JOYO VELARDE - Love And Understanding (2010)

Fresh modern Hip Hop Soul sounds from Joyo Velarde, her full length debut for Quannum, featuring production that ranges from uptempo funky to laidback and bumping!! Joyo has a versatile style vocally, and the producers bring a variety of backdrops to suit, including producer and vocal collaborator husband Lyrics Born, plus production by Jake One, Headnodic and others, and collaborations with RJD2, Tommy Guerrero and others. But this is Joyo's show all the way, and she pulls it off with soul to spare!!

Tracklisting:

1. Mama's Got A Brand New Swag (So Exquisite)
2. Build This World
3. Certain Special Way (I Feel About You)
4. Strong Possibility
5. Ticket To Love
6. With Feeling
7. The Way We Are
8. You Got Me (In The Mood)
9. Lower Deck
10. Feels Right
11. Take You Home
12. On And On

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MILES BONNY - Smell Smoke (2006) / Incense & Wine (2010)

Double feature from the great Miles Bonny, with his first album Smell Smoke and the newest and fabulous Incense & Wine!! The slow rolling moody Soul sounds from Miles Bonny are a mix of relaxed beatcraft that's rich in hypnotic atmosphere. Beats, bass and keys flavor the sound, with Miles' vocals laid down as part of the overall atmosphere as much as the driving force of the tunes, and makes for an interesting blend of danceable keys & synth Soul to more of a headphones head nodding experience!! Fantastic!!

Smell Smoke (2006) - Tracklisting:

1. Intro
2. Cans Ass City Waltz
3. You
4. We
5. Car Symphony
6. Stampede
7. Not The One
8. I Need A Drink
9. Bridge Breakfast Shortage
10. Garden Work
11. The Garden
12. Shining Ignorant
13. Meditation On Hip Hop
14. When Your Dead
15. Boom Doos
16. War Is The Enemy
17. Sing Your Song




Incense & Wine (2010) - Tracklisting:

1. Spiritual Nutrition
2. Do You
3. Words (I Love You)
4. Endless Possibilities
5. Blue And Green
6. Number 5
7. Satisfy
8. Never Be The same
9. On Impulse
10. Green Chemical Lawns
11. Cans Ass City (Feel Sexy)
12. Something I Can Dance Too
13. Joy
14. Shouts Out
15. Aggressively Calm
16. Marion Truth

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ZO! - ...Just Visiting Too (2009)

Fantastic stuff from keyboardist and producer Zo!, the follow up to his Just Visiting EP previously released!! There’s nothing better than when the future of Soul all comes together for an album. But when the announcement of the formation of Foreign Exchange Music came several months ago, we held out hope that more music would be forthcoming, allowing the loose consortium of friends and artists to collaborate more. The time is now as Zo! manages to bring together some of music’s most talented, if yet unrecognized voices like Sy Smith, Darien Brockington, Phonte, Yahzarah & Carlitta Durand to assist in …Just Visiting Too. The free, seven track album features talented singers alongside the creative hands & mind of Zo! handling the production and majority of the instruments. Taking a handful of originals by Prince, The Isley Brothers, Quincy Jones & others, Zo! revisits & revamps them with warm, mellow arrangements of keys, guitars, handclaps & fingersnaps. Classy 21st Century Soul sounding!!

Tracklisting:

1. Perfect Angel feat. Yahzarah
2. Nights Over Egypt feat. Carlitta Durand
3. Crazy You feat. Sy Smith
4. Holding You, Loving You
5. My Flame feat. Phonte
6. Somethin Special feat. Yahzarah
7. The Highways Of My Life feat. Darien Brockington (Pts. 1&2)

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JIMETTA ROSE - The Barber´s Daughter (2010)

Full length debut from Jimetta Rose, with spacey Soul production and spiritually resonant lyrics, maid all the more rewarding thanks to warm, emotional vocals and deft vocal arrangements from Jimetta!! We first heard Rose providing a sweet vocal foil for Shafiq Husayn of Sa-Ra on his excellent En-A-Freeka album, and she steps out wonderfully on The Barber's Daughter. The spacey Hip Hop Soul sound is akin to Georgia Anne Muldrow, but Jimetta has her own, perhaps more grounded and focused vibe than the astral atmosherics. Also like Georgia, she has a talent for arranging her vocals to lead, follow and respond to hypnotic effect. This set should be a harbinger for even more wonderful things to come, great set and likely to be one of our favorite independent Soul efforts from the LA scene for a long time to come!!

Tracklisting:

1. Intro (I Got A Dream)
2. Glory Us
3. Life Unfolds
4. Sweet Necessity
5. Revolution Out There
6. On My Own
7. Middow (Days Of Our Lives)
8. America (Revisited)
9. Constellations
10. Drifting Far Away
11. I Got God
12. So Easy
13. Outro (Heaven)

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