Adrian Younge is the next generation of soul music. A self-taught musician and recording engineer who has dedicated his life to the study of classic soul music, Younge finds himself at the center of a new soul renaissance with a vision for pushing the boundaries of the music itself.
 
The story begins in 1998 as the budding hip-hop producer found himself confined by the limitations of the MPC. He began teaching himself how to play various instruments so he could fully realize his vision. First it was keyboards, then drums, sax, guitar, and bass. Fascinated with the sounds of Italian soundtracks by the likes of Ennio Morricone, Younge begins work on the soundtrack to the fictional film Venice Dawn, recording the album intermittently over the course of the next year. What developed was a sound that is equal parts Morricone and Air. Self-released in 2000, the moody, synth-drenched album was entirely composed, arranged, played, and recorded by Younge.
 
Eight years later in 2008, Younge would find himself at the center of the Black Dynamite zeitgeist. Instrumental in the film’s development, Younge not only edited the film, but also composed the original score, which was hailed as a modern blaxploitation masterpiece for authentically capturing the cinematic soul of the 1970s, from Isaac Hayes to Curtis Mayfield. The album was released by Wax Poetics Records. Adrian Younge solidified himself as a force to be reckoned with and soon went to work writing music for the forthcoming Black Dynamite cartoon series on Adult Swim.
 
His next solo project, Something About April on Wax Poetics Records, Younge envisioned a new sound that would revisit his earlier, more baroque instrumental work of Venice Dawn and mesh it with the deep, gritty soul of Black Dynamite, eventually deciding to bring everything full circle by releasing the material under the moniker Venice Dawn. It is a heavy, dark mix of psychedelic soul and cinematic instrumentals with hip-hop aesthetics, touching on influences from Morricone to King Crimson, Portishead to the Flamingos, Wu-Tang to Otis Redding. Two songs—”Sirens” and ”Reverie”—were sampled by Timbaland for Jay-Z’s Magna Carta… Holy Grail, respectively on the lead single “Picasso Baby” and “Heaven,” which features Justin Timberlake.
 
In spring of 2013, Younge released Adrian Younge Presents the Delfonics (Wax Poetics Records), cowritten with William Hart, founding singer of the legendary soul group; as well as Adrian Younge Presents Twelve Reasons to Die, a concept album with Ghostface Killah on RZA’s new imprint, Soul Temple. He and his band, Venice Dawn, toured to support the Ghostface album.
 
Younge has recently completed Souls of Mischief’s There Is Only Now, and is currently working on follow ups to Ghostface Killah’s Twelve Reasons To Die and Venice Dawn’s Something About April. A new project with A Tribe Called Quest alumni Ali Shaheed Muhammed, The Midnight Hour: One Night in Harlem, 1971 sees the duo creating music that ATCQ would have sampled had these records existed decades ago. “I’m a modern soul artist who, as a hip-hop head, is always making music he hopes will get sampled,” Younge adds.
New collaborations with Bilal, Raphael Saadiq, Common, No ID, and DJ Premier are also in the works for future release.
 
With Lyor Cohen coming on in a management position and having recently inked a deal with Sony/ATV Publishing, Younge is poised for the big leagues. Both parties have been instrumental in forging relationships with today’s top artists with the sole goal of making good music, confident his sound is the next big thing.
 
“I aspire to be the modern day Quincy Jones. I consider myself a composer, not a beatmaker. Beatmakers make ten beats in a day, I try to make one good beat every two or three days,” Younge acknowledges.
A love child of the Wax Poetics aesthetic, Adrian Younge’s time has come.
 
Bio written by Andre Torres
 

Photo credit The Artform Studio

Taylor McFerrin is an American DJ, producer, keyboardist, beatboxer, and vocalist signed to Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder label. Son of popular musician Bobby McFerrin, Taylor falls into a very unique and cutting edge genre of hip-hop known as future soul characterized by electronic ambient textures, highly processed and often progressive drum samples/beats, ’60s soul and jazz, and a structure heavily based on improvisation, all gelled together with a strong hip-hop feel. Since the 2006 release of his debut EP, Broken Vibes, McFerrin has been gaining quite a following/buzz and has exceeded audience’s expectations all over New York City and internationally with his genre-defying solo-act, seamlessly building beats from scratch with a heavy reliance on part looping. McFerrin currently resides in Brooklyn, NY continuing to tour and work on his highly anticipated up and coming debut solo album Early Riser.

DJ Spinna is something of an anomaly in music. A humbling example of what it takes to truly succeed within the framework of multiple fields. A steadfast work ethic, an obsessively extensive vinyl library and the willingness to pursue the full extents of his roots (Funk, Soul and Jazz), foundation (Hip-Hop) and future (Electronic/Dance music) with no restraints.
 
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http://www.pharoahe.com/