Slum Sociable – All Night
I needed to hear roughly seven seconds of Slum Sociable’s transcendent single “All Night” before I raced to iTunes and pre-ordered their TQ EP, which drops on Oct. 9. If you don’t fall in love that fast that’s alright, I’m weird, but I have a feeling you won’t be able to listen to “All Night” just once.
Mixing genres is a high-risk, high-reward proposition. Do it wrong and your track seems like a cheesy attempt at crossover appeal, but if you can nail it you open your sound up in an incredible way. Slum Sociable fall squarely in the latter camp, I’m happy to report.
“All Night” is bluesy and soulful, filled with vinyl warmth and jazzy seventh chords that give the record a bewitching, melancholy feel. But it also has a trip-hop breakbeat, and the vocals are undeniably 2015, straight out of a SXSW showcase.
It really is a stunning track, and even more proof that Australia is producing the best downtempo music of the modern era.
At once incredibly complex and unpretentious, “All Night” is quite the statement for Slum Sociable and sets the bar for TQ about as high as it could possibly be.