OLR & Jungle Leez – Another Place (Album Stream)
Within the first few moments of the It’s Getting Real track, I knew I really was on a journey to Another Place. With the announced cruise through jazzy and soulful sounds, you could’ve expected a nice jam to chill to, but in reality, the Serbian beat maker OLR took a bit different turn and went totally indie with it, creating quite a distinctive mood. Almost touching the spacey borders of music with the ambiental background and hypnotizing basslines, the slightly echoed brass sections and bells blend in magically. Putting aside the shortness of the album, Another Place is easily an ambitious project.
However, this is not an instrumental album and with that being said, OLR chose quite a persona to collaborate with. Going internationally with the choice, the artist in question is Jungle Leez; a London-based singer and MC with whom OLR worked with earlier on The Colors Of Light tune. Going hand in hand with the set mood and tempo, the black skin lady is confident as hell and heavenly blesses the mic with her singing/rapping skills. Just as like the instrumentals don’t feature any fuzzy, glitchy or sudden loud noises, you can picture Jungle Leez sitting on a barstool all laid back with a mic in her hand, sharing the love and knowledge.
Everything is so rich, warm, and soothing. I would boldly compare the sound with something between the afro-jazz spirit of Nubiyan Twist, and the spacious, deeply atmospheric sound of Submotion Orchestra; a seven-piece band driven by ambiental dub, chillstep, and jazz. Combine all of the mellow parts from both sides into hip-hop, and what you’ll get is Another Place. That’s the beauty in expressing oneself through art, and to honor that the duo announces a music video for The Anthem of Freedom that also speaks of her growing up in Paris.
On the flip side, as said before, even though that everything is in its place, even with the mixing and mastering, his fourth studio album is painfully short. And I’m not hairsplitting here, but after finishing up with it, I simply craved for more because it’s so attention-stealing. Even when OLR grabbed the second mic for two tracks; Apology and Shiny Ground, it sounded bloody good, not to mention the swift scratch techniques provided by DJ Munja that blend perfectly somewhere between the background and the spotlight. I don’t know how much time was put into the project, but the whole lot emits a lot of invested effort with him discovering new ways of musical expressions, so I can say that we can expect a lot of good stuff in the future.
Tracklist:
01. It’s Getting Real feat. DJ Munja
02. The Anthem of Freedom
03. Apology feat. DJ Munja
04. Shiny Ground
05. Another Place (Interlude)
06. The Lake
07. Hear Me
08. Music (Prologue)
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