Trip Hop Thursday 1: Emancipator and Vital

     I'm starting to think I might be a morning person, I mean I've been up for an hour, haven't had a coffee, and already I'm working on a new post. But in all truthfulness it was my goal this week to get a post up everyday, and I'm almost there, this weekend won't happen because I plan on driving around in the mountains for my birthday, but that's besides the point, to the tunes!

     Doug Appling, or Emancipator is probably the second trip hop artist I found myself completely immersed in, but unlike Saltillo I can listen to his albums in the car with polite company. But why you might ask what makes Emancipator so different from other Trip Hop/Dowtempo artists, well slightly condescending viewer its all about the jazz.

     Yes jazz, mister Appling spent quite some time recording with Japanese jazz instrumentalists really just letting the oriental feel seep into his newest non remix album, Safe In The Steep Cliffs. I really don't want to get too in depth this morning but I'll try to break down his overall sound; take the beat of you're favourite hip hop song, then layer it with soft fuzzy guitar then sprinkle on violin, piano and cello, and bake in the collective voices of a choir and serve with jazz saxophone and clarinet and a nice pinot noir, voila. Now as long as you don't actually turn your oven on we can move on, Soon It Will Be Cold Enough was Emancipator's first studio release way back in 2006 at the age of 19... yeah  another child prodigy, its a little light on the jazz, heavy on the feeling, this is where trip hop really shines through. The whole album is just layered with synths and lilting vocal melodies, with just enough darkness and mystery to keep you stuck to your seat, its amazing, truly a masterpiece and I will gladly bite my thumb at anyone who says otherwise.

        So yesterday afternoon I was creeping around Youtube as I am prone to do, and stumbled across a song, yes just one, that's really all it took. It was a remix of Frou Frou's The Dumbing Down of Love (just wait for the link ya?) and I can truthfully say it has been an excessively long time sing I have been moved by a trip hop song like this. Anyway the remix was by a Jeffrey Haviland (or Vital), or Jeffrey Evans (Think I might be related to him) if you go by Soundcloud, confusion aside I did some digging and lo and behold there was six pages of absolutely amazing tracks, from House to Ambient and back to downtempo, so lets take a look at that shall we?

     The first mix I took a look at was called Steadfast Through The Seasons, roughly an hour and twenty minutes long weighing in at 182Mb it is a THICK file, let me say that again not only is it the musical representation of a Sumo but the sound itself is absolutely beefy. I mean picture the best burger you've ever had then throw in some chill synths and high hats, damn I'm hungry.  For that matter every song I took the time to listen to on his Soundcloud had a crispness to it, they all sounded clean and refined and even though he only has 60 FB fans his tracks have raked in thousands of views and active comments, so there you go, don't judge a book by its advertisements. So grab it up, all of it and don't forget to support the artists even a "like" shows active support, (shameless plug) and check out our Facebook page here.