TOKYOLITE YES! DANCE!

The exuberant sounds of young Indonesian trio Tokyolite came to me via email from the band themselves, which was jolly nice of them indeed.

The song that struck me most was 'Yes! Dance!' - mainly for it's unstoppable groove. Yes I like a nice groove, and when there are funk guitars and slap bass involved, it's even better. It's certainly a toe-tapper.

There are a lot of different styles thrown into the mix for this one, something that is sometimes a bit risky - mainly if you don't do it right. If you don't do it right, it can sound messy and nigh-on horrendous. Thankfully, Tokyolite have an good ear for sound and their subsequent mix comes out like a well-made cake: tasty.

So here's 'Yes! Dance!'

There's a kinda latin chord structure laying at the bass of everything here, coupled with the speedy drums it does give it a very 'Spanish' feel - the break down beginning "We will carry on..." brings a moody edge to the song, too. But there are also funk guitars in the chorus, coupled with a funky 80s slap bass, which is almsot a little Seinfeld - but then again, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I love Seinfeld.

There are even some happy-happy horns in the chorus, too, framing the catchy hook of it with an original, mixed-up-without-being-messy sound. The vocals, whilst perhaps not as in-keeping as they could be with the sound of the song (a little husky maybe; they could, for instance, be a little more lo-fi in their sound - a little more echo, a little less focus), nevertheless do have a nice melody about them that gives a pop feel to the song.

It comes from Tokyolite's latest Hello EP. These guys are yet another artist I have written about lately who are seeing the benefits of netlabels and free downloads - a 'creative commons' approach to spreading their music.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Like Tokyolite on Facebook
Listen to Tokyolite on Soundcloud
Hear more Tokyolite on bandcamp
Follow Tokyolite on Twitter
Watch Tokyolite on YouTube