This Week In Music: 8th April 2021
A weekly update on all things music, advertising, and technology coming straight to you from Anthony Vanger at MassiveMusic. #TWIM
ARTIST OF THE WEEK: AROOJ AFTAB
The voice of Pakistan-born, New York-based musician Arooj Aftab, seduces and confounds. She articulates her singular sound by blending elements of Pakistani classical music with folk-acoustic and trance. “Mohabbat,” the lead single from her forthcoming album Vulture Prince, is her take on a famous lyric poem. In it, she strips back the instrumentation and elongates her words, beautifully drawing out the consuming sadness of separation from a lover. Over the slow burn of nearly eight minutes, "Mohabbat" draws you into a world of magic and mystery, each verse piling on layer upon layer of emotion until we have reached our Damascene moment. This could be an early contender for track of the year.
#aroojaftab #vultureprince #mohabbat #ghazal
From the full-length album "VULTURE PRINCE", Available April 23, 2021 on New Amsterdam Records.
Pre-Order / Stream / Download: https://smarturl.it/VulturePrince
AD OF THE WEEK: BRITISH ARROW AWARDS
Create Not Hate, the organization set up by Trevor Robinson OBE to get underrepresented young people into the creative industries has launched a series of workshops to give the CNH cohort exposure to the world of music for media.
One of the live briefs involved working on a piece of music for the British Arrow Awards, which took place on March 25. The music accompanies a film for the award ceremony for the ‘Made in Lockdown’ category. The participants were invited to record themselves expressing how they’ve felt about lockdown and the challenges they’ve faced.
The winning entry was a poem written and performed by 16-year-old, Jaiden Chang. This was made into a piece of music and entrants were invited to see the process of the music being produced. The Arrows also gave two participants paid work as runners at the Arrows award ceremony for exposure to the events side, aligning with Create Not Hate’s mission to create viable work opportunities and experiences for participants.
GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES LIVE-STREAMING EVENT
Glastonbury Festival will host a special live stream event on May 22nd. The global event takes place on Worthy Farm, the site of so many historic memories for music fans. There's no physical festival this summer due to the pandemic, so Emily Eavis and the team have organized something a bit different. Taking place on May 22nd, Live At Worthy Farm features Coldplay, Damon Albarn, HAIM, IDLES, Jorja Smith, Kano, Michael Kiwanuka, Wolf Alice, and Honey Dijon.
Tickets are on sale now. #glastonbury #coldplay #damonalbarn #HAIM #IDLES #jorjasmith #kano #michaelkiwanuka #wolfalice #honeydijon
TOURING DJS’ IMPACT ON CLIMATE EXPLORED IN NEW REPORT
The environmental cost of DJ tours has been explored in a new report by Clean Scene.
The report, which can be read in full here, examines “the carbon footprint of touring DJs and [looks] towards alternative futures within the dance music industry.”
The 20-page report, titled Last Night a DJ Took a Flight, points out that, prior to the pandemic, many DJs would travel the world on a weekly basis to play clubs and festivals, and would regularly travel between two or three countries over the course of a weekend. The report states that the dance music industry has been given a unique opportunity to rethink this environmentally unsustainable system and to reimagine a clubbing landscape that is less damaging to the global climate.
Clean Scene compiled their figures using data from Resident Advisor’s Top 1000 DJs chart from 2019 and estimated that those DJs took approximately 51,000 flights that year. That equates roughly to 117,000,000 km traveled, 3,200,000 litres of fuel, and 35,000,000 kg CO2 into the air. That much CO2, the reports states, is the equivalent of 20,000 households’ electricity for one year, powering 8000 festivals for three days, or pressing 25 million records.
“The average touring DJ emits 35 tonnes of CO2 per year,” the report continues. “And their carbon footprint is more than 17 times higher than the recommended personal carbon budget of approximately 2 tonnes of CO2.”
While the report emphasizes that it is not placing blame on artists (rather, looking at the industry as a whole that has facilitated the culture as it is), it states that collective action must be taken to create a dance music scene that is more environmentally sustainable.
VISIT A NIGHTCLUB DESIGNED BY DAFT PUNK'S CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Daft Punk’s creative director Cédric Hervet has given Hong Kong’s renowned Cassio venue an impressive redesign.
Hervet was the French pair’s creative director for over fifteen years and was responsible for album cover art and overseeing the stage design for their 2014 Grammy performance.
His luxury furniture design company Hervet Manufacturier, which he heads with his cousin Nicolas, gave the restaurant and bar its first makeover since the venue opened in 2016.
The retro-futuristic design includes custom-made furniture, lighting and a DJ booth that Cédric describes as a “spaceship that landed on the dancefloor.”
The venue also has four bars including one only accessible by secret password and a video art installation by Canadian director and artist Marco Brambilla.
BANG & OLUFSEN'S ICONIC BEOGRAM TURNTABLE HAS BEEN REVITALISED
Bang & Olufsen is releasing a Limited Edition version of its Beogram turntable.
Priced at a cheeky ￡9,000, the Beogram 4000c Recreated Limited Edition comes with a polished anodized aluminum body, which is placed inside a hand-crafted oak frame.
Other features include a new stylus, which is added to the tangential tonearm, a RIAA phono-pre-amplifier, and a re-designed protective cover.
Just 95 units of the Beogram 4000c Recreated Limited Edition will be available from October 19 in Bang & Olufsen shops.
Written by Anthony Vanger
Additional reporting by Adam "Badger" Woolf
Artwork by Gustav Balderdash
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