Concert in your area for Electronic, Indie & Alt, Funk & Soul, Pop, R&B, and Hip-Hop.
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Kelis Rogers was born 21 August 1979 and grew up in Harlem, New York with her father Kenneth, mother Eveliss and three sisters. Her father is a former professor at Wesleyan University as well as a jazz musician and Pentecostal minister. Her mother is a Chinese/Puerto Rican fashion designer and one of the sole sources of encouragement for Kelis’ musical pursuit.
Kelis was involved with music at a young age. During her time at Manhattan Country School she learned the violin, piano and saxophone and later progressed to Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. During her attendance in high school she joined an R&B collective called BLU and from there went on to cross paths with the Neptunes, a group consisting of Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo. She eventually formed an amicable and musical relation with them and scored a recording contract with their help.
Kelis‘ debut studio album “Kaleidoscope” was produced by the Neptunes and saw release on 7 December 1999. It entered the US Billboard 200 at No. 149 and featured the three singles “Good Stuff”, “Get Along” and “Caught Out There” (a track which was later sampled by the British electronic artist James Blake for his single CMYK). The album did reasonably well in Europe. As a result of the positive response overseas she released her 2nd album “Wanderland” exclusively to a European, Asian, and Latin American market. This release was widely eclectic in nature referencing genres from bossa nova, disco, and freak funk. The album’s only single was “Young, Fresh n‘ New”. Despite it’s relatively weak sales performance it was herald in media outlets like NME and the Guardian.
Kelis finally found her way into the mainstream in 2003 with her single “Milkshake” and did so without compromising a shred of her artistry. The song proved to be one of her strangest and most minimal releases to date, opting in detuned monophonic bass lines for the elaborate instrumentation that grace her prior releases. “Milkshake” hit No.1 on the Hot Dance Club party Chart and No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was also included in the movie Dodgeball (though many may wish to forget that scene) and was monumental in boosting the sales for her 3rd studio album “Tasty”. Likewise the single was a critical feat for Kelis earning her a grammy nomination and was named the top single of 2004 by the Observer and the 8th best single by Pitchfork. The album “Tasty” contained three additional singles “Trick Me”, “Millionaire (feat. Andre 3000)”, and “In Public (feat. Nas)”. Around this time Kelis released the collaborative hit “Not In Love” with Enrique Iglesias” and remixed Bjork’s single “Oceania”. In 2004 Kelis supported the release of “Tasty” opening for Britney Spears on her Onyx Hotel Tour.
On 22 August 2006 she put out her 4th studio album “Kelis Was Here” through the label, Jive. The album was both a critical and commercial success, reaching No. 10 on the US Billboard 200 and receiving a Grammy nomination for Best Contemporary R&B Album. Kelis issued a compilation album entitled “Hits” in 2008, which marked her last release through Jive.
From 2006 to 2010 Kelis took a short break from her music career to focus on her dream of pursuing the culinary arts. During her time off she enrolled at the Le Cordon Bleu cooking school through which she obtained certification as a chef. After her break she entered a recording contract with the label Interscope and released “Flesh Tone”. This album was strongly geared toward electronic dance music and reflected influences spanning from David Bowie, Donna Summer, Bjork, and Basement Jaxx. Kelis supported this release with her “All Hearts Tour”, performing alongside Swedish pop star Robyn.
In 2011 Kelis scored a No. 2 UK charting single with Calvin Harris called “Bounce” and in 2013 signed to the cult British electronica label Ninja Tune. A year later Kelis released her 6th studio album “Food”. The album was produced by TV on the Radio’s Dave Sitek and emanated a style more subtle and to a degree more stark than her previous releases; however, it still carries on in her traditional use of soul and electronic forms.
Maribou State are made for the pulsing club circuit, with upcoming shows with Fatboy Slim and The 2 Bears at Warehouse Project, at the Ministry of Sound and at the well-established Watergate superclub in Berlin. They’re the international discotheque trailblazers that will make everyone’s night from Brooklyn to Brighton to Ibiza to the glowstick parties of Croatia and Romania. Their shadowy, eclectic minimal-house sound resembles that of Pantha Du Prince, Modeselektor or Shackleton. They understand what it means to be laconic, using subtle shifts in tempo and gradually overlapping samples to create a kind of mutating ambience that’s deceptively complex.
Their debut EP blended sub-tropical percussion and symbols with intercut, soulful vocal tracks to create a perambulating, worldly sort of nu-jazz, with appearances from Saint Saviour on ‘Scarlet Groove’ and Pedestrian on ‘Rush Don’t Run’. Their subsequent Eps Native and Truths have a more haunting atmosphere about them. Their live tracks fuse all their widely-sourced jams together seamlessly. As a point of reference, check their Boiler Room set, which flails wildly between Afro-jazz, bossanova, minimal, coldwave and funk in the first half-hour.
The term booming voice would be one way to describe a performance by Kelis, another would be awesome. Even though I was too young to hear the old style R&B/Soul singers of the 70s, Kelis has helped fill that void by providing a very unique yet old style feel to her music.
In this day and age I would have thought it would be difficult for something like this to catch on given the changes that R&B has gone through over the years, but judging by how many people came to the venue to see her perform this is far from the case. It was very easy for me to get a ticket and even easier for me to get a parking space.
While it seemed like there were a lot of people there to see her perform, I was easily able to find a seat near the front row that would allow me to comfortably enjoy her show. Once she entered the stage I could see that she was wearing a very simple dress and that her orchestra was well dressed, but not in a way that was over the top.
As she began to sing "Rumble" her orchestra moved close to her and she began to sing and dance around her microphone as her female background singer flanked her side. Another thing I noticed was that she had a female drummer and that is something that you hardly if ever see in the music industry in general unfortunately, but it was a nice and welcome change. I really enjoyed the performance and left with happy and calm feelings and a smile on my face.
Moodymann induces quite a ruckus as he walks on stage this evening. The audience is extremely excited for this highly anticipated set.
The whole performance that they do is so strange. It is almost like an art installation, with the way that that they have such a funk soul and disco sound in their performance with the DJs behind him not only triggering beats and basslines, they’re also playing the keyboard and the guitar in such a funk style. Whatever it is, it is making this audience dance and adding to this almost unsettling sort of atmosphere. Moodymann walks aimlessly around the stage with his signature long hair just flowing about, when he walks up to the mic and simply just says a few words here and there with his drawling American accent. So interesting to watch, if a little bit strange. Some of the best-received songs are “Don’t You Want My Love” and “Desire” which is similar sort of vibes, which create similar reactions amongst this audience. It’s an experience.
Theo Parrish is a talented, educated techno/house artist who has worked with Rick Wilhite, Marcellus Malik Pittman and Kenneth Dixon. The American DJ has gained a pretty popular following in the UK and plays clubs most of the time. However, he will occasionally change up his live sets and include live instrumentals into the mix.
I’m always split between my opinions when it comes to techno/house music. On the one hand, it can be tedious and repetitive, but on the other, if you are listening to the live set, it can be tons of fun, especially because there is so much dancing that can be done. The latter is the case for Theo Parrish’s live sets in the clubs that he plays. The transitions between songs are flawless and unnoticeable, but at the same time, there is no repetitiveness to what he spins. Plus, everyone that is around and in the venue is having a great dance party and nothing else seems to matter. Watching Theo spin, you can see how he gets lost in what he’s doing, really driving home the art form that can go into doing a live DJ set. However you may feel about techno/house music, Theo is sure to ensure a good time.