oohbrilliant-blog

[oohbrilliant-blog]

10 Moments.

With Ooh Brilliant closing for good on May 1st we’re counting down our favourite Ooh B related moments over the last few years. One a day for two weeks and in no particular order. With Ooh Brilliant closing for good on May 1st we’re counting down our favourite Ooh B related moments over the last few years. One a day for two weeks and in no particular order.

Monday: Gold Panda at Sonar 2012. Of course ‘in no particular order’ actually translates to a really great moment. I’ve been going to Sonar on and off for a decade and whilst I’ve not been to very many festivals Sonar is actually the best - everyone knows this. It’s a city festival. City festivals are amazing. The city is Barcelona. Barcelona is (mostly) amazing. The month is June. The music is amazing. Nothing can go wrong (!) Gold Panda, or Derwin to many is a gifted musician, there’s many things he does that warm the soul (though i wish he did more promo!) which is reflected in the music he makes. In many respects he updated a chapter on the musical rule book, for so many years electronic music was seen as cold and ‘inhuman’ but Derwin has always been able to project huge amounts of varying emotions into his music. For me there was always a tinge of melancholy and again, it’s a reflection on the creator, rarely did tracks run over 4 and a bit minutes which is wonderful. Always captivating, always emotional and always technically excellent, Gold Panda remains special and I’ll always be a fan of him and his music.  

Apparently Panda had been asked to perform at Sonar on previous occasions but because of varying other 'things' he hadn't SO it really was amazing so see a total favourite at the best festival ever and as someone once said 'i just want to play to an appreciative crowd' which Sonar mostly is. Thinking back I may have sent music to the bookers at the festival before he had an agent in 2009 -it only took 3 years.  As a side note i was out of my mind on painkillers and Estrella after almost breaking my foot after falling over and twisting my ankle. Regardless. It was amazingly fun.Something worth noting is how incredible the post 6pm sets are on the MainStage during the day, with the sun starting to think about setting and the intensity of everyone trying to get in during the day there’s an atmosphere that’s hard to define outside of beautiful - it’s one of those times of the day that makes Sonar what it is. Happy memories of James Holden and The Field playing similar times and it just being BLOODY WONDERFUL.

If you know nothing about Sonar this Guardian thing is kinda funny.

Tuesday: La Roux: celebrate and cherish Perception is everything. In 2015 the burning question is ‘what is success’. With so much of media pegged to sales and chart positions - confusion is understandable but what if the album is a critical failure, culturally irrelevant and throwaway forgettable? Is that successful? Some say yes. How about if a musician chucks an unexpected curveball off the back of a Grammy winning, 10+million selling record (singles and albums), delivers the most critically acclaimed major label album of the year but fails to sell as much as hoped/expected. And in doing so grows significantly as an artist, as a human and tops everything off with a peerless 5* live show. Some also say that’s a failure. It isn’t but that’s what some artists contend with. Success in 2015 is very often high jumping expectations, isn’t it? Whatever the point of success is, Elly Jackson overcame a number of well documented barriers to release one of the outstanding albums in 2014, an album so perfect in making and execution she became Britain’s best artist. Anyway - the first time i heard ‘Let Me Down Gently’ was in one of those annoyingly small offices at a record label and it sounded like the greatest pop song ever and everything - E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G great about modern music - a touch of the old, plenty of new, determination and soul. And that gap, who has the balls to do that, oh yes, Elly. The truth is nobody expected 'Trouble In Paradise' to be the musical extravagance it is - and nobody expected the aritst who penned and performed 'Bulletproof' to write an album of such untouchable charisma and skill. For me it’s almost impossible to whittle down the album to a moment, but ‘Cruel Sexuality’, again - another amazing ‘non single’ was a moment (i say again because much was made of the fact 'LMDG' wasn't actually a 'single) - and specifically the bridge into hook/chorus from 2’22 is fairly unstoppable. Should there have been more celebration and acknowledgement? Yes. Yes there should have been.

La Roux needs to be cherished and celebrated. She’s our tomorrow at a time when few artists are capable of touching such levels of artistry. And what will she do next? That’s the really quite exciting bit. Thanks to Hannah Neaves and both Tony & Claire at Quest. It was a privilege.

Wednesday: Chløé Black & Raleigh Ritchie: stars for tomorrow Given these two are pretty new to the whole world of music I've popped them in together, more so to me at least they have some similar personality traits. More so, when i decided to finish Ooh Brilliant my mind immediately turned to these two, I'd grown so hugely fond of them both and felt an element of guilt at leaving their campaigns. PR people often get the heavy end of the hammer but there’s many that care an unbelievable amount and possibly more so, in fact, unhealthily so - we're incredible loyal and protective of our artists.

Chloe and Raleigh have huge potential and should be international stars by the end of this year. Chloe hasn't released her best music yet, sure 27 Club was well received online and she's building a lovely little audience but my oh my the best is most certainly left to come. She's already brilliant live and she's so full of beans and charisma her music is going to be taken to the hearts of a great many people. Raleigh is slightly different, we've been working with him a little longer and he probably should have released his (what will be) a very good album by now. He's exceptional live, a natural born star, and great entertainment live. He's a very visual person and over time will become brilliant at articulating all of his amazing ideas for us all. People in the industry talk about how much harder it has to break new acts ("would Arcade Fire or Ed Sheeran be the biggest artists in their domains if they launched in 2015") - so let's hope these two get a fair shot. I always loved how Popjustice would talk about great acts online and how he always hoped in particular HURTS would get 'heard by the people' [he is saying it'd be nice if traditional media helped support the act on mass audience platforms]. So often that isn't the case so fingers crossed for these two shining lights. 

Thursday: Tom Odell: a big moment It's easy to forget this young chap wrote 'Another Love' at the age of 20 and it's easy to forget his songwriting was celebrated at the 2014 Ivor Novello awards (songwriter of the year) because his success happened incredibly quickly. Listening back to his debut 'Long Way Down' a few months ago i was reminded what an exceptional album it is - it's easy to shoehorn a BRITS Critics Choice artist into a mainstream 'pop' category and completely ignore the artistry involved in these type of records. Tom co-wrote 2 songs on the album, infact the greatest moments, however subjective you look at it were the songs penned himself. 

Two winters have since passed after the album’s release and there's still no news of when the next one will come. With winning the BRITS Critics Choice prize, there is huge expectation on Tom and there's little point in him releasing a record that isn't incredible. But it will be.

The campaign was something of a juggernaut from when we joined it in January and it provided some of my favourite moments. We created this content for Nowness thanks to Columbia UK hiring the entire team and creating two amazing videos in a fantastic London location (see below). We were thinking of some of the more well known John Lennon moments with a clean and minimal feel that would sit comfortably with Nowness and it's audience (which is perceived as super cool / early adopter and international). Nowness; Grow Old With Me session. File under ‘curated content’ Mr Porter: Live session at Abbey Road and photo shoot interview Daytrotter: 4 track session recorded straight to vinyl. File under ‘creative’

Friday: Tove Lo and The Swedes

Just this week Tove Lo sits at #8 in the UK albums chart with her amazing debut album, it took a year to reach the UK unlike our American and Swedish friends but that’s the nature of the current UK industry. For a few years we had an incredible run with Swedish artists who we launched Icona Pop (global #1 with I Love It), NoNoNo (sold over 1million singles in the US), Elliphant (current alt pop darling working with Diplo and Skrillex etc, 30million streams already), Korallreven (Swedewave revivalists), Niki & The Dove (default press darlings of 2009/2010) and Tove Lo (international megastar and one person hit factory) and yet somehow, somehow, we ended up working with non of them by the time we closed. Astonishing. Go Swedes?

[oohbrilliant-blog]

This is fantastic. Team Raleigh!

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Looks good! Via Ronson's press team.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Wrote a piece in this weeks Record Of the Day Magazine (it's an essential tool and worth the subscription fee alone) about how hard it is to break new music online at the moment. There's lots more points i could have gone into but kept it fairly simple. Ultimately I'm driving at tools being far more considered before being let go online.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Another excellent Chloe Black track inspired by Bresson.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

The Rising Power Of Social Media Influencers from Tailify on Vimeo.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

What a band. Great news isn't it? We won't be around for this campaign but still, it'll be exciting to hear what they come up with.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Friends quietly split up a year or so ago which was kinda sad given how brilliant the new music was sounding, anyway, Samantha, Sam, Urbani has popped her first solo track on the internets after a number of collaborations and it's very very good. But that press shot - incredible.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Ronson and Mystical do 'Feel Right' on Ellen yesterday

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Thanks Chloe Moretz

[oohbrilliant-blog]

new album cummin

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Feel that Chloe Black is a bit special. Best new artist we've had in a long time (since Tove Lo and Raleigh) - shouldnt really say that but i just love her songs, lyric and sass. A new song from the EP titled 'Cruel Intentions' What a song.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

We debuted a Lapalux remix of Purple's excellent 'In My Dreams' on Dummy

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Buzzfeed wrote about Raleigh and his new video and connecting his acting career (which expands beyond GOT) and his excellent music.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Ooh Brilliant night out at Caribou last night. Interesting to see the transition he's made into a big live act. Brixton Academy is a funny old beast, the sound in certain places of the venue is excellent but often for the minority and that's for a mainly electronic show. 10/10 for the lighting show. Here's the Gold Panda remix of 'Jamelia' from C's last record. Nice to see Derwin Panda at the show last night too!

[oohbrilliant-blog]

Debuted on the ever on point Pigeons & Planes, this Songo remix of Purple Ferdinand is excellent and picking up a healthy amount of online action.

[oohbrilliant-blog]

So this is the new video for Raleigh Ritchie's 'The Greatest' which we debuted on Popjustice yesterday. It feels like another hit from the penned works of Jacob Anderson, an artist we should cherish and celebrate. There is no act in the UK more deserving of stardom and stadium shows - his live show, his attitude and his overwhelming talent.