📣 LAZY INTERVIEW #31 — TOUCH SENSITIVE

Opening the email that contained the story behind Touch Sensitive's masterwork in electropop, 'Pizza Guy' – the song that burst into our consciousnesses in 2013, re-released two years later to even wider appreciation – was disarmingly exciting. It's a funny story actually.

"My friend and former band mate from Van She started a night called Pizza Party and he never invited me to play which is understandable because we lived in each other pockets," he writes, "But at the time I was disappointed so in a fit of rage when I was bouncing it to send to Future Classic I called it 'Pizza Guy'." Don't worry, he and Nick (Routledge) can laugh about it now. Originally an instrumental, he told us how it went through "so many different versions" and finally became non-instrumental: "A friend of mine (who went on to become a global superstar) cut up a vocal from an undisclosed location and that's kind of it."

And even though the song isn't this romantic tale of a struggling real-life pizza guy, we can still live vicariously through the video for the track which features Touch Sensitive as the eponymous purveyor of pizza.

Between then and now the Australian musicmaker has dropped a string of singles, including the glistening bouncy 'Slowments', and finally his debut album has appeared: Visions. Funnily enough the album opens with a self-referential track called 'First Slice', a dreamified snippet of 'Pizza Guy', and if that wasn't enough of a nod the "official visualizer" has the producer walk over to a table, open a box and pull out a slice of pizza that he nonchalantly munches as he gazes out a window—the majority of the album tracks do also come with visuals, including the album's piano-thumping lead single, 'Lay Down', which "went through 50 versions," we are told. Elsewhere on the album Harriet Brown features on two songs, there's an instrumental called 'The Mystery Of Cats', and glorious tape warp on 'You're My Last Chance (Interlude)'. Visions glitters and clacks, glows warm and textured with classic synthesiser sounds.

But with the album release behind him by about two weeks now, Touch Sensitive was finally able to sit down with a slice of pizza and a kitten curled up next to him and answer our world famous Lazy Interview questions. Read on, dear reader, read on.

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w h o   a r e   y o u ?   w h e r e   a r e   y o u   f r o m ?   w h a t   d o   y o u   d o ?

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My name is Michael Di Francesco, I'm from Sydney Australia and I make and play music.

h o w   d i d   y o u   s t a r t   c r e a t i n g   m u s i c ?

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I played in bands at school then studied it at university then I discovered Daft Punk so I sold my double bass and went halves with a friend in a TR909 and an EMU sampler, after that we went crazy collecting records etc. etc. I also spent many years playing in cover bands and doing whatever session gigs I could, I got to play with some cool people most of whom are/became my friends.

h o w   w o u l d   y o u   d e s c r i b e   y o u r   s o u n d ?

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Not sure but I'm constantly trying to make it better and break out of harmonic and rhythmic habits, that's the greatest challenge for me anyway. It can always be better. But by better I don't mean technically or rather sonically, the combination of the elements.

i s   t h e r e   a   p e r f e c t   t i m e   a n d   p l a c e   f o r   l i s t e n i n g   t o   y o u r   m u s i c ?

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Maybe driving, I'm not sure. „
If anyone likes anything you do it's nice and if it made people happy that makes me happy
” w h a t   i n s p i r e s   y o u   m o s t   w h e n   m a k i n g   a   t r a c k ?

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A sound, something that just happened, a couple of words or a phrase.

w h a t   i s   y o u r   m o s t   m e m o r a b l e   m u s i c a l   e x p e r i e n c e ?

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I got to do a session with Snoop once, that was pretty cool, also had the privilege of playing with Jamie Liddell many years ago, that was cool too, some of the best ones are in a friends studio or at home.

w h a t   a r e   y o u r   f a v o u r i t e   t h r e e   s o n g s   a t   t h e   m o m e n t ?

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Harriet Brown – 20/15

<

Kate Bush – Why Should I Love You

B.B. & Q. Band – Mistakes

♫

w h o   d o   y o u   m o s t   a d m i r e   i n   t h e   m u s i c   w o r l d ?

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Anybody that finishes stuff and puts it out. 

i n   y o u r   o p i n i o n ,   w h a t   i s   t h e   f u t u r e   o f   m u s i c ?

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I think it's an exciting time on so many levels but also it's a bit sad at times because most of the time music is not all about music, there are so many contributing factors, there are amazing players and performers all over the world who don't get the accolades or recognition they deserve. On the other hand with the technology we have now it's easier to find these people and message them direct.

w h a t ' s   t h e   f u t u r e   o f   y o u r   m u s i c   –   w h a t   d o   y o u   h o p e   t o   d o   n e x t ?

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Not sure but not the same as last time. I just pulled my studio apart so time will tell.

w h a t   i s   m o s t   i m p o r t a n t   t o   y o u ?

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The Rhodes Chroma from a materialistic perspective but as a human being probably coffee and good manners.


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• 🔔 Touch Sensitive's debut album Visions is out now on Australian label Future Classic. You will find streaming options on this hyperlink, whilst over here is a more physical offering in the form of a vinyl, CD and merch bundle.

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📠
☟ Touch Sensitive Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram

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← #30: MARIUS #32: IGLOOGHOST →

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🐣 TOUCH SENSITIVE — LAY DOWN

There is something instantly classic in this track, something that is instantly gratifying, a dose of familiarity with just enough unfamiliar infused, a sound an atmosphere that virtually lives in our collective memories with the easy sway afforded by the clean bouncing syncopated synth bass throughout, with the clonking stabs of piano chord that summon a resurging era of yesteryear, kicking up dust and giving this track the raw organic feel that effuses from real instruments like that, the sweating bodies hot skin real life humans on the other side of the speakers, a sense of sensual reality also rising from those vocals: "Why don't we lay down for a while?" The poetry in this simplicity is too much to bear: the electric charge behind those words, what it suggests as a situation, what preceded, what follows, it quivers carnally.

Australian musicmaker Touch Sensitive has certainly evoked something in 'Lay Down', that is for sure. Lyrically, because language is what we understand, but also in the warm crowded varying layers of the vocal, the aching reminiscence of the melody, the repetition of "lay down for a while" calling to mind some unnamable nostalgia—and then that shivering falsetto. And next to all this human organicity is of course the synthetic, the neon chords that fade in and out towards the end, the French touch splat and thud of the beat, the construction of it all, its artificiality, desperate desire for closeness in closed quarters, in private, spinning mantra-like in this track that both suits and evokes public dancing places, where you are alone in a crowd, an internal juxtaposition that combined with its timeless retro appeal gives 'Lay Down' a sense of tragic beauty, a yearn for something that was never there.

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• 🔔 The very fitting video for 'Lay Down', decidedly of a different era with its flashing fonts and collages of dancing 3DCGI objects and imagery – and directly inspired by Prince's lyric video for 'Sign 'O The Times' – was directed by Lost Art with the 3D bits created by Melbourne-based Adam Parata.
• 🔔 'Lay Down' is the latest single by Touch Sensitive released by Sydney-based record label Future Classic. You can purchase and stream the track variously if you click upon this link right here.

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📠
☟ Touch Sensitive Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram

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WOOLFY – CITY LIGHTS EP

Waking up waking up is difficult especially on a Monday morning soooo why not go on a disco odyssey for 8 minutes 11 seconds? And this ain't no sweaty throwback New York dopamine-enhanced disco club disco, this is like the slow jam of disco, slo-disco, and as such it's perfect for a brain that doesn't want anything faster right now. Perfect for a brain that like, wants to wake up, but not suddenly, and definitely not anytime soon; this kind of quasi-sleep in the early morning is quite nice its own horrible little way.

And what track pray tell am I chatting about? Well, it's come aaall the way from LA and it's by a guy named Woolfy (real name Simon James) and the track is called '17' which is one of those Great Ages – others being 18, 19, 21, 23, 27 or something (this is what happens when you write early in the morning, you make shit up) – that everyone loves so much. Anyway, like I said earlier this is like slo-disco, slo-house, chilled kinda sound, and it reminded me of the sort of sounds I heard once on one of German (Munich) label Permanent Vacation's If This Is House I Want My Money Back compilations – there've only been two so far so it's one of those – which is funny cause this other track at least ostensibly has something to do with Perm Vac. After some reading, I've found that he first released music under his alter-alias Woolfy vs Projections (his The Astral Projections of Starlight album) on Permanent Vacation, so there you go.

Anyway, it comes from his newly released (14th April) City Lights EP which features two original tracks and two remixes. Here you go it's right below uh so you can listen to it.

At the beginning and at the heart of '17' the main riff is provided quite unusually by a ukelele or mandolin or something, a little toy-esque riff that gives the track a cutesy earthiness, grounding it something entirely different from what the funkily popping slightly slap-bassline and rich piano chords will have you believe. Combine this with misty swooshing tides of synth, scattered tumblings of lead blips and ever-so-often saw-wave chord stutterings, you have quite the soundscape – a mix of Del Mar flavours, coastal indie pop and late-night lounge music. Glassy organ solos enhance the atmosphere, draping it in classy inebriation; and that's not to mention the singing, which talks of some kind of romance and being 17 years old ("And when you grow up grow up to be the woman that you are / you're gonna appreciate the fact that I / kept myself away / cause you were seventeen"). Ghostly, synth-punk vocals reverbing into space with the slacker refrain that mentions sex, cigarettes, Ford Cortinas (¿¿¿ or am I deaf ???): "Couldn't care less."

It comes as the late-late-night sequel song to the first track of the EP, the eponymous 'City Lights'. It's a nicely bouncy track, a slapdash acoustic guitar riff being the foundation of the track, packed with organic percussion like shakers and gently muffled kicks and this one fluid sound that sounds like a cross between a delayed sample of water simultaneously dripping into and draining out of a sink, and tasty woodblock cloppings. This roots-indie flavour is strengthened by two additional things: a xylophone that gives the track a airily cute appeal, and of course the vocals which appear endearingly unpolished and campfiery. In fact, campfire is very much the vibe here. A beach campfire. WHICH is strange considering the song's title and its lyrics: it's about city lights. Being in the city. So in some ways, instead of making "the city" out to be this archetypal hazy, scary, hard-edged, blocky place, the magnitude of its impact is brought down a peg or two thanks to Woolfy's treatment of it – it becomes pretty and quaint, essentially having been observed from a different angle. The finishing refrain, "We live to love you…" – a perfect sing-along – tops it off as a lovesong, the so-often-done love-letter to a city, but with a refreshingly down-to-earth difference.

But wait there's more! Two remixes of '17' grace this EP, too. One by fellow LA-ppl Split Secs is a slow-builder into a synth odyssey, sawtooth boops bouncing along with retro intent in place of the more organic bassline of the original. The vocals, reverbing and dreamy before, are now much trippier, blasting off into the void with heavy delay and reverb like a weird cloud passing above. Synth lead roars into life and explodes with the same trajectory as a cosmic boiling kettle amidst the warm chords and popping clusters of melody. Francis Inferno Orchestra, from Melbourne, makes it a more intense ride, however, with clearer synths playing cosmically over the hard pulse of kicks, waves of phased-out sound blanketing it all. The second half of the track is pockmarked with laser-like synths and a mash of sounds from crashing disco hi-hats and cymbals to booming toms and thickening chords. Both remixes do different things, one is low-key and the other is imbued with much more of a sense of head-spinnery than the other, but both are excellent treatments of the original.

Soooo yeah that was Woolfy. And it will maybe (maybe) surprise you to learn that this has graced your ears today courtesy of Australian label Future Classic, who've been putting out great stuff for ages, wonderfully diverse all the way from the surgical synth of Charles Murdoch to the Drive-inspired sounds of Touch Sensitive, and this most recent release with Woolfy (his debut with the label) continues a much-loved series of sounds with dance/electronic-leanings that ooze originality as much as they do quality and loveable quirks.

• Grab this if u like it from iTunes now or just stream it forever on SoundCloud
• Or hang on if you like vinyls it exists in 10" form too

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TOUCH SENSITIVE – SLOWMENTS

I've been thinking about this song ever since it arrived in my inbox. I didn't write about it straight away because 2013's timeless-incredible track from Touch Sensitive, the indomitable and eternal 'Pizza Guy', was just so good that I was worried the next instalment from this Future Classic-dwelling Australian producer just wouldn't match up. With that worry firmly locked in my mind last night, I finally steeled myself: it was on the cusp of sleep that I resolved, tomorrow – today – I would write about Touch Sensitive's new track, 'Slowments'.

The song itself is a remix, essentially – or perhaps more correctly, a re-envisioning – of Art of Noise's bizarre and sensual 1985 track 'Moments In Love' (also responsible for the Prince-covered 1988 hit, 'Kiss'), yet when the slow arpeggio of synth bips rippled through the air, my first thought was of the 'Prelude' from Final Fantasy VII, and if that makes you angry, or you think I'm stupid, I'm really sorry. Just listen to the song and forget I said anything.

Turning the original vocals into high-register piercings of soul-moving sound, Touch Sensitive – real name Michael Di Francesco – lays on controlled torrents of warm, flowing bass, enough to rumble your very blood, whilst organising jumbled metallic hits to reverb their way through the faraway romance of the song. It's a perfect match of old and new – modern drum sounds clapping and thudding out a mid-tempo, extremely danceable rhythm; glittering old synths like vintage jewellery raining from the sky. At heart, it's a retelling of 80s synthpop and it's very pretty.

But— is it better than 'Pizza Guy'? Well, in my opinion, no. I say this because I have been and still am obsessed with that track. It's one of my go-to songs. But 'Slowments' is different in style, eschewing the bold and bright Drive inspired sounds of last year for something subtler, and maybe prettier; something that, by description, pays homage to something else (and as such it's difficult to compare to the originality of 'Pizza Guy'). I like it, I like it a lot, but I am yearning for something that is going to jolt my heart with such energy that I can't help but listen to it on repeat for days on end – perhaps that's what's to come.

Get this for free right here (clickety-click-click).

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SAMUEL FALLING STAR EP

Sparks of brilliance sometimes just come from nowhere without any forewarning. Such is the case with London-based Samuel, an enigmatic no-surnamed Irish-born singer & songmaker. Recently he has worked with Gervase Gordon, aka Okzharp - 1/3 of London trio LV - to produce this brand new Falling Star EP.

It's a collection of sounds that have really put a spin on the world of R&B, falling much more into a kind of swirling post-R&B protoplasma, a place where all the form and style of "urban" music is taken from the streets and blasted into far-flung galaxies where physicality is something dreamt-up. Much of this is owing to the noises that in all their careful minimalism make for an enormous atmosphere of a futuristic space-age of music. There are distorted delayed synths in the menacing subby sea of 'Death Star Wonder', sounds of lasers rippling by like a neon-tinged dogfight in space - which is kinda perfect as the song is an intergalactic vision of dancehall-flavoured music, a club night orbiting Earth where there is no day, only the eternally danceable night.

Likewise, in 'Boom Boom Boom', the ultra-clean snapping beat of "present-day" R&B becomes an otherwordly, liquidly-distorted bounce, the romantic pizzicato strings become ultra-computerised beeps. Hip hop faces the future in the short-n-sweet title track 'Falling Star', its shuffling rhythm combining sharp synth chords with fidgeting lead bleeps that become more and more paranoiac towards the end of the song. Here also, Samuel's vocals themselves go through a change with a Jamaican lilt that he clearly seems to enjoy singing with, feeling each note with a longing ache.

One of the crucial elements of all good R&B is of course the voice and it's no different here. Samuel's soulful vocals change to suit each track; they're clean and almost sing-along in 'Death Star Wonder', holding up against the harsh sounds of the song; then there's his tongue-in-cheek parody of contemporary R&B with some of the lines in 'Boom Boom Boom' - "Errbody say hey, hey", mentioning "East Coast" and "West Coast", and declaiming "I'm not a fighter. I'm a lover, baby" halfway through. But in 'Steam Train' his vocals are softer, wrapped in a thin mist of hush that totally suits the slow chill of the song - it's a perfect start to the EP, one that instantly introduces the glistening melodies of imagined planets before going into a gloriously minimalistic verse: each sound is left to resound by itself, Samuel's voice given space to reverb heavenly over everything else.

I wrote about this EP for Dummy magazine at the end of last week. It's difficult to sum it up using different words than I used in that article, so I think what I'll do is just copy and paste them here. Yeah, it's lazy, I know, but, well, maybe there's just no other way to say what I think, ever consider that? "These are isolated idylls of romance; all of it holds reminders of traditional modern pop music, yet its far-flung progressive sound makes it something much more exciting." Pretty much. Where will we find Samuel's voice next? Singing in a pod slowly making its way across the universe... Perhaps not, but if ever there was a sound to remember when the sound of R&B music begins turning its head towards the endless chasm of the future, it's this Falling Star EP.

PS. This is released on Ninjatune affiliate, Technicolour.

PPS. Check out my interview with Samuel!

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BODHI IMPERFECTION

How about some HOUSE? Yeah? Yeah? Good idea, great idea, let's do it, let's have some house, wooo. So, anyway, I was once in somewhere when someone said to me, after I noticed that they were listening to something by Cyril Hahn, that I should "love the house bruv" - and I am thinking now: yes, love the house; continue to love the house and do so in all its new, weird and wonderful forms. Love the house always. Don't be a fan of only house - that's STUPID - but love the house. Love the house like your own house, flat, residency. Love. The. House.

And who, in their right mind, doesn't like a little bit of house, a house tipple, a shot of house, every now and again? You're right: not many people. So in the spirit of that, I thought I'd share a little bit of some house music that I have found. If my SEO for "house" doesn't go up, I'll be like well annoyed. Just kidding, I'm err doing this cause I like the song. Can it be called a song? Track I guess. It's a house track. And it comes from Australian label Future Classic, who are ploughing right into the future with a load of decent releases recently (just have a look & listen fo' yoself); in some ways, just that stamp, the FC one, is enough to know that this is gonna be tasty tune.

It's called 'Imperfection' and it is by a duo, made up of Luke and Olly, called Bodhi - they are from Cardiff (that's in the UK you know). Ready yourselves for a very rhythmic encounter.

Thick and meaty multi-layered goodness dwells in this song, like an extremely tasty multi-storied sandwich but one that jumps outta your hands and dances into your mouth. It's progressive, too, taking you from a simple kick pattern, adding in different spices and all sorts like making a delicious curry or something: in comes the hint of bouncy bassline, the sharp metallic hiss of regulated hi-hats, chunks of chopped vocal, rushing ambient crackles, flakes of tambourine. Then it all explodes into an indomitable groove, thanks mainly to a funky bassline that rumbles ridiculously low-register. My eardrums are getting a massage through this vibration.

Emotion and romance is added through the help of a vocal sample (where is it from, do u kno?) that cries out wonderfully throughout the track, chopped and reconstructed with a clear ear for what's gonna get everyone going. As it continues, a wave of synth chords rise ever upwards through the noises of the song to bring the excitement and interest in the track to a literal boiling point, fever pitch, a limitless barrier seeming to have been broken to how much euphoria can figure in this short space of time.

Whew. I feel exhausted. My mind itself has been dancing. It has sore feet. Anyway, you know this is on Future Classic and it's the Imperfection / No More EP and it's out 7th October.

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TOUCH SENSITIVE – PIZZA GUY

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UPDATE: 'Pizza Guy', after being the most Shazam'd thing ever in the UK thanks to appearing in a Very.co.uk advert, is being re-released by Future Classic on 26th July 2015 〜❤️️

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Just heard this song on the radio and had to write about it. I just... yeah. I really like it. When they first said the name on the radio I was like, a bit confused. The first thing I thought of was an actual touch sensitive pizza guy, i.e. a pizza guy who is touch sensitive. In what way, I do not know. Perhaps it could be a comment on how everything, even pizza delivery, can be done through a touch screen on a phone - so in a way, the actual pizza guy who delivers it is himself "touch sensitive". But it wasn't anything as poetic as that. No. This is just a song called 'Pizza Guy' by a Sydney-based producer called Touch Sensitive.

Now that we've cleared that up, let's continue on our little jaunt. The first thing I liked about this song is the majorly major atmosphere that has been created with these sparkly synths all working together - one playing a simple arpeggio, one mapping out the bassline with a plunging funk that cannot be denied, one bopping like electric popcorn, one glassily jutting out through the rest like an ephemeral spike of sound. In that way it kind of gives me the same buzz that I got from people like College, Electric Youth and Kavinsky (to an extent) - the connection here is a 1980s "classic" aesthetic. Cheesy but meaningful - long walks and knowing glances. Do you know where I'm going with this? It could be in Drive, basically.

And with this wonderfully stylised video, you can tell that's the sound that has been chased like a dream and - I would say - rather successfully attained. Enjoy the sounds and sights.

What else I enjoy is the vocal sample. It is enjoyable. I love it when samples are twisted and turned - played with as if they were another instrument in the song. These dynamic cuts of the sample are supported very nicely by an equally dynamic powerhouse of a beat. Can't really tire of a beat like that. Meaty snare - heavy kick with a tinge of synth. Perfect tempo as well. Perfect for head-bopping whilst looking at things on the internet. That is what I used to do as my job, basically, and all the hours in that office were made all the sweeter thanks to songs like this one, songs that fall somewhere between sit-down-and-chill and get-up-and-boogie. But as I said in the beginning, it's that electric nostalgia that pulses through the atmosphere of this song that I can't quite get enough of.

It is a single off a very short EP of the same name (Pizza Guy) released on the effortlessly cool Future Classic. Anyway - Touch Sensitive will be closely watched from here on in.

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