New Music: D/C - Bad Man

One of two new tunes that he’s uploaded to Soundcloud today, wonderboy D/C (real name Daniel Caplen) gets confessional with Bad Man, a song about his past wrong doings and how he wants to make things better in the future. The other song (which you can find using this link) is called All My Sins, so there’s a theme of repentance going on here. Bad Man combines gospel, a gritty soul and a delightful pop sensibility with some blunt honest words. “I went to church but it made me feel worse,” he sings regretfully before admitting later he found some solace in another sort of heaven: “I used the bottle to sink all my trouble and hope that I don’t recollect.” Out of trouble comes some good though; I like it a lot. I hope you do as well.

D/C - Bad Man

D/C - The Fall

Five facts about D/C:

1. He played some cello on the song Blame It On Me on the George Ezra album.

2. He’s currently on tour with The Neighbourhood.

3. There’s a second EP on the way to follow up the  excellent Epiphany EP which featured the likes of Devil On My Shoulder and Daughter, Daughter both of which streamed on Breaking More Waves.

4. The new D/C EP shouldn’t be confused with the forthcoming AC/DC album, which is a very different thing indeed.

5. Initials are the thing here though as The Fall, a new song from D/C is produced by ADP. We’d like to think that when they were in the studio together they called each other by these initials and not their real names. 

Oh, we guess we’d better talk about the music. Press play and you’ll hear D/C’s distinctive gritty soul voice and lush late night electronics. It’s a track to feel as much as hear, full of mood setting ambience and soothing subtleties – a definite 3am track.

D/C - The Fall

D/C - Daughter, Daughter

This is so good.

Since we introduced D/C to Breaking More Waves back in October 2013 we’ve been patiently waiting for new material to arrive and here it is. Daughter, Daughter is exactly what we wanted him to deliver. Telling the classic tale of a father who can’t accept that his daughter is in love with someone who he doesn’t approve of (“he wants to have a doctor or a lawyer”) D/C drives the song home with electronic hand claps and beats,  head nodding deep bass and his deliciously husky mellow croon. We have no idea what's cool and what isn't, but if we were to hazard a guess, we'd say that this sounded cool. This is the sound of a man who knows what he's doing.

Some fatherly advice to the dad in question – lighten up man, she’s going to do her own thing anyway (“she’s got that fever”). Every resistance will find an equal and opposite force, so better to stop pushing, chill out and listen to this spot on tune. She'll love you even more if you do.

D/C - Daughter, Daughter

D/C - Devil On My Shoulder

This is the 2000th post on Breaking More Waves. To celebrate here’s a free download. It’s a song we’ve featured once before on the blog, albeit at that stage the track was just a live version. Now D/C’s Devil On My Shoulder gets the full blown studio treatment complete with cellos, keys, guitar picking that sounds like raindrops and D/C’s soulful voice. His gritty languid earthiness gives his music the same sense of downbeat spliffiness that the music of Ghost Poet has. 

Whilst still relatively under the radar D/C’s recently been working with Gorgon City, has been name checked by Chase & Status “some exciting new talent right there” and is due to release a debut EP soon. He’s also been confirmed for Britain’s finest new music festival – Brighton’s Great Escape. For now, press play, download for free then press play again and again.

D/C - Devil On My Shoulder

Gathering 2013 - Preview

Us Brits love talking about the weather, mainly because it’s so variable. We even have a multitude of words for rain, that all mean different things: It’s spitting, showers, drizzle, wet air, tipping it down, raining cats and dogs, sheeting it, the list goes on and on. So it’s inevitable that when we mention UK summer festivals, the weather gets high priority in conversation. Yet this year, despite Breaking More Waves spending most summer weekends somewhere in a field in the UK soaking up live music, we haven’t got a soaking. The wellies haven’t had one single outing. Mud? What’s that?

Now the tent has been packed away for another year it doesn’t mean the end to music festivals quite yet. For it seems that nearly every city throughout the UK has its own multi-venue event and many of them take place in autumn. But because they're in urban locations, our wellies can stay safely packed away - there are many positives to tarmac and an indoor venue. We’ve already covered Southsea Fest, the weekend just gone saw Norwich’s Sound & Vision and next weekend both Cardiff (Swn) and Oxford (Gathering) will find wristband sporting music fans  trooping the streets until the early hours - we’ll be amongst them in Oxford.

Gathering is a one dayer in the Cowley Road area of the city and runs from 4pm until 3am. Still a relative newbie in this ever growing market Gathering has some big names in Local Natives and London Grammar topping the bill, but this is very much a festival about new bands.

The line-up is like a smorgasbord of Breaking More Waves featured artists. The likes of Chasing Grace, Candy Says, Cheatahs, Chlöe Howl, Findlay, Gold & Youth, JJ Rosa, Laura Welsh, Pawws, Pylo, Ruen Brothers and Mt. Wolf are amongst the 42 acts playing across the 7 venues. If you’re going we recommend any of those, plus in addition here’s three more recommendations from the bill that we haven’t featured before.

D/C

London’s D/C is like a bucket. A bucket that’s full of talent, with that talent sloshing over the side trying to escape. He’s been putting out some incredible mash ups based around intense cello playing and beats including this one that includes Justin Timberlake, Kendrick Lamar and Rudimental parts within. You’ll find more of that over at his Soundcloud as well as this live recording of an original song called Devil On My Shoulder which is the musical equivalent of the smoothest mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows and cream piled high.

Jake Hart

Understated, minimal, late night, Jake Hart owes something to James Blake with his down tempo blissful songs. Lovely stuff found in the form of Awake below.

Lauren Aquilina

‘18 year old singer songwriter and biscuit enthusiast,’ is how Lauren Aquilina describes herself. With her Fools EP and Sinners EP both finding plenty of fans online her 2014 tour is already beginning to sell out, Lauren could well be 2014’s Gabrielle Aplin, even without a John Lewis Advert.

Gathering takes place on the 19 October at various venues in Oxford and organisers are predicting a sell-out very soon, so don’t leave it till to the last minute to buy your tickets (here). We’ll be bringing a review from the streets of Oxford and Gathering 2013 shortly after it finishes.