France’s David Guetta belongs to the sparkling wave of DJs who combine Daft Punk’s sleek house music with a pinch of electroclash’s punch. Guetta had been DJ’ing around France playing popular tunes, but his brain was particularly rewired in 1987 when he heard a Farley Jackmaster Funk track on French radio. He taped the track, brought a copy to a gig, and promptly cleared the floor with it during one of his own sets. Things loosened up a year later when acid house came to France and Guetta successfully promoted his own club nights. It was during one of those nights in 1992 that he met Robert Owens, a Chicago-based house legend who was touring across Europe at the time. Guetta played Owens some of his own tracks, and Owens picked one he liked enough to sing over. The result was “Up and Away,” a minor hit that lurked in garage DJ crates for the next four years.
Guetta’s carefree attitude — that he only produces good music while he’s having casual fun — kept the DJ from releasing anything until 2001’s “Just a Little More Love.” The track featured American gospel singer Chris Willis, who met Guetta while on vacation in France. Another slow burner, “Just a Little More Love,” kept popping up in sets for the next two years, first in an electro version and later in a pumped-up Wally Lopez remix. During this time, Guetta snuck out a bootleg remix of David Bowie’s “Heroes,” retitled “Just for One Day.” Bowie gave the go-ahead to release the track officially, and Guetta soon had a massive hit on his hands. Guetta featured the liberated boot on his first mix CD, Fuck Me I’m Famous, named after Guetta’s successful Ibiza-based party.
The fun-loving slacker DJ finally got around to releasing a collection of his own productions in 2004, Just a Little More Love on Astralwerks. Guetta Blaster arrived that same year, followed by Poplife in 2007. Chris Willis sang lead vocals on the latter album, which spun off multiple dance singles in multiple countries. Fuck Me I’m Famous: International, Vol. 2 was then released in July 2008, giving listeners a taste of the stylish sounds that orchestrated Guetta’s summer club events in Ibiza. A year later he released One Love, a platinum-selling album featuring the singles “When Love Takes Over” with Kelly Rowland, “Sexy Bitch” with Akon, and “Gettin’ Over” with Chris Willis.
In 2010 Guetta received five nominations at the 52nd Grammy Awards, two of them related to the One Love album and the other three for his work on the Black Eyed Peas’ massive worldwide hit “I Gotta Feeling.” That same year, One Love was reissued as One More Love, featuring a bonus disc of remixes and new tracks. A superstar guest list — featuring Akon, Lil Wayne, Flo Rida, Usher, Chris Brown, and others — would figure into his 2011 release Nothing But the Beat, but this time the DJ’s songwriting was inspired by dramatic rock bands like Coldplay. ~ David Jeffries, Rovi.
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For some it was a fat mayor on a zipwire or that triple-golden Saturday night in the Olympic stadium. But for others, East London’s incredible summer of 2012 began one month earlier when Hackney Weekend was struck by a storm whipped up onstage by four local boys and their band of friends.
Rudimental’s ‘Feel The Love’, had just topped the singles chart, arms were raised, bodies bounced, neck hairs sprang to attention and throats went a little lumpy as thousands of voices sang along on a grey London day on the Marshes.
Not only was this the undisputed feel-good hit of the summer, it was stamped Made In Hackney, home to three-quarters ofRudimental and still their number-one hangout and recording base. The fourth and final part, Amir Amor, came from nearby Somers Town.
Piers learnt about music playing piano in his dad’s blues and ‘60s covers band, and also as “a white kid called Darker making grime,” he laughs. Amir was making garage beats in a Camden community studio and collaborating with Plan B (as Analog Kid), but also playing bass in “post-hardcore” rock bands as a side line. Kesi got the bug after picking up guitar aged six and was making hip hop beats in his teens, while Leon was spending his pocket money on grime 12-inches, dj’ing with Piers on pirate stations and scratching up his mum’s Anita Baker albums.
He, Kesi and Piers have been together as Rudimental since late 2007, making music reflective of London’s eye-wateringly diverse street scene. But it was 2011’s low-slung, ‘Deep In The Valley’, that was, in Piers’ words, “the first time Rudimental started to sound like Rudimental”. With the arrival of Amir, everything suddenly gelled.
“When we first came together it was like it was meant to be,” he says. “It was like he’d been there all our lives,” concurs Piers.
Rudimental’s work is all hand-crafted, singer and producers in the studio together working on the song, whether it’s emerging talents, such as MNEK, who appears on the incredible ‘Spoons’, or 2012’s superstar Emeli Sandé, co-writer and singer on ‘Yeah’ and ‘Free’.
“Emeli lives in Hackney and she came to our gig when we supported Maverick Sabre. She came down to the studio a few days later and we had a lovely idea on Free. When she came in and worked on it we were so excited,” says Piers. “It was such a simple kick drum and guitar and me going ‘oh oh oh’,” adds Amir. “She heard it and started making up words, singing, putting it together.”
“The beauty of it is that we’re still in the same studio using the same crappy equipment,” says Amir. “The process hasn’t really changed. All the artists on this record are people we’ve worked with before in some capacity. We met John Newman in a pub and ‘Feel The Love’ just fit nicely with his voice so we put him on there.”
Like Soul II Soul, Massive Attack or Basement Jaxx before them, Rudimental are a front person less dance act with a strong supporting nucleus. “Not to say we have a circle we’ve created and no one can access it,” says Leon. “What we’re creating on this album is a family vibe. People like Mark Crown, who follows us everywhere, Sinead, Syron [who also sings on Spoons and the beautiful title track], MNEK are all family we can just call on.”
Family, community and indeed home are themes that are stamped on Rudimental as surely as rollicking rave tunes and a sense of adventure. They’ve all benefited from community music studios, learning their trade on cheap equipment and picking up pro tips, while Leon and Kesi have both had mentoring roles in schools. And this sense of music as a healthy distraction from the inner city’s less productive pastimes informs everything they do. Think of the award-winning ‘Feel The Love’ video, which is shot in Philadelphia’s Fletcher Street project that gives disadvantaged kids the opportunity to ride and take care of horses against the bleak backdrop of North Philadelphia. Or for ‘Not Giving In’, which uses the tale of a Filipino break dancer to illustrate art’s power to transform lives.
Amir says, “The sad thing is the focus is always on the negative side of youth. In our videos we show the positive side.” Leon adds, “Where we came from there was negative things all the time – drugs, violence. Music was a means of escape. Fortunately I had a parent who funded and supported that. A lot of the people didn’t have that. We consider ourselves real people, we’ve been around real things.”
And it was music (alongside football – Leon played semi-pro until Rudimental took off) and the wider sense of musicality that proved their outlet. “There was definitely a moment when I was all about riding Dizzee Rascal for about two years,” says Piers. “But at the same time I’d go and do a pirate set with loads of really aggressive MCs, get really into it, testosterone all over the place, then I’d go home and sit down with my dad and play blues. At school I used to hide my iPod ‘cos it was full of blues and jazz.”
“We’ve all gone through so many phases,” adds Kesi. “The unifying thing is raving and soul music. Blues and jazz and guitar music and house and hip hop all come together. We really love soulful vocals and sing-a-long parties.”
That sense of playfulness, of variety, of ‘what are they gonna do next?’ is what makes Home such a stunningly rich, constantly surprising album. It’s something reflected in their live shows, where they play as a 12-piece band (Piers admits he’d like to go even bigger), including Piers on organ and synths, Amir on bass, keys and guitar, Kesi on keys and percussion and Leon on “MPCs, shouting and getting my top off”.
‘Feel The Love’, of course, wasn’t just a one-week wonder in Hackney. After hitting the top spot, it spent months in the UK top 10, then toured the charts of Europe and went triple platinum in Australia. It also took four mid-20s lads from Hackney and Camden and gave them a new lease of life. Says Leon, “We always go on about Hackney Weekender, but it’s given us the licence to show we’re not just a drum ‘n’ bass track, we can do a soul tune or an Angel Haze track at 119 bpm.”
Dropping ahead of the album, the new Ella Eyre vocalled single ‘Waiting All Night’ went straight in at no.1 in the UK singles chart, selling more in its first week than any other track this year so far.
The summer was packed full of festival appearances including Glastonbury, T In The Park, Global Gathering, Bestival and more. The band have also just completed their sold-out autumn headline tour, and will return for another tour in Feb /Mar 2014, including 3 sold-out dates at London’s Brixton Academy.
As you’ll discover on their debut album – HOME, there’s not much they can’t do.
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UB40 are a British reggae/pop band formed in 1978 in Birmingham, England. The band has placed more than 50 singles in the UK Singles Chart, and has also achieved considerable international success. The band has been nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album four times, and in 1984, they were nominated for the Brit Award for Best British Group. One of the world’s best-selling music artists, UB40 have sold over 70 million records. Their hit singles include their debut “Food for Thought” and two U.S. Billboard Hot 100 number ones with “Red Red Wine” and “Can’t Help Falling in Love”. Both of these also topped the UK Singles Chart, as did the band’s version of “I Got You Babe”.
The story of UB40, and how this group of young friends from Birmingham transcended their working-class origins to become the world’s most successful reggae band is not the stuff of fairytales as might be imagined. The group’s led a charmed life in many respects it’s true, but it’s been a long haul since the days they’d meet up in the bars and clubs around Moseley, and some of them had to scrape by on less than £8 a week unemployment benefit. The choice was simple if you’d left school early. You could either work in one of the local factories, like Robin Campbell did, or scuffle along aimlessly whilst waiting for something else to happen.
By the summer of 1978, something else did happen, and the nucleus of UB40 began rehearsing in a local basement. Robin’s younger brother Ali, Earl Falconer, Brian Travers and James Brown all knew each other from Moseley School of Art, whilst Norman Hassan had been a friend of Ali’s since school. Initially, they thought of themselves as a “jazz-dub-reggae” band, but by the time Robin was persuaded to join and they’d recruited Michael Virtue and Astro – who’d learnt his craft with Birmingham sound-system Duke Alloy – the group had already aligned themselves to left-wing political ideals and forged their own identity, separate from the many punk and Two Tone outfits around at that time. The group had nailed their colours to the mast by naming themselves after an unemployment benefit form. Their political convictions hadn’t been gleaned secondhand either, but cemented in place whilst attending marches protesting against the National Front, or rallies organised by Rock Against Racism.
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Daft Punk – Get Lucky ft. Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers
Daft Punk is an electronic music duo consisting of French musicians Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo (born 8 February 1974) and Thomas Bangalter (born 3 January 1975). Daft Punk reached significant popularity in the late 1990s house movement in France and met with continued success in the years following, combining elements of house with synthpop. The duo is credited with producing songs that are considered essential in the French house scene. It was managed from 1996 to 2008 by Pedro Winter (Busy P), the head of Ed Banger Records. Early in the group’s career, the band members were strongly influenced by groups such as the Beach Boys and the Rolling Stones.
Bangalter and de Homem-Christo were originally in a band called Darlin’, which disbanded after a short period of time, leaving the two to experiment musically on their own. The duo became Daft Punk, releasing its critically acclaimed debut album Homework in 1997. The 2001 release of Discovery was even more successful, driven by the club singles “One More Time”, “Digital Love”, and “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”.
In March 2005, the duo released the album Human After All to mixed reviews. However, the singles “Robot Rock” and “Technologic” achieved success in the United Kingdom. Daft Punk toured throughout 2006 and 2007 and released the live album Alive 2007, which won a Grammy award for Best Electronic/Dance Album. The duo composed the score of the film Tron: Legacy and in 2010 released the soundtrack album of the film. In January 2013, Daft Punk left EMI Records for Sony Music Entertainment’s subsidiary label Columbia to release its next album.
Daft Punk is noted for its elaborate live shows, in which visual elements and effects are incorporated with the music. The group is known for its emphasis on visual and story components associated with their musical productions. Daft Punk is also known for its use of disguises, particularly the ornate robot costumes, while in public and/or performing.
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Born on March 1, 1994, Justin Bieber started singing since he was 12 and finished the second place when participating in a local singing competition. “The other people in the competition had been taking singing lessons and had vocal coaches. I wasn’t taking it too seriously at the time, I would just sing around the house,” he recalled.
In an effort to share his victory to family and friends who missed his performances at the competition, he and his mother opened a YouTube account and posted his video performances on the file-sharing website. “I put my singing videos from the competition on YouTube so that my friends and family could watch them,” he stated. “But it turned out that other people liked them and they started subscribing to them. That’s how my manager found me. He saw me on YouTube and contacted my family and now I’m signed!”
His manager Scooter Braun flew Justin from his hometown Ontario, Canada to Atlanta, Georgia for a meeting with Usher. “I sang for him and his people and he really wanted to sign me then and there but I still had a meeting with Justin Timberlake who also wanted to sign me.
It turned out Usher’s deal was way better. He had L.A. Reid backing him up and Scooter had a lot of really good connections in Atlanta,” he traced back his memory.
In October of 2008, Justin was officially signed to Island Records and began working on his debut album “My World”. Powerhouse producers like Christopher “Tricky” Stewart and The-Dream lent their helping hands on the effort. He also got Usher as his collaborator on one of the songs.
“My World” was released across United States on November 17. The album was preceded with four hit singles “One Time”, “One Less Lonely Girl”, “Love Me” and “Favourite Girl”, all of which cracked Top 15 of Canadian Singles chart and reached Top 40 of Billboard Hot 100. This achievement made him the only artist in Billboard history that has four singles from a debut album charting in the Top 40 of the Hot 100 before the album’s release.
Justin toured with Taylor Swift as her supporting act on two of her U.K. stops for “Fearless” tour. He also embarked on five headlining concerts in Canada. Moreover, he appeared in several hit U.S. TV shows, naming some were “Good Morning America”, “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.Read more…..www.aceshowbiz.com
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Born on March 1, 1994, Justin Bieber started singing since he was 12 and finished the second place when participating in a local singing competition. “The other people in the competition had been taking singing lessons and had vocal coaches. I wasn’t taking it too seriously at the time, I would just sing around the house,” he recalled.
In an effort to share his victory to family and friends who missed his performances at the competition, he and his mother opened a YouTube account and posted his video performances on the file-sharing website. “I put my singing videos from the competition on YouTube so that my friends and family could watch them,” he stated. “But it turned out that other people liked them and they started subscribing to them. That’s how my manager found me. He saw me on YouTube and contacted my family and now I’m signed!”
His manager Scooter Braun flew Justin from his hometown Ontario, Canada to Atlanta, Georgia for a meeting with Usher. “I sang for him and his people and he really wanted to sign me then and there but I still had a meeting with Justin Timberlake who also wanted to sign me.
It turned out Usher’s deal was way better. He had L.A. Reid backing him up and Scooter had a lot of really good connections in Atlanta,” he traced back his memory.
In October of 2008, Justin was officially signed to Island Records and began working on his debut album “My World“. Powerhouse producers like Christopher “Tricky” Stewart and The-Dream lent their helping hands on the effort. He also got Usher as his collaborator on one of the songs.
“My World” was released across United States on November 17. The album was preceded with four hit singles “One Time”, “One Less Lonely Girl”, “Love Me” and “Favourite Girl”, all of which cracked Top 15 of Canadian Singles chart and reached Top 40 of Billboard Hot 100. This achievement made him the only artist in Billboard history that has four singles from a debut album charting in the Top 40 of the Hot 100 before the album’s release.
Justin toured with Taylor Swift as her supporting act on two of her U.K. stops for “Fearless” tour. He also embarked on five headlining concerts in Canada. Moreover, he appeared in several hit U.S. TV shows, naming some were “Good Morning America”, “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.Read more…..www.aceshowbiz.com
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