Mini March Update

Been a while since I posted anything – even though I am in the midst of getting several articles together – so am really just posting now to say ‘hi’. 

A few random things… we’ve received some excellent feedback from the Kat Webb interview which is really exciting.  We’ve been in contact since it was posted and she’s hoping to come over to the UK really soon for some live gigs which would be excellent, so I really look forward to that as and when it happens.  Hope people check out her music, which stands so high on its own merits and really doesn’t need me to preach about it.  Songs from ‘A bit Different’ will be added to the Blue-in-Green Sessions playlist over the next few weeks, but in the meantime, here’s one to whet your appetite:

Jesse Fischer, the man behind Soul Cycle and who helmed a hefty chunk of the production on Kat Webb’s ‘A Bit Different’ has actually added me to his newsletter so I’m thinking he may have seen the interview too, which would be very cool.  Hopefully, we can reach out to him as well(?).  Great things seem to be coming from Fischer as well, including his killer new remix of Jose James’s ‘Trouble’, which he’s just entered into the Blue Note remix competition, plus new work for Melanie Charles.  Furthering their collaboration from the Soul Cycle album ‘Flipped’ (and their tackling of Stevie Wonder’s ‘My Cherie Amour’), this new number is called ‘Drifting’ and is described by Fischer as ‘gritty and psychedelic’.  Well, have a listen for yourself…

Listen and purchase here:
http://melaniecharlesmusic.bandcamp.com

New music from Melanie Charles is definitely a great thing.  I first heard of her from her vocal contributions to what was the absolute best album released in 2011, ‘Love and Revolution’ by the Italian maestro, Nicola Conte, appearing on two of the album’s best songs including the title track itself, ‘Love and Revolution’, as well as ‘The Mystery of You’.  [That album also put us on to vocalists, Gregory Porter and Nailah Porter, the latter being of no relation to the former… or the other way round either.]  ‘Introducing Melanie Charles & The Journey’ marks her first full-length release, along with her accompanying band ‘The Journey’, who are as much the stars on this release as Charles – her vibrant and fresh-faced vocal has found a fantastic home with her complementary musicians whose refreshing blend of jazz with contemporary soul and R&B is equally effervescent and delightful, particularly evident on ‘My Love’, ‘One in a Million’ and, for me, the album’s highlight, ‘Unfamiliar’.  Albeit, criminally short… really, really short actually… of the ten numbers on the album, only six are complete songs with four (although musical) interludes.  (A few choice remixes or alternate takes supplied at the end as bonus tracks would perhaps have made a nice addition?)

‘Introducing Melanie Charles & The Journey’ really is something to get excited about though so get it quick as it seems may be on the way!