‘Sapien’ has the same rhythmic shuffle, but adds threads of micro-tuned synth, trance- tinged riffs and a shredded breakbeat, before a hefty bleep-driven coda. ‘Closer’, with its 2-step skip, feels like a relative of earlier hit ‘Eyes Down’, yet it has a more electronic melancholia, a more layered intricacy.
It also features a host of collaborators, who further flesh out its melodic and emotional landscapes into memorable songs. In its mixture of sounds, it feels like a product of now, packing in a fair share of bangers built for the club and live stage, as well as more reflective moments. Across the record, which is set for release in January, familiar Bonobo characteristics combine with new ideas and experiments. The occasion of our interview is Bonobo’s new album, ‘Fragments’, his first in four years and possibly his best since 2010’s ‘Black Sands’. It’s just doing what feels right at the time.” I like the spirit of the label, it’s a very independent thing that’s not beholden to hype, or clinging on to specific genre-hopping ideas. They kept it as a time capsule of the old Ninja. “This is the only room they didn’t renovate in the office.
“It’s like a permanent museum,” Green says, glancing back at the vibrant art on the back wall. He’s part of that epic story, and his own shift from downtempo beats to lively dancefloor sounds in 2010 was one mirrored by the label. Green has been releasing music since 1999, and has been signed to Ninja Tune for most of that time. Sat in Ninja’s meeting room, the wall behind him is plastered with posters, flyers and ephemera charting the label’s long and illustrious history. A friendly interviewee, he’s softly spoken, but becomes more animated when he hits upon a subject that sparks his imagination. With his salt-and-pepper stubble and pale blue eyes, he exudes a sense of calm. Wearing a black T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up and army fatigue trousers, his hair is swept to the side, the temples greying a little. Green has just flown back to the UK from his home in Los Angeles for the first time in a few years. If you feel there’s a familiarity, or there’s a sense of nostalgia. That sort of very honest, emotional content is possibly the thing that people connect with. Then loads of people loved it they found it very personal, and connected with it that way. “I thought it was so silly, because it was just this thing I made that was really lo-fi. “When I put out my first record, ‘Terrapin’, it was a really weird little thing I did on an Akai sampler, it was just like a couple of guitar lines and a sitar,” he recalls. There’s something about his music that strikes a universal chord. His last album, 2017’s ‘Migration’, was No.1 on the US Billboard Dance Chart and made the top 5 in the UK, while his 2010 record ‘Black Sands’ is widely hailed as a modern classic. He has a massive following, selling out huge venues like London’s Alexandra Palace or Denver’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre, and performs everywhere from Glastonbury to Coachella and Japan’s Fuji Rock festival. Incorporating elements of UK garage, ambient, breakbeat, house, jazz and R&B, the music that Bonobo makes has an experimental edge - yet his sound crosses over to all kinds of audiences. “It’s an emotional response from me, I guess.” “I think maybe because it comes from a very personal place,” he says. Sat on a sofa in the Ninja Tune offices, somewhere in Kennington, South London, Simon Green, aka Bonobo, is pondering the question of why his music resonates with so many people.
0 kommentar(er)
