Dear group of “music astronauts”, we said goodbye in the height of summer, full of desire to escape and days to live with improvisation and enthusiasm, the summer evenings demanded euphoria, alarm clocks to be deactivated, simple but colorful clothing and wind in the face to breathe. full lungs. The only prerogative allowed were the headphones to be worn as needed, that is, whenever the charge of musical vitamins tended to decrease in our veins, after all the notes are the only recommended medicine exempt from the wording q.b. = enough!
During the aforementioned period we were accompanied by a magnificent track, FRED AGAIN .. & THE BLESSED MADONNA- MAREA (WE’VE LOST DANCING), characterized by melody and rhythm suitable for sunsets and dawns, versatile use during a dj-set still placed in many international rankings:
This is the most important production of the artist Fred Again.. which sees the participation in the voice of the dance icon of the moment Marea Stamper aka The Blessed Madonna (formerly famous with the stage name The Black Madonna changed for “media reasons”), is a praise to the dancefloor and all the things we took for granted. It is a nostalgic piece but at the same time full of hope and optimism, all best explained by the text of Marea itself which reads:
“if I can live through this next six months / day by day / if I can live through this / what comes next will be… marvellous!”
The video as for the track is a sampling of joyful moments alternating with nostalgic thoughts and words, it really comes from a video call between the two artists in full lockdown and highlights the harmony between two extraordinary talents: what Stamper defines “a truly artist singular that she has a really tender way of dealing in particular with sound “and that Fred at the registry office John Philip Gibson renames” his shaman of rave “.
Fred Again.. is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful pages of the last two years in the field of electronic music production, in particular during the whole of 2021 he acted as Charon, ferrying us from one shore to the other of music and feelings, he led us from the moments heavenly at the darkest moments by launching the ACTUAL LIFE album in the spring and the aforementioned track to rock us in the summer. While to accompany us from the summer heat and libertine to the cool autumn characterized by that mix of feelings that involve all of us still suspended between the melancholy of a season that is too short and the warnings to dive into winter and new purposes, it has produced a track that fits brush for this section: BILLIE (LOVING ARMS):
The concept of this production is the perfect antithesis of Marea, since as you can see from the video it refers to a return to normal conviviality, the sounds and rhythms are faster and the piano riffs convey joy and serenity.
Billie is subsequent to the album Actual Life (April 14 – December 17 2020), a project released last April that brought FRED AGAIN.. radio and charts to the fore. (The two dots are part of the many beautiful oddities of the character).
FRED John Philip Gibson is a 28-year-old London producer, a particularly exciting character because he is constantly looking for authenticity in everything he does, letting himself be inspired by everything around him; he records all the moments of productive genius even as a result of an evening hangover and then works on them with lucid sensitivity mainly using LOGIC PRO.
Fred currently produces for his label and for the great EarOne but “plays” making music since he was 15 under the first push of his brother (current manager) and then of his much sought after mentor BRIAN ENO, a legend of international music and recognized inventor of “ambient music”, musician and record artist with a curriculum so long as to risk taking us off topic, it is enough at least to recall collaborations with various David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, Underworld, U2, Talking Heads, Toto & many more. It was Eno who encouraged Fred with the principle of a good production starting from a sound rather than from scratch, because they say:
“It frees you from the feeling that it must be perfect, you start from this big block of granite and start chipping it rather than hoping that the first thing is immediately a Sistine Chapel”
Before producing the album Actual Life himself, Fred Again worked for big names like Ed Sheeran, The XX, Eminem, Underworld. Listening to this record that blends dancing piano notes with house rhythms, we get to know fragments of real life and the plot of stories belonging to real people told as in a diary in an emotional way track by track, which is why every single one has the name of a person. and in brackets the title of a moment lived together with it (another courageous and innovative choice by the artist). For example, the vocal sample in Julia tells the feelings of falling in love “I am deeply immersing myself in your emotions”; Angie or Dermont (voice of Dermont Kennedy) denote melancholy reflections on the meaning of life; the rhythm will rise from Sabrina onwards in the second part of the album without skipping the passage on ME dedicated to a friend hospitalized for covid in which the voice of Fred Again sings “I would like to run inside and take you away, unplug the cables and kiss you. … “
It was right to digress on Actual Life, but we are here for Billie and our Dolorean takes us to 1995 when the German singer-songwriter BILLIE RAY MARTIN (also voice of the Mystic Motion project of our DATURA italian duo composed by the legendary Cirillo and dj Ricci) :
“Put your loving arms around me, And it feels like shelter when you, Put your loving arms around me, And inside your arms I’m burning” everyone sang it up to take it to the top of the charts in 1995, the year of Giorgia’s rise in Sanremo, of Tom Hanks’win in Forrest Gump at the Oscars, the year of the first PLAY STATION and the second title of F1 World Champion for Michael Schumacher!
YOUR LOVING ARMS has been re-sung among others by Marta Walsh and Sagi Rei but has enjoyed the well-deserved immortality in the decades of music also thanks to the countless remixes of various genres and tastes, the most important ones that have followed one another over time are by TODD TERRY, by ROGER SANCHEZ and JUNIOR VASQUEZ:
The Italian CHRISTIAN MARCHI also ventured with this historical track in 2017, but the most electronically romantic reinterpretations were granted to us by the Trance remixes on the track sung by Karen Overton, real sonic journeys towards the hyperspace of synthetic sound thanks to three exceptional pilots of the kind TIESTO – ARMIN VAN BUUREN – MARKUS SCHULZ:
To each the choice of the preferred interpretation, the fundamental concept that brings us back to FRED AGAIN is that a vocal sample and a quality melody can survive over time and be reborn countless times.
In this episode I behaved just like Marty McFly when distracted by the feelings and events that occurred to the other characters in the film, he risked missing appointments over time and remained on foot with his Dolorean, but FRED AGAIN produced an album that creates a connection. unique emotional that leaves like a snout in the throat, BILLIE is an innovative track and the story behind it delves into time and memories of different eras from its birth in 1995 to its dance – trance and house rebirths!
The DOC calls me, it’s time to load the headphones and discs on the Dolorean console, I will wait for you at the next Back2Roots ride to discover the grooves dug by the roots of Electronic Dance Music.
“MUSIC IS THE ANSWER”