lundi 15 Oct 2012, 2h20m

I don't really dig on American dance music, brostep, club electronic music, or, really, most mainstream pop music in general (which explains why I'm just writing about this now)… but I have to admit, this guy is crazy good.

Tracks like She Was (ft. Birds of Paradise) or The Great Divide (Seven Lions remix) erase my previous, long-standing gripes with American "dubstep"–i.e. the boorish "kid playing with a noisemaker" feel. Did anyone else have one of those weird Sound Blaster toys with the "death ray," "machine gun," and "bomb" noises? Press and hold two buttons at the same time and it sort of blended the noises to make them even more irritating for the parents? Eh, maybe not. Anyway, that's inevitably what I think of when dubstep gets mentioned.

And sure, all that is still present (it seems to be one of the defining characteristics of much of American clubstep), but Seven Lions' approach to production sets him far apart from most. This noise is sculpted. And it's not even the main focus. My word, it's actually melodic. Just lovely. It's refreshing to finally hear something like this. It took me a long time to try to force some 'step down, and a little more time after that to begin to enjoy some of it, but I have few complaints about any of the Seven Lions remixes/songs which I have heard thus far.

The Velvetine track in particular reminds me of Coloris era (2008-present) she, but with overt, trendy dubstep drops, and a breathtakingly gorgeous break starting at around 2:20. It's still childlike, but in terms of the sense of excited wonder, the sense of scale and spacey, futuristic, cyberpunk beauty it evokes–a welcome antidote to the "midrange cack" that seems to butt its ugly bass in everywhere these days. Something like last year's Make Me Real would make a fine companion on a playlist.