#33 - It's your golden hour 🌞

Happy Sunlighter and Easter Sunday! This week, we’re cutting the word count so you can scroll less. Let us know what you think of the new flow in the comments section at the end of the newsletter!

This week, we’re spotlighting the music newsletter, Can’t Get Much Higher, which delivers deep, data-driven insights on music trends. We love the approach, and as available data in music continues to grow, data-driven decision-making will continue to be important for the industry. Here’s a blurb from one of our favorite pieces:

“When looking at every Billboard Hot 100 number one hit between 1958 and 1990, we see that the key of G major was a very popular key. This was because the key of G major is easy to work with on the guitar and piano, the two most popular compositional instruments during these years. In fact, across the decades, we see that keys that are convenient to use on these instruments (i.e. C major, G major, D major) are more popular than others that are less convenient to use, like B major and Gb major.”

If you found that interesting, subscribe here to read more.

Here's what we have queued up this week:

1. 🌶️ Review of demon time by Mura Masa.

2. 🔀 Playlist updates: U.S. Girls, Tohji, 42 Dugg, Maisie Peters, and more.

3. 💿 This Week in Music: Anitta splits from WMG, Drake samples Kim K, and TikTok growth.

4. 🎙️ JVKE is our artist of the week.

Chris: We’re rewinding the clock to last September to review Mura Masa’s (overlooked) third studio album, demon time. According to Mura Masa, “demon time” is akin to the “witching hour,” in which no good things happen after 11:00 P.M. but pure hedonism, and that’s made explicitly clear with the intro to the album, “demon time.” The theme of self-indulgence is explored throughout the album and is accented with artists like Shygirl, known for her rulebreaking intimacy, and slowthai, who adds an industrial grittiness to club-banger “up all week.” While the album starts strong (“slomo” is quintessential hyperpop) and provides plenty of diversity throughout (“tonto” uses an accordion for it’s primary backing beat), the theme is eventually lost as the album progresses through the wide variation in production, impacting the cohesiveness of the entire album.

Donya: First thing’s first, this is a great album for a 30-minute workout (that’s exactly what I did while I listened to it). While demon time featured a diverse group of artists, it lacked a comprehensive flow. One thing I loved, though, was the unique production elements behind songs like “blessing me,” which has cadence similar to the sound of a pipe organ, and “blush,” which brings the song title to life with a sound blurb of a laugh and a subtle reference to Dua Lipa’s “Blow Your Mind (Mwah).” One final note: the album introduces a UK-based singer, songwriter, and producer named LEILAH (signed to Mura Masa and Nas’ label) who has plans to drop solo music in 2023.

The Sunlighter Playlist 🔀

This Week in Music 💿

😅 The top news of the week was filled with tension, trolling, and a sprinkle of reverence:

• 😨 How I’m Feeling: Lewis Capaldi is at the center of our attention this week. His Netflix documentary, How I’m Feeling Now, debuted on Wednesday, where he opened up about the possibility of quitting music if his Tourette’s syndrome worsens. The next day, he performed at Radio City Music Hall, bringing out the Jonas Brothers as his surprise guest.

• 🫀 No Organ Auctions: Last month, Anitta took to Twitter stating that she would “auction her organs” to be let out of her contract with Warner Music Group. This week, they finally parted ways.

• 🔢 Just 4 Years?: One of the men involved in the home invasion and homicide of Pop Smoke pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 4 years in prison. Justice is not being served.

• 🤔 Drake vs. Kanye: Drake’s sample of Kim Kardashian in his latest single, “Search & Rescue,” raises questions of renewed beef between him and Kanye West. While the trolling grabs the attention, the song falls a little flat.

• 🚔 Ticketmaster Police: These days, Robert Smith of The Cure is becoming more known for policing Ticketmaster. As a result of overpriced tickets and an abundance of scalpers, he was able to force Ticketmaster to partially refund concertgoers while also canceling scalped tickets 👏.

• 🇺🇸 This is America: Childish Gambino (Donald Glover) revealed that “This is America” was originally a clever way to diss Drake.

• 🐝 Does It Sting?: There was speculation this week that Diddy paid Sting $5,000 per day for an uncleared sample. That wasn’t true.

• 🥊 A Motley Crew: Mötley Crüe is currently… a motley crew. The guitarist, Mick Mars, has filed a lawsuit against the rest of his bandmates for previously attempting to oust him during their 2022 tour. It’s been especially contentious between him and Nicki Sixx.

• 🖋️ Seymour Sign: Seymour Stein, a legendary music executive best known for signing Madonna, Talking Heads, Depeche Mode and The Ramones, passed away at the age of 80.

• 😢 RIP Paul Cattermore: S Club 7’s Paul Cattermore passed away this week, potentially jeopardizing their reunion tour set for later this fall.

📡 The music industry is shrugging off a tough economy and is still on the upswing:

• 📈 New Streaming Highs: This week, Luminate, a music and entertainment data company, reported that global streaming numbers hit 1 trillion, with Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” leading 2023 streams with 1.16 billion.

• 🤑 TikTok Revenue: TikTok contributed to ~12% of ByteDance’s $80 billion in revenue, which translates to approximately $9.6 billion. We expect that number to grow with SoundOn.

• 🎶 TIDAL DJ Mode: Following Amazon Music’s DJ mode and Spotify’s Open AI-enabled DJ functionality, TIDAL released a new functionality this week that allows users to create their own DJ sets.

• 🇮🇳 Spotify in India: Spotify’s focus on their go-to-market strategy in India has paid off. According to Billboard, Spotify has tripled their revenue in India, driven by their focus on servicing local languages.

• 🎼 AI Music Stems: AI-powered music stem separation platform, Moises, hit the 30 million user milestone.

• 🎡 Stream Coachella: For the first time, every stage at Coachella will be live streaming on YouTube.

• 🎧 NYC Hi-Fi: If you’re into vinyl and analog culture, In Sheep’s Clothing Hi-Fi is opening a new space in New York City. Look out Public Records, you have company!

• 🫧 Music Underwater: The Foo Fighters have opened up a new Washington D.C. music venue known as The Atlantis, paying homage to the historic 9:30 Club.

• 🖨️ So long, Printworks: The iconic London EDM music venue will be closing this weekend after a successful run that started in 2017. Artists playing closing weekend shows include Black Coffee, Peggy Gou, and many others.

🎧 Finally, here’s new music and collaborations you need to know:

• 🔥 KAYTRAMINÉ: KAYTRANADA and Aminé are teaming up under a new project name, KAYTRAMINÉ and will be releasing their self-titled debut album on May 12th.

• 👩‍❤️‍👨 Music Power Couple: Rauw Alejandro and Rosalía performed together for the first time as part of Rauw’s Saturno World Tour.

• 💡 Pretty Lights: It’s been six years since Pretty Lights released new music and nine years since he released an album, but he’s finally back!

• 🏟️ One Night Only: The Jonas Brothers are playing all five of their albums as part of a one-night-only show at Yankee Stadium this summer on August 12th.

• 💫 Starcatcher: Greta Van Fleet announced a new upcoming album, Starcatcher.

• 🥁 The Drums: Indie pop band, The Drums, are back with their first project since 2019.

Artist of the Week: JVKE 🎙️

If you read our SXSW 2023 edition, you probably have a sense of what listening to JVKE feels like. After his performance at the BOSE x NME showcase, we were intrigued to learn more, and we loved what we found.

Hailing from Cranston, Rhode Island–or “Lil Rhody,” as he calls it–Jacob Lawson (JVKE) grew up in an environment where music was all around him. From the age of 3, JVKE started taking piano lessons, briefly switched to drums, then guitar, before switching back to piano again until the age of 15. His mother was an elementary school music teacher, and his father was a pastor, where his family attended church and JVKE and his brother Zac performed in the worship band. From the chord structures to the basic makeup of a song, JVKE describes his time playing in the worship band at church as “super influential” to the way he thinks and creates music now.

JVKE’s world was exclusively contemporary worship music until he secretly took his brother Zac’s iPod and discovered Kanye West and Drake for the first time, drawing especially heavy influence from 808s & Heartbreak. He started recording his own beats for two years before he went off to college at age 16 (a genius!?). While his college experience didn’t last long (he dropped out a year later), he knew his passion for becoming an artist couldn’t wait, and he needed to go all in.

Upside Down

At the beginning of COVID lockdown, JVKE started making TikToks, doing remixes and dance videos with his mom (who he says continues to play a huge role in everything he does), which grew his following to 30,000. However, it only took one song to turn his life “Upside Down,” and coincidentally give him his artist name, “JVKE.” Charlie Puth caught wind of the song with the rest of the world, and a couple of months later, he quickly hopped on it for a remix. The next song was a dance-pop collaboration with Galantis, which JVKE originally recorded in his basement studio. Between 2020 and 2022, he had written over 800 songs, and he knew it was time to extract the ones he really loved for his debut album.

this is what ____ feels like

JVKE heard Elvis Costello’s famous words and took them to heart as his inspiration when creating his debut album: “You have your entire life to write your first album, and you have six months to write your second one.” For JVKE, he felt called to write and record the most impactful time in his life, which was his first relationship and breakup. Throughout the album, he navigates the listener through his feelings from every stage: falling in love, going through heartbreak, feeling sadness, and ultimately falling out of love. He wanted the album to feel more like an experience rather than an album. He doesn’t box himself into a particular genre or style–you hear a little bit of everything on this album, from influences of percussive hip-hop through his vocals, to stellar instrumentation. By far the most popular song has been “golden hour,” which will hook you from the minute the hypnotizing piano intro begins. Since the song was released, JVKE has posted several TikTok moments regarding the song, from hearing it on the radio for the first time with his best friends, to performing it on stage with Alicia Keys with his childhood piano teacher watching from the front row. You can’t help but feel JVKE has real perspective and gratitude for every bit of success that’s come his way.

What’s so refreshing about JVKE is that he’s an artist who has his hand in every element of the creative process: writing, singing, producing, mixing, and mastering his music. While he rose to fame during the TikTok craze of 2020, we think those core skills make him a genuine talent to see through a long career in the music industry. He’s going on tour from August through early September of this year, and you know we’ll be there–you should be too.

Wrap Up 👏

We're closing the newsletter this week with a song that reminds us to keep it positive and sit down...be humble.

Check out our other articles and give us a follow on Twitter!

See ya next Sunday 😎

Chris and Donya