Happy weekend, bpm Nation. Say hello to our most favourite new thing — and maybe yours, too. Morgan Page, our man-crush of the moment, has remixed the single “Leave The Lights On” by up-and-coming L.A. indie-pop singer-songwriter Meiko, and it’s pretty epic. This goes on our summer playlist, right alongside Morgan’s Tegan and Sara collab, “Body Work.”
We’ve put it up on our SoundCloud for you to give a listen. If you’re into it, head on over to Meiko’s Web site, where it’s available as a FREE DOWNLOAD.
Meiko describes herself on her site as a “Singer, Songwriter, Shit Talker, Lover, Fighter, Over User of The Word ‘Balls,’” which kind of makes us love her. Her sophomore album The Bright Side is due out May 15 from Fantasy/Concord Music Group. She had a big hit with the 2008 single “Boys With Girlfriends,” off her self-titled debut LP, and if you watch Grey’s Anatomy, Pretty Little Liars or The Vampire Diaires, then you’ve probably heard her stuff. You can check out the original version of “Leave The Lights On” here:
The forthcoming single from Above & Beyond‘s studio album Group Therapy, this vocal trance track is the perfect, entrancing nepenthe. Group Therapy itself is a heart-stirring album perfectly summed up by its title. Listening to this LP, pegged by Mixmag as the artist album of 2011, is pretty much guaranteed to alleviate any form of negative emotion.
The newly released music video for “Love Is Not Enough” plays in reverse, taking the viewer on an emotional rollercoaster as it tells a story of deep love that was just not meant to be. The video, directed by Vicky Simmons and starring Emily Beecham and Liam Boyle, fits the track’s sad love story perfectly. Together, the track and the video play enticingly on the emotions.
We’re fortunate to be able to stay up to date with new tracks and new artists from Above & Beyond’s influential Anjunabeats label by tuning into their weekly show Trance Around The World. As they have proven yet again, their sound is sempiternal, and we can count ourselves lucky to have such an incredible trio on the EDM scene.
Gosia Mrugala is a Toronto-based blogger and reviewer. You can read her blog HERE, and follow her on Twitter HERE.
Longevity and music don’t always go together. The industry is littered with careers that lasted for a cup of coffee. One low-fat soy latte later, and these artists aren’t much more than ghosts on your iPod. Up they pop when you’ve got it on shuffle, and you’re left to ponder: “Oh yeah. Whatever happened to these guys?”
Cosmic Gate are not that type of group. With seven albums to their name over a span of 10 years, I think it is safe to say these guys are here to stay. Their hypnotic synth sound established itself as the unofficial soundtrack to the Guvernment’s dancefloors back in the early years of the last decade.
It all started with “The Drums” in 1999. Back then, on the eve of the millennium, EDM wasn’t anywhere near as big as it is now — at least, not in North America. But this song managed to cross the Atlantic and spread light on us. It’s always fun to go back and listen to a group’s first hit just to see how far they’ve come. But honestly, “The Drums” is so big and so perfectly “cosmic” that it feels as though it could have been released yesterday. They may have a little more melody and some softer sounds in their music today, but tracks like this are still what gets the crowd wet at Cosmic Gate shows. Of course, remixes by Markus Schulz and Robbie Rivera will help get your name out there.
Longevity in the music game doesn’t come without effort. It takes years of late night studio sessions — and generally a couple of days without showers as you try to figure out the right combination of LFO envelopes and cutoff filters to make that song a thing of true beauty. If you look at Nic and Bossi’s remix resumé, you’ll see that these two never take a day off. A rundown of their best remixes:
Now fast-forward to the present and the release of their album Wake Your Mind. This is soundtracky, heavenly, emotional and all-around good music. With the tools available to all our favourite artists now (Native Instruments’ plugins, Nexus, almost anything made by AiR), you can really tell who’s a pro and who’s a joe. Anybody can make a song now — but it’s the pros who know how to make a song that’s out of this world. And Cosmic Gate are the living proof.
I don’t know if they’ll have time to bust out all of their originals and remixes when they hit The Guvernment this Saturday — but I am sure the ones they get to will be the cream of the cream of the crop. If you’re in town, I definitely recommend you catch this show. More than a state of trance, sure to make you dance! CLICK HERE FOR INFO & TIX.
