidently felt the same. It was about the music. A sense of kinship. It was beautiful for a young man of 20-ish to be imparting knowledge to a great, wise man in his 80s. Jacob will be feeling low today, in his home in Finchley, London. Far more than I, in my home in Finchley, London.
It was not an easy decision to choose this week’s pick. There was a great deal of goodness to be had from the past 10 days of new releases. The trip-hop vibes of Summer Lee Carlson. The new found rockabilly trend of Dany Horovitz, Patrik Ahlm and Marcus Magnusson. The absolute gorgeousness of Bernice Marsala’s latest. The thrilling new surge from Passive Panic (bigbaldben & Billy Lowry). The loving delicacy of About Gorillas and Vampires’ ballad. The Kate Bush/PJ Harvey originality of Kele Fleming. The pop/rock satisfaction of Unobliterated’s new one. The sparse ice warm of Blue Scarr’s fresh track. The extremely cool and unusual dark vibes from Darren Mason. And SO many more! All these songs are very different from one another (excusing the unforeseen rockabilly trend), but they all have something in common. The producer is evident. The production is to the fore. It just shows the importance of production and the producer. Normal people couldn’t name a handful of producers. Producers are generally not known. In fact, very few people can say what it is that a producer actually does. Some are more like a mixing engineer. Others are more like a spiritual guru (here’s looking at you, Rick Rubin). Most are somewhere in between. But Quincy, well, let’s just say he is probably most known for the horn sections in Michael Jackson records. Of course he did FAR more than just this, but that is at least something you can all latch on to. It’s like the “sound of Quincy Jones”. So, with this in mind, and the raw news of Quincy’s passing, I felt this week’s pick had to be something rather suitable. The news surely woke me up, but I needed to find something that would make me smile.
Cue Franklin & Bell, with a song that is just hours young: WAKE UP! (& Smile). Franklin & Bell are not so much a band as a duo. A duo from West Sussex, England. Cally Bell is our vibrant, strident singer, writing songs and loving theatre. Chris Franklin is our man behind the music itself. As well as co-writing, he plays, produces and mixes all their music. So how did this music side of Chris come about? Was it much like most of us; that we had rockstar aspirations and thought that all we needed was long hair and a guitar? Was it simply a childhood of listening to hundreds if not thousands of records? Well, though I have no doubt it may have started there, Chris took it to the next level. You see, he has been immersed in the music world his entire life. Despite being English, it was America where he found his calling, in such places as Los Angeles, New York and Houston. But after touring with the likes of Gloria Gaynor (the true inventor of immortality), and working in Vegas for a bit, he found himself in South Africa as a musical director in Sun City! It was after this point that he started to write music, finding success in (of all things) computer games! This prompted him to set up his own recording studio and be his own man. In doing so, it taught him a lot. It also explains his persuasion towards jazz, funk, soul and fusion. Only PROPER musicians really GET this stuff. With this impressive resumé, it’s easy to fall into borderline arrogance. The funny thing is, I really had to coax this information out of him! He is so modest and so charming. And charm runs in the duo. Cally is delightful and ever so fun, but a relative newcomer to the process of making music, having only been singing and writing for 5 years. What perfect chance it was for them to meet and share talents! They go well together. One needed a voice. The other needed a pro music producer.
As soon as I pressed play, I thought I was listening to my own Parakeet track! But no. Permission granted; I did not invent birdsong. Paul McCartney did. But then the choppy, clean (but used) guitars fade in as the birds grasp the most incredible sense of rhythm. This guitar intro is really rather exciting. The 6/8 time signature gives it a floating gallop. The high root note remains atop the chords, layer on layer, until we are hit with a satisfying dissonance on round two. Something I shouldn’t like, but I very much do. Things start to get fuzzy and crunchy. The drums pile in with one heck of a fill. In fact, the drums throughout the song are so exciting. And we’re straight into verse one, padded by a piano slink and a jazzy guitar or two. The bass has that “session bassist” sound to it. Ya know; as if this obsessed player changes his strings between takes (not that they’d ever need more than one take), and rinses his fingertips in an unknown secret formula in order to retain those vital callouses. Ridiculously good, basically. But what else comes at this point? That’s right! It’s Cally. She’s cheeky, she’s sassy, she’s enticing with a pearly smile. But she’s being abstemious with her emotions. She’s holding back for later on. But just before launching into the pre-chorus, I can’t remember the last time I heard such a good “Oh” and “Yeah”. The lift of the Oh. The breath of the Yeah. Owh, it’s so goooood! But speaking of pre-choruses (pre-chori?), her rapid-fire crisp enunciation propels the song towards the chorus, as her inner stage presence takes hold. She’s playing to the audience. She’s playing WITH the audience. Wrapping us around her little finger. But song-wise, this is JUST how it is supposed to be done. One section leads us in to the next. It seems and sounds simple enough, but it is so rare to hear! Most music these days sounds like it’s written on a computer. Which most of it is. You can hear the end of one section, and the beginning of the next. There is no transition. No elision. No segue. There is also often no real relation between sections. Or too much relation, and they sound almost identical. With Chris and Cally, though, wow-WEE! THEY know what they’re doing.
Where did I get to…? Oh yes. Cally’s incredible ability to stage a build and build a stage. The intensity is mounting towards the fireworks that are the chorus! Happy Guy Fawkes everyone! Remember, remember, the 5th of November! EYE did. It is at this moment that I really do WAKE UP, and smile. The chorus. The harmonies!! The HORNS!!! And it was THIS that made me feel all Quincy. Well, actually, it’s the second chorus, and the third. Those horn runs! Quincy would approve. But it’s more than the horns that draw similarity to the great man himself. It’s the attention to detail throughout the entire song, and the musicality. One cannot make this kind of music by accident. It can only come from skill and experience. One of many reasons why I despise HAL (A.I.). Speaking of which, there was yet more fake trash junk in the new releases of the last couple of weeks. And our Top 20 chart!! I urge you to be discerning and to shun any music made/created by robots. I’ve just absolutely had enough of it, and I cannot understand why the entire artist community is not 100% against it. I would swear, but it would be disrespectful to Quincy on this day. Speaking of whom, let’s get back to skill and experience. This is what real art is all about. What it was ALWAYS about. Sure, we have various bits of tech to make things quicker or easier, but the tech was never supposed to do the creative part for you. Otherwise, what is the actual point of art? I know I have harped on about this several times this year, but it just NEEDS to be said. Skill and experience are what Franklin & Bell have in abundance. This is why the writing is so good. The subtleties are there to be explored if you’re so willing. But you can equally just enjoy the fun of it all, if you’d rather. It hits on so many levels. The attention to detail is what makes it all come together; and so satisfyingly. The final mix, even, is just as pro as the writing, singing, playing, arranging and production. It’s the exact same philosophy as Quincy Jones’ own. That the highest level of skill and the highest level of art have to combine to make the best of everything. Always striving for perfection in every way. Every human way.
We all know about pre-chori (pre-choruses?) But we don’t hear much about the “post-chorus” – quite a rare thing in all eras of music. Yet this is simply another thing to heap on the pile (not the bonfire!) of wünderbits within this one song. Honestly, it’s such a well made piece. WAKE UP! (& Smile) is – in my humble opinion – by far the duo’s best song so far. Not just in terms of technicality, but in energy.
As to Quincy, I will assume that come the end, he went out with a bang.
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