Dark, danceable and unexpectedly cinematic: this week’s synth pop bops range from slow-burning queer electro-pop to Y2K breakbeat dreamscapes to a sci-fi portal story six years in the making, all of it built to move you.
Valentina McQueen – On My Knees
Valentina McQueen serves up a stunning piece of Prince-influenced dark electro-pop filled with queer femme intimacy
“On My Knees” moves through queer femme desire and emotional tension with the kind of cinematic deliberateness that marks Valentina McQueen’s best work. The production draws from Prince and late-night 80s synth aesthetics, which is basically my fave genre, and it all comes together into a slow burning banger. It’s got an emotional rawness those tracks gestured toward, and definitely seduces you into Valentina’s world.
McQueen is an Australian electro-pop artist whose work explores sexuality, femininity, queer identity and empowerment with consistent directness. Her reference points span Lady Gaga, Tove Lo and Prince, and the combination of those influences gives her productions their particular quality: commercial pop with a genuine edge. We love this and hope there’s more coming from Valentina McQueen.
Nia Ray – Hearts in the Clouds
Nia Ray’s “Hearts in the Clouds” is an excellent Y2K-inflected synth-pop single: breakbeat percussion, gorgeous textures that captures the rose-coloured glasses beginning to crack.
“Hearts in the Clouds” is the second single from Nia Ray’s project If You See Me, No You Don’t, and it moves the narrative forward from the heartbreak of “Evergreen” into a more complicated emotional space: a digital dreamscape where escapism and reality blur at the edges. The production draws from Y2K pop melodies and drum and bass influences, and it’s honestly produced wonderfully. It all adds up to something genuinely colourful, bouncy that carries a slight sense of unease. There’s excitement here, but also a hint of the unstable, but overall, this is an absolute summer banger.
Nia Ray is a South Florida-based artist whose sound sits at the intersection of R&B, soul, pop and hip-hop, with an atmospheric, intimate approach to production that focuses on moments that feel familiar but rarely get spoken aloud. After stepping back to refine her direction, she has returned with a more intentional creative approach, and the If You See Me, No You Don’t project reflects this. It’s fantastic, and we can’t wait for more.
Nelida Oyma – Silent Haze
Nelida Oyma delivers a gorgeous instrumental electronic track filled with morning mist, melodic guitars and a groove ready for your next rainforest rave
“Silent Haze” is built on the balance between organic and electronic: melodic guitars running alongside synth textures and a steady electronic groove. It’s got a fantastic sound design, as it reaches into atmosphere and movement. Musically, it grooves along in a beautiful downtempo-ish way; think Tycho and Bonobo with a touch more nature. The subject is an early morning in a mountain forest: mist moving through trees, light filtering through cloud, the quiet of nature before the day begins. It’s a compelling idea, and the track does a great job of doing it justice.
Nelida Oyma is an indie electronic project blending hypnotic grooves, melodic guitars and synth textures into a modern instrumental sound. The project operates in the more melodic, groove-oriented end of instrumental electronica rather than the ambient or purely textural end. It’s a great place to be, and I love how this single creeps up on you in style. A great, atmospheric banger.
zekiizo – SHOTGUN
zekiizo’s “SHOTGUN” is a brilliant piece of NYC dance-pop: heavy pumping synths, big, distorted rhythms, and we’re loving every second of it.
“SHOTGUN” is built for the feeling of being pulled toward something chaotic and not particularly caring about the risk. The production places a heavy, pumping synth over a fast boom-clap structure, aiming for that late-night high-speed driving and the strange, compelling euphoria it produces. The subject is new infatuation, the kind that has a Bonnie and Clyde quality to it, and the arrangement commits to the idea wonderfully.
zekiizo is a self-produced Boston-born, NYC-based artist known for blending electronic, indie and experimental influences into genre-defying pop with a compelling stage presence. Her productions are built on a bold sonic identity that pushes creative boundaries with each release, and “SHOTGUN” is her most direct dancefloor statement to date. It’s a banger.
Paper Swords – Breathe In The Light
“Breathe In The Light” is a stunning piece of cinematic dark-pop from Paper Swords, the rare single that feels like the opening scene of a film.
Paper Swords’ new one is synth pop with the scope of a soundtrack. Cinematic synths swell beneath emotional vocals, and the whole track carries the weight of something larger than a single, a sense of story pressing in from the edges. I love a little ambition in this genre, which can sometimes feel a little thin, and this one has real atmosphere, dark and immersive vibes without losing the melody. And what a melody it is, it soars into the chorus and we’re fully sold.
Paper Swords is the solo dark sci-fi universe of Wyoming artist Phil Black, who wrote, performed, produced, mixed, mastered, filmed and edited the entire project himself over six years. The track opens a sprawling narrative about an engineer searching for his lost wife after an experiment tears open a portal to another dimension. That one person built the music, the 3D worlds and the films around them is staggering, and it explains why “Breathe In The Light” feels so completely realised as a world rather than just a song. A great single, and I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on Paper Swords this year.