This week, we’ll be covering possibly the worst track from Hardwell, the Jonas Aden & Brooks collaboration that features some bombshell writing credits, Hexagon’s perplexing new Generation Hex EP, a promising new talent, and we’ll check in on our Spotify behemoths and Mike Williams. As always, we’ll be compiling a short recap of notable tracks that we didn’t have time to cover during the previous week. We hope you enjoy our selection and if you have any tracks you’d like to see here, please feel free to post your suggestions in the comments!
Hardwell Ft. Richie Loop – Drop To The Floor
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It’s that time of year again for a new Revealed Compilation to see which tracks the higher-ups enjoyed the most out of their catalog and maybe get some new Hardwell music. In this tenth edition, we got two new tracks but really just one since the collaboration with Suyano lacks a definitive release date. That track was “Drop To The Floor.” Hardwell certainly has a few duds to his name like “Kickin’ It Hard,” “Unity,” “Hands Up,” but I think this one takes the cake for one of the worst, if not THE WORST, of his discography. Richie Loop is capable of some really incredible work like “Higher” and “BURY,” but this one sounds like it was taken from some free tribal sample pack, lacking any notable characteristics. The instrumentals are taken straight from the Revealed playbook of 2017-2018 relying completely on syncopation and for some reason, the most unfitting kicks which are either too weak or poorly mixed. The drop “melody” sounds a very persistent mosquito buzzing around your ear late at night when you’re trying to sleep. If this didn’t have the Hardwell name on it, I would be surprised to even see this as a community release on Revealed because it’s just plain bad.
28/100
G-POL x ALEX – No Pain (KIIDA Edit)
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When I saw the names on the new Generation Hex EP, I was surprised to see so many Hexagon alumni on there rather than new talent. The only freshman to the label was MorganJ who has a pretty successful and diverse career behind them – by no means a new face in the scene. G-POL has an amazing debut on the label with the sparkling track, “No Fear.” When I heard this new one, it sounded incredibly familiar to Shaan’s remix of “Shine” as they’re in the same key and move through the chords in similar fashion. To add insult to injury, they all relied on an overused KARRA vocal sample last seen in “Relieve” by Blinders. It’s a shame to see KIIDA losing a bit of edge he once had in terms of sound design and fresh samples and G-Pol reverting to old (even derivative) tricks in order to secure a new release. If Hexagon wanted to put out an EP of “almost there” demos, I just wish it could have been a new series instead of cannibalizing the only shot new artists have at getting their foot in the door.
64/100
Brooks & Jonas Aden – Riot
While seeing these two future house behemoths team up for the second time might seem like a big deal, digging into the credits reveals that Martin Garrix, Albin Nedler & Kristoffer Fogelmark [Bonn] (who are both writers for Avicii, MØ, Sam Feldt and a slew of Top 40 artists) also contributed to the track. The vocals are assumed to be by Bonn although I couldn’t find any official confirmation of that. The crediting practices of this industry will continue to perplex me as I will never understand why an original vocalist wouldn’t like to be known for their work.
At any rate, let me return to the track at hand. As with their last collaboration, “Take Me Away,” “Riot” appears to be a muted version of both of these artists’ style. The main leads of the drop coming from Jonas Aden and the bassline from Brooks. Hands-down the most disappointing part of the track comes in the second breakdown with the absolutely lackluster attempt at a break melody which only slightly modifies the layers from the drop. Ever since “Like I Do,” Brooks has really failed to recapture the magic which brought him to where he is now, especially compared to breakdown gems from like “Hold It Down,” “Make Your Move,” “Alamo,” “If Only I Could,” “Like I Do,” and remixes of “Close,” “Safe Till Tomorrow.” The tracks he has made since then have been “good” with memorable melodies, but they don’t go above and beyond like they used to. If nothing else, we got an extremely entertaining music video out of it!
76/100
R3HAB & Julie Bergan – Don’t Give Up On Me Now (MOTi & Terry McLove Remix)
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It’s been a while since we’ve checked in on our Spotify behemoths. Seems like a fitting time now that their empires have crossed streams with MOTi and one of his disciples remixing one of R3HAB’s generic pop fodder tracks. I will say this, while R3HAB’s label has more diverse and interesting talent, MOTi’s own tracks and collaborations are more interesting than R3HAB’s. That being said, this remix follows the melodic future house style that MOTi has used in other tracks and the result is another enjoyable but forgettable remix. Did you expect anything else?
61/100
Mike Williams – Day Or Night
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Speaking of people who haven’t quite been the same, Mike Williams. I know we’ve been bashing him over his past few releases (with valid complaints) but it finally seems like he’s recaptured some of his old magic. It might have taken him four other artists to do it, but here we are with the above-average “Day Or Night.” While I thought the melody was fairly simple as it is just a descending scale, it turns out to be sampled from ABBA’s track, “SOS.” So now that makes two bootleg releases in a row. It seems that Mike Williams is really grasping for any crutch he can to maintain relevance in this industry. To the track’s credit, the drop is a pretty solid mix of big room and future house production-wise and is provides nice textures through headphones.
70/100
Wildstylez & Sound Rush – Untamable (feat. Ruby Prophet)
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Having been a fan of these two’s melodic style for a while now, it’s great to see them finally team up for an original track. Ruby Prophet gives a decent performance here but I didn’t find the lyrics or melody as memorable or moving as the ones from the producers behind the track. The rest of the track is clean and follows the standard hardstyle arrangement with nothing new to say other than the melodies.
Now I don’t follow hardstyle culture as closely as I do big room, future house, and bass house, but from the outside, there seems to be a lull in new talent after Sub Zero Project skyrocketed through the industry. Now as I looked further into this, I noticed that Art of Creation has been killing it on YouTube, raking in more than ten times the views than Q-Dance, Scantraxx, X-Bone, and others. On Soundcloud, all of the labels are getting around 2-10k plays per release. The success of EDM is contingent on bringing new people into the genre, not just satisfying your core audience. It’s a shame to see a genre like hardstyle in a plateau phase similar to progressive house while other genres forge ahead and bring new fans into the fold.
78/100
Ummet Ozcan x Arem Ozguc x Arman Aydin – IZMIR
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Arem Ozguc and Arman Aydin are not names that I’ve seen for a few years since their release on Menanoia with “Mafia.” Seeing them team up with Ummet makes sense as they celebrate their Turkish heritage. More to the track, it follows the typical Ummet Ozcan big room style, reliant on one melody, same melody for the drops, and a slightly more interesting second breakdown – this time featuring ethnic instruments and harmonies on the melody. The melody in question bears many similarities to “Freaks” by Timmy Trumpet. We’ve been seeing this all year with classic big room names like Bassjackers, Hardwell, Blasterjaxx, and W&W going back to their roots while adding nothing new. It’s a shame that the genre isn’t seeing the evolution it needs from the most influential producers.
63/100
Teminite – Believe
As he prepares his new EP, Teminite has been stepping his content game even more providing jaw-dropping live performance videos of the tracks he’s been putting out including this one and “Unstoppable.” In the caption for the video, he writes, “I wrote this song for me. It’s a song about how badly I want to succeed in my life – and how I must believe in myself in order for that to happen!” When you see his performance and the emotion he pours into his playing, it sends chills down your spine. For me, “Believe” sounds like a follow-up to one of my favorite tracks from him, “State of Mind.” It features the same incredible vocoder work, saxophone solo, and heavy drops. The differences in the first drop are incredible, with a call and response between Teminite and the crushing bass to create something awe-inspiring. However, where the track begins to falter is in the second “drop.” It follows another vocal section and begins its build with expertly layered electro elements growing underneath the sax. But then it just sort of gently accelerates into the drop with a weak kick and frenetic beat. It feels like it’s continuously building to something and never resolves which leaves me as a listener with a lot of pent up tension. Ultimately, I imagine this was more of a personal statement rather than the next anthem of Lost Lands. As he said, he wrote this for him, which means this was given to us an insight into his mind and his aspirations.
84/100
Julien Fade – Cover It Up
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Two artists have been on my radar lately: Kiyox for his incredible remix of “Overrated,” and Julien Fade for his amazing rendition of Gloria Estefan’s classic, “Congo.” Friday, Julien put out a self-released single called “Cover it Up” using an unfortunately overused vocal sample that has been on an Afrojack track as well as NCS, TurnItUp Muzik, and countless others. (Just search “Cover It Up” on Soundcloud and you’ll find plenty.) Rant aside, the single does showcase this new STMPD-inspired generation complete with a TV Noise style drum kit and electro influence similar to Loopers, Seth Hills, Crime Zcene, and others on the roster. While this is not Fade’s strongest track, I hope this at least serves as an introduction to his music. If I was a betting man, I would put money on Julien Fade skyrocketing through the industry very soon.
68/100
We hope you enjoyed our recap of selected songs from last week. If there is a song that you felt should have been on here, be sure to leave it in the comments below and we’ll do our best to give our take on it. Certain songs were not included because they will be covered in more detail in the following days so make sure you’re following our social media pages to see all of our latest posts!
Deorro, Henry Fong & Elvis Crespo – Pica (Laidback Luke Remix)
Ben Ambergen & EWAVE – Tug of War (feat. Dan Brenner)
Madison Mars – New Vibe Who Dis (ft. Little League)
Dannic & Harrison – Burn Me Down
This recap was provided by The QR Network which is a site for interviews with producers and DJs. Check out their interviews with Olly James, Todd Helder, Justin Mylo, Krimsonn, and Wasback.
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