HOUSE MUSIC'S NEXT DIVAS, DJ-PRODS AND STYLE
Building up to the newer electrohouse tracks from early February's Electro II/Burn List Feb 09 Part 2, this set is all about 2009 house music. The vocal anthems. Straight club music. Dance radio airplay. Burn List Feb 09 Parts 1 and 2 attempts to offer a peek of the hot and heat-seeking dance divas, DJ/producers, and house music style.
House music in today's standards are generally mid-tempo dance music with bpms ranging between 118 to 135, and often consisting of four-to-the-floor kick drum elements and extended drop-outs. Until a few new prolific DJs, dominated dance floors and iPods with tracks and remixes characterized predominantly by a faster, heavier groove; with a few novel elements like super extended build-ups; video game-sounding or wind instrument-sounding loops; and vocals that are anything but vocoded like the last we heard of Cher! Other than that, house remains the dance music you won't be concerned playing in a crowded beach (since you keep thinking the guys next to you are also nursing their hangovers!) Additionally, we still love our female vocals in the house. And in that (high) note, we begin with a rundown of a few hot/heat-seeking dance diva's to watch:
Tracks 1 to 5. The Next Divas.
Unless you're living in a cave, you must have heard of Lady GaGa. Her second single "Poker Face" is just now ramping up the US Pop Charts after having already dominated internationally. Very recently, Lady GaGa releases not one, but two different 3rd singles from her debut album "The Fame", depending on which continent you're from. Lady GaGa starts this set with a new feirce track that's neither of the two! "Fashion" (also performed by Heidi Montag) from "Confessions of a Shopaholic" OMPS, is probably not even going to hit the singles charts since it may not be released as a single. Bets are, it'll be quite a hit anyway! Let's start Madonna comparisons for now with these three words: Into The Groove.
Amanda Wilson is definitely the vocalist of choice for many DJ producers, and the collaborations almost always result in dance radio smash! With another global hit from a cover of Robyn's "Keep This Fire Burning", I can't have an up-and-coming diva list with no mention of Amanda Wilson. In the vocal-belter heat-seeking divas list, the one to watch out for is Jennifer Hudson. Period.
In NYC, independent dance music with a whole lot of raw flavor is grabbing a hold of the dare-to-be-different set. What was previously isoculture and soul-heavy, the clientele of hot parties like Asseteria and Bagatelle Brunch of late typically includes, well, just the young and the trendy. For fear of Santogold's wrath for identifying her with anything "soul", Flora Cruz stands to be the movement's carrying diva. Her music has been remixed by a line-up of essential DJ's today, including Beatportal's nominee for 2008's Best Tech House Artist, NYC's Jerome Sydenham, whose mix of "Let The Sun Shine Out" is nothing short of outstanding.
The fifth heat-seeking dance diva I find worth blogging is Lily Allen and here's why. First off, Brit chicks are breaking placenta!!! She follows hot blazing trails from Natasha Bedingfield and Duffy in dance music, or from Adele and Amy Winehouse in all pop music. Then her latest hit, "The Fear" is remixed by the likes of Dresden and StoneBridge (as featured here) paving her way to club dominance and favorable dance radio airplay. Spice it up with lashing statements and rotten behavior (a.k.a, publicity machine), then show up everywhere with a hot new image for her sophomore effort after losing all that weight, this young brit instantly becomes all the more worthy of gay adulation and quite automatically the "diva" distinction (the Mass Plenty will surely soon follow).
Tracks 6 to 10. DJ/Prods.
Except for UK's ATFC, all of the next five heatseaking DJ/Producers has had other tracks previously featured in ASND blog already: Dave Aude (remix of Lady GaGa's "Poker Face", 11/08 and her latest single "LoveGame"); Chris Lake ("Only One", 12/08 and his latest release, also featuring Nastala, in "If You Knew"); Vandalism (remix of Kurd Maverick's "Blue Monday", 02/09, and their own release, "Bailando"), then there's a triple assault from StoneBridge's ("If This Isn't Love", "The Fear", and "Tell Your Mama" with Emma Deigman). Given that the blog only started back in November, the works of these prolific DJ/Producers - some newcomers, others more established; have taken much volume of late. Their popularity have taken new momentum too from a wider reach offered by a nultitude of dance music blogs, which starting in 2008, became regarded as one of the more effective promotional channel of choice in music today. And yeah, these music blogs are also fast becoming the domain of A Stud Named Disco's sovereignty.
Then there's ATFC. Having been named Beatportal's House Music Artist of 2008, ATFC is certainly shaping house music's new sound by way of a few really kicking tracks like his latest production, "Tell U Y" featuring Yasmeen. With his own record label pioneering a "download-only" distribution ("to provide emerging electronic artists a chance to be heard"), ATFC continues to have us listening to all the tracks coming out of his studio, as well as from his own genius.
Tracks 11-15. Style.
(as featured in Electro II/Burn List Feb 09 Part 2)
The disco ball of fortune has a few heat-seeking styles of house music taking shape: electrohouse revivals like Kurd Maverick's "Blue Monday"; all-male dance groups (think Pet Shop Boys) like Australia's Empire of the Sun with "Walking on a Dream"; minimal house pioneered by Oliver Twizt (with his latest "You're Not Alone" featured here); club ready mash-ups like Hardwell's "Shake & Work"; gryme similar to Kid Cudi's "Day N' Nite"; and the styles which I can no longer mention because I've already dropped too much house in this post.
DOWNLOAD BURN LIST FEB 09 Part 1
DOWNLOAD BURN LIST FEB 09 Part 2
