FK A T WI GS
Slow and low, that is the tempo
WHO THEY?
Tahliah Barnett should, by rights, romp home this year. Tipped
as one to watch in 2014 by everybody who ought to know about
such things, we really don’t need to be doing it all over again in
2015. But we will anyway.
WHY FK A T WIGS?
Moving to London from Gloucestershire at the age of 17, Twigs
earned a buck cutting a rug as a dancer for the likes of Minogue
(Snr) and Jessie J, before elbowing her way into the spotlight
with the Bandcamp-released ‘EP1’ in December 2012. While it’s
neat and tidy to tag this as R&B, what we’re actually looking at
here is a very neat slight of hand, resulting in something much
more up our street. The beats and backing are wildly inventive,
verging on the experimental, the voice is fragile and captivating.
TELL US MORE
Last August’s ‘LP1’ – her debut album, in case you can’t work it out
– on XL offshoot Young Turks picked up a Mercury nomination. It
won across-the-board acclaim too. When this properly blows up, and
surely it will, the Top 40 massive will be wondering what’s hit them.
This is Bjork-grade squonkiness that also appears to be heading
for the charts. No mean feat for something that is so delightfully
leftfield you’ll need to be looking the other way to see it coming.
E X PLOR ERS
S AM ARI S
Taking electropop to the stars
Icelandic witch house
It’s hard not to smile while listening to Explorers, a duo
consisting of Sheffield native Jeremy Dennis and Chesterfieldborn/Portuguese-bred Robert Bannister. Drawing influences
from their childhood, they craft dreamy and upbeat electropop
that drips with adventure and nostalgia. Heavily inspired by the
1980s (they’re named after the 1985 John Carpenter film), their
use of synths and drums perfectly match the journey they want
to take you on. They’re not completely retro-fuelled, mind, with
hints of Hot Chip and snippets of Empire Of The Sun seeping
through. Anyone going to a disco that starts in the clouds and
ends on an undiscovered planet will need this lot along for the
ride in 2015.
One Little Indian has long been a home from home for the
esoteric. This is the label that signed Björk, after all. Formed
in 2011, Samaris have the same leftfield Icelandic heritage as
Björk and they deal out double quirk like playing cards. They go
straight for the downtempo jugular with the soothing chant-like
vocals of Jófríður Ákadóttir, her lyrics whipped from 19th century
folk poems and weaved into their songs, while Áslaug Brún
Magnúsdóttir adds moody clarinet and Þórður Kári Steinþórsson
underpins the lot with bold, bruised and swollen thrums and
rumbles and infectious skip-along beats. It really shouldn’t work.
Acker Bilk did much to knacker the clarinet’s rep, but Samaris
are determined to redress the balance as ‘Silkidrangar’, their
debut long-player released last spring, triumphantly shows.