music – The Cultural Exposé

Eric Benét and co have teamed up with Cuban artists for a new album

Matilda — Tue, 24 Oct 2017 18:23:29 +0000

Once a music journalist, always a music journalist. A PR hit me up recently to let me know that Eric Benét was coming to town. Now, aside from recent shady shots fired from Jay-Z, I can’t say the fella’s been on my mind of late. And the feminist within hasn’t quite forgotten the Halle Years (not holding that over his head by the way, God’s forgiven him…)

Anyway, as it turns out, he’s part of this new album called Two Beats, One Soul – a project featuring a bunch of American and Cuban artists coming together to make, well, music. And it’s pretty good. Other guests on the release include Jon B, Louie Vega and Shaggy, so if you’re here for those latin beats with a little twist, it’s definitely worth a listen.

But back to Eric Benet coming to town. I’ve only known and loved one his albums – 1999’s A Day In The Life, which I distinctly remember buying in Birmingham City Centre before rinsing it to death. Can we talk about Love Of My Own? Georgy Porgy? Why You Follow Me? Love The Hurt Away? That’s tune after tune after tune after TUNE. I just hope those make the playlist at his gig this Thursday at the Electric Brixton. Anyone else going?

The post Eric Benét and co have teamed up with Cuban artists for a new album appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Five Dope Tracks – The October 2017 Edit + podcast

Matilda — Sun, 01 Oct 2017 11:00:12 +0000

During my recent ‘fun-employment’ (aka freedom from the 9-5), I decided to do something I’ve wanted to do for ages: record a podcast. Well, tada! You can now check out the very first Five Dope Tracks podcast, featuring my friends Justin Onyeka and Rasheed Dauda .It’s all about Janet Jackson’s The Velvet Rope album, which turns the grand age of 20 on October 7th. Admittedly, it’s a little weird this record – but that made it all the more fun, getting reacquainted with it and identifying its Five Dope Tracks (which you can listen to just below). The podcast is on Mixcloud (although unavailable in the US, sorry – copyright rules!).

The post Five Dope Tracks – The October 2017 Edit + podcast appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Five Dope Tracks – The September 2017 Edit

Matilda — Sun, 03 Sep 2017 19:35:03 +0000

So…

I wasn’t 100% sure what I wanted to do for this month’s Five Dope Tracks (as I’m actually looking forward to the October Edit which may or may not be a podcast!?!? Waaaahhhh….We’ll see).

Anyway, I knew I wanted to make this month’s more artist focused. Jill Scott popped into my head as I haven’t heard from her in a minute – and it turns out her third album The Real Thing: Words and Sounds Vol. 3 is officially 10 years old (!) on September 25th. Sure, it didn’t match the mega success of her first two projects, but it’s just as musically accomplished – so I’ve rounded up some of the album’s dopest moments for a mellow Sunday eve, and a couple of her other tunes for good measure.

ENJOY

(You can read about why I started this little music project here. And feel free to follow me on Twitter here)

The post Five Dope Tracks – The September 2017 Edit appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Five Dope Tracks – The July 2017 Edit

Matilda — Sat, 01 Jul 2017 08:00:14 +0000

Happy July everybody! You good? Everything straight? Your people okay? Nice. I’m FINE although I’m not satisfied with the few hours of summer we’ve had – and the little that came and went absolutely nuked the grass in the communal garden. Not cool. It doesn’t help that I always consider July as the start of the steady descent to autumn – so I’m already thinking about what boots I’d like to rock soon (I’m thinking a suede Chelsea in maroon could be a cute look).

BUT – as it’s supposedly still summer, I’ve gone for a late, balmy night at a rootop party vibe for the second edition of Five Dope Tracks. The theme I had mind was ‘nostalgia’, thanks to this brilliant artist from LA I recently came across called MarcLo. His throwback Neptunes style gets the playlist started this month, followed by the original R&B It girl Kelis, the inimitable Janet Jackson and Canada’s underrated neo-soul star Slakah the Beatchild. Q-Tip brings things home with a song from Kamaal the Abstract – the album he released in 2009 that nobody could quite get their heads around. But hey, I liked it.

Check out the playlist below – it’s currently on Spotify and Google Play – and if you like what you hear, feel free to share it, follow Five Dope Tracks on Twitter, send me a message, or leave a comment below!

The post Five Dope Tracks – The July 2017 Edit appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Introducing Five Dope Tracks

Matilda — Thu, 01 Jun 2017 07:09:25 +0000

Before I was a lifestyle journalist I was what you’d call a “music critic”. This meant that for at least a decade, my career typically involved:

getting new music in the post
rating – or slating – that new music
attending “album playbacks”, sometimes with the artist in attendance
interviewing artists (new and old, promising and legendary), sometimes on the phone, occasionally in another country
going to those musicians’ shows – sometimes in this country, sometimes in another city

It was a charmed life – a poorly paid one, mind you, but I had fun. Eventually, the love for the game died and I realised I preferred scrutinising starters at restaurants and hanging out in art galleries than waiting for the music industry to produce artists I could get excited about – like really excited about, not “you’ve flown me halfway across the world to listen to a wack album but I’m gonna pretend to like it because free flight and hotel innit” excited. Trust me, it’s happened.

Anywho, to prevent this becoming unnecessarily ranty, I officially like music again. Dare I say, I even love it. I started flirting with Apple Music, eventually put a ring on it (aka £9.99 a month) and it’s opened me up to a whole new world of music in the way my favourite mags did back in the day (Vibe, The Source, XXL, Black Beat, Blues & Soul, Trace, Touch, Tense, Undercover the lot).

It also doesn’t hurt that I’ve been covering gigs for The Evening Standard since the beginning of the year which means going to a lot of shows – some fab, others a bit meh – and remembering why I fell for music in the first place.

So to consolidate my new-found appreciation of it all, I’ve launched a little something-something called Five Dope Tracks. It’s a regular round-up of the tunes I’ve either come across recently or back in the day and reckon you might like – five tracks at a time. It’s short, sharp and sweet.

The June 2017 Edit is kicking it all off, featuring Mr Jukes (London, stand up!), Ohmega Watts (a conscious rapper from Brooklyn I’ve been loving off for years), Beleaf (a ‘dad’ rapper from Baltimore who’s got a hilarious YouTube channel starring his wife and kids), Rob Araujo (a very cool jazz man from LA) and Pool Cosby (an indie-ish group from NY who’ve done this nice summery collabo with man like Raekwon – who’d have thunk it?)

Check out the playlist below – it’s currently on Spotify – and if you like what you hear, feel free to share it, follow Five Dope Tracks on Twitter, send me a message, or leave a comment below!

The post Introducing Five Dope Tracks appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

What we’ve been up to… the Havana Cultura: Anthology launch, Shoreditch

Matilda — Sat, 26 Nov 2016 10:39:55 +0000

A few weeks back, I enjoyed the most incredible week of music. Robert Glasper Experiment on a Monday. Miguel Atenwood-Ferguson’s Suite for Ma Dukes on a Tuesday. Then, the launch of the latest Havana Cultura album on a Wednesday, which wasn’t just a fun night out of discussions led by Gilles Peterson and live performances (shout out to Havana Rum for the grub and cocktails), but it absolutely schooled me on everything I never knew about the brilliant, long-running project to champion Cuban artists. I also got to see the stunning Dayme Arocena – who’s been described as the Cuban Jill Scott and recorded her first EP via the initiative. Learn more about Havana Cultura here and check out some pics from the night below.

Pic: Fabrice Bourgelle

The post What we’ve been up to… the Havana Cultura: Anthology launch, Shoreditch appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Somewhere you should go… summer parties in London: No Long Ting All Dayer + Room for Movement

Matilda — Fri, 05 Aug 2016 07:30:33 +0000

Man… July was a bit of a cruel one to me. My site got hacked plus I’ve had loads of housing drama (typical London). Like, ‘start a building petition and write to your MP’ drama. But it’s August, it’s “summer”, and I can finally see the calm after the storm. Thus, it’s time to get my social life back. As it so happens, it’s my birthday month (woop!) and personally, I’m all for celebrating as much as possible until the actual day (the 15th), so with no further adieu, here’s the first of two summer parties in London I can’t wait to check out this weekend:

No Long Ting All Dayer Part 2, Pop Brixton, August 7th (2-11pm)

I’ve wanted to hit up No Long Ting for the absolute LONGEST. It’s sort of like a block party / house party hosted by one of the capital’s finest hip-hop artists Ty and the good folks from the United 80 shop in the Market Village. I heard good things about the June event, so I’m expecting all of the best vibes.

Room4Movement, The Book Club, August 7th (7-midnight)

Fresh from killing another Jazz Re:fest at the Southbank last month, the Jazz Re:freshed crew is throwing the latest of their East London music jams this weekend. DJ Charlie Dark will be bringing the tunes, along with residents Bunny Bread, Top Rock & Adam Rock. These guys always come strong, so no doubt it’s gonna be a lively one!

Are there any summer parties in London you’re looking forward to? Let me know in the comments!

The post Somewhere you should go… summer parties in London: No Long Ting All Dayer + Room for Movement appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

Photos: Lovebox Festival 2016

Matilda — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 07:00:27 +0000

True stories: I knew very little about Lovebox festival before I got tickets. But a friend reckoned that if I’d ever experienced Wireless, this annual gig in Victoria Park wasn’t too far off. Well, he wasn’t wrong. Between the young demographic and the limited info available to direct you to the right stages, I gotta say, it wasn’t really my vibe. But what I did appreciate was seeing my Run Dem buddy Peigh reunite with his group NuBrandFlexxx for a brilliant show on the Visions stage.

The return of NuBrandFlexxx

Amped, energetic and brilliantly reckless, the grime gang flew through their known hits. I wished I recorded the ecstatic crowd reaction to their anthem and 2000 Nu Brand – folk were really all up in their emotions. Also, I got to see a bit of Kano in a tent (which made no sense whatsoever – give the man main stage already!). If I’m gonna be real with y’all, I felt so uncomfortable in the midst of the mosh, I needed to back out and find a space where I could breathe. I’m way too old for all that pushing and shoving. But naturally, I stayed long enough to get a few snaps, so here’s my pictures from the Friday of Lovebox Festival 2016:

Lovebox festival 2016 – at least the weather was good.

Matchy matchy

Locked and loaded – inside the Visions tent to see Nu Brand Flexxx

Lively.

Man like Peigh.

In the zone.

Inside the FabricLive tent, waiting for Kano

King Kano. Solid set from one of the UK’s finest.

The next fest I’ll be heading to is Jazz Re:fest on the 31st, which is totally up my street. I wentchecked it out tlast year so I know this year’s event will be just as brilliant. Can’t wait.

The post Photos: Lovebox Festival 2016 appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

The gig I’m looking forward to this week: The Internet at Koko

Matilda — Mon, 07 Mar 2016 13:00:11 +0000

I am notoriously bad at buying tickets for gigs before they sell out. That is how I missed those Prince gigs in 2014. And in 2007 (but then I realised, I actually don’t love Prince that much, so the FOMO wasn’t really strong enough). But when I heard my new favourite band The Internet (real name) were playing Koko last year and I couldn’t get a ticket, real thug tears were shed. That is, until I heard they rescheduled the shows to this year and would be adding more dates. So thanks to the media powers that be, I’m GOING TO SEE THE INTERNET THIS WEEK! If you love neo-soul and just good music full stop – look these guys up. They’re dope.

Check ’em out on Jimmy Kimmel:

Here’s my favourite song from Ego Death, their latest album that got nominated for a Grammy:

And here’s my favourite track from their previous album, Feel Good:

Gosh, I miss bands!

The post The gig I’m looking forward to this week: The Internet at Koko appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.

My weekend in pictures: January 9

Matilda — Mon, 11 Jan 2016 08:30:53 +0000

The first weekend of the New Year was all about chilling at The Tabernacle in West London, the bar/gallery space that’s hosting the new SOUND SYSTEM CULTURE: London exhibition. All pics shot on a Canon 5D Mark 1 with a 24-105mm lens.

The post My weekend in pictures: January 9 appeared first on The Cultural Exposé.