Around 4am last night I was sent this album and felt dutifully forced to e-mail Speeakz with giant typeface expletives urging him to draw for his Beats by Dre (#noproductplacement) immediately.

You know when you can hear something special? Well we were discussing today about what the natural progression of Electro-Soul/Soultronica that had bubbled around ’07 – ’08 should have been had it not seemingly dissipated in recent times (aside from newly risen ‘Post-Dubstep Soul’ or the ever blazing Dutch/Scandinavian Soul scene). For example, three years later we still await a major label debut from the likes of J*Davey on the international side of things… I will say now the conquest however is not lost and fresh blood could be found in husband and wife duo Vlooper & Modlee.

They’ve a dark and sexy hybrid of deep space synths, cracking snares, swung drums, swagged out, breathy Jazz vocal, pinches of Neo-Soul and plenty of Avant-Garde, ambient, sci-fi texture. Can even pin-point their influences to a tee but in being careful not to box them, I’ll let our readers decide. Elevated Alt-Soul and Soul-Hop heads will relish (so many bloody sub-genres).

Been listening to their debut offering and I’m a little bit in love with ‘Feeling Good’, ‘Honey Molasses’ and ‘Mondayz’. Can you tell these two sonic love-birds are just warming up?

Lighters out everyone. Listen & download for free here…

The Cool Kids drop a new video for ‘Big Talk’. No matter what I say, you just can’t not feel that beat. Lol. The Cool Kids stay doing their thing – but at some point, they’ll need to switch it up.

Here goes the latest Monster Monday track from Swizz Beatz. This one is led by Maino and features Jadakiss, Jim Jones, Joell Ortiz and of course, the producer himself. Have a listen and download below…

Download: Maino Feat Swizz Beatz, Jadakiss, Jim Jones & Joell Ortiz – ‘We Keep It Rocking’

A cover left off of their recently released collaborative long-player of Soul reworkings.

I love the original Arcade Fire version of this; such a grand, stirring number that very few would dare touch, but this kind of well-executed audacity pays off.

Download: The Roots feat. John Legend – ‘Wake Up (Arcade Fire Cover)’

I’ve had both these tracks for a while now, but with their official release I thought I’d give them some spotlight.

Ninja Tune has just let loose the first double A-side record from the Floating Points Ensemble. ‘Post Suite’ & ‘Almost in Profile’ were both recorded and mixed at the legendary Abbey Road Studios for Ninja Tune XX twentieth anniversary celebration.

Since 2009 Sam Shepherd aka Floating Points has been producing innovative electronic-inspired compositions earning himself influential fans such as Benji B, Theo Parris and Mary Anne Hobbs. Not to mention a whole legion of audiophiles around the world.

It is with his 16-piece Ensemble however where Floating Points is able to fully flex his classically trained artistry. The Floating Points Ensemble won last year’s ‘Best Maida Vale Session’ at Gilles Peterson’s ‘Worldwide Awards’ and this year spent a week at Abbey Road recording these songs.

The conclusion – two phenomenally beautiful songs, both featuring soaring vocals from our very own Fatima. I don’t think I’ve heard her sound so strong. The compositions are stunning, pristine and eminently moving.  Blending classical, with jazz, I even hear middle eastern influences (‘Post Suite’). Live instrumentation mastered as brilliantly as this, is something incomparable to any other type of recording. The epic nature of both ‘Post Suite’ (listen below) and ‘Almost in Profile’ is literally food for my soul.

Both songs are out now and available via Ninja Tune.

On Saturday the PinBoard man’dem went down to the Troxy in Limehouse (*blank stare*) to watch Bonobo bring his musical musings alive with a full band and special guest my future wife Andreya Triana.

His latest album Black Sands has played the role of soundtrack for us over the past year. A spectacular body of work featuring music so captivating, it’s almost addictive. His understanding of instrumentation is heroic. The clash of strings, keys, horns, drums and break beats featured on this album is mind altering.

Hearing songs like ‘Kiera’, ‘El Toro’ and ‘Eyesdown’ played by such brilliant musicians was beautiful. It reiterated his talent and his ability to create complex and contradictory compositions. Andreya Triana soul stirring performances of ‘Eyesdown’ & ‘The Keeper’, bringing the house to their feet each time. Her voice is by far one of the illest I’ve ever heard – sexy, smooth, strong and distinct. Her and Bonobo make an excellent team.

A dynamic evening filled with magnificent musicianship and spellbinding sounds.

Black Sands is out now.

Photography by Danny Wood

I decided to take some time out from the fast paced life that London often demands this weekend. As much as I love the city, it can be draining sometimes, so I decided to take a break and visit our relaxed, chilled-out neighbours over in Amsterdam for a couple days. Whilst there, I still had to get my fix of live music, so where better to go than The Garden at Toko MC, an event put on by our friends over at Moovmnt featuring PinBoard favourites Jesse Boykins III, Mar & Full Crate.

One of the finest upcoming soul artists out of the states, Boykins has been making moves across seas for a while, especially in London and the rest of Europe. So it made perfect sense for Boykins to do a Romantic Movement tour, serenading fans from some of his favourite cities. Off the back of the London show on Saturday, he took to the small fenced stage at 11.15pm ready to show the Dutch crowd what he had. Backed by Full Crate on the decks, trademark hair loose, swagger on, Boykins began. He sang tracks from the new album Love Apparatus and of course favourites like ‘Amourous’  and ‘Pantyhose’.

The vibe was mellow, with dimmed lights, lounge chairs and a group of ladies singing every word from each song in unison with Boykins, I was witnessing some “Romantic Movements” fo’sho. The flirtatious singer even took some (lucky) girl’s hand and escorted her even closer to him. Boykins was definitely having fun and later told me, it is “so dope to just be blessed to perform in all these other countries!”

#Humble

With no opening act, it was a pleasure to see one of my favourite male voices outside of the UK, Mar invited onto the stage. Full Crate dropped some heavy soul instrumental classics. Classics I tell you. Mar and Boykins then freestyled effortlessly over the top of them, tantalising the reserved crowd with their vocals. No rehearsed situation, strictly smooth talent, stripped down to a pair of decks and one mic.

After the performance, the party kicked off. Full Crate and Manga did what they do, bringing some of that nu soul, broken beat, funk that works so well, with Mar adding his adlibs where necessary. Great to hear they ‘preciate for the English – Big up Ben Westbeech and co as well. Dancing away with the locals (me – doing the British hands in the air skanks, them-doing 80′s B-boy spins and twirls lol), with canels, windmills, bikes as the picturesque backdrop, still goes to show GOOD music is GOOD music, wherever you are in the world.

BET played host to some of the biggest and best names in Soul music for a Christmas special which saw stars such as Jazmine Sullivan, Ne-Yo, El Debarge, Chrisette Michele, Keri Hilson and Marsha Ambrosius performing renditions of their favourite Christmas songs.

Up top peep Marsha’s version of ‘Christmas Time is Here’, hit the jump for the rest…

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Good news folks, Jamie Woon has just announced dates for his UK tour next year. Staring in February, the Woon will be hitting up venues up and down the country including London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Newcastle, Glasgow and more. Hit the jump to see the full dates and cities.

Wait til’ you hear this guys album. Ha. Mind blowing shit.

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Chris Brown just dropped a new ‘webisode’ entitled ‘This Is Me’, in it the R&B star talks about how he’s feeling right now, the work that he’s putting in and about his career. I quite like this idea, it’s good to see Breezy like this.

I really don’t think Chris Brown and his team have been making the right moves as of late. This guy is stupid talented, we all know that, it’s a fact. And despite whatever has happened in his life, I don’t see any reason why he shouldn’t be a top selling artist again. However, if he continues to churn out mixtapes (regardless of whether their hot or not) and songs that don’t really reflect his musical taste or ability (i.e. euro-pop) I feel he’ll never really be taken seriously (again). I understand the ‘market’, I get the whole chart chasing thing, but at the same time – we all know that Chris Brown is best when he’s making songs like ‘Kiss Kiss’, ‘Wall to Wall’ and ‘Transform Ya’. And the great thing about that is – I think he’s the one who can make that [R&B] cross over again. He’s demographic is quite widespread (young girls, young adults etc), so he has the potential to make the music he loves and have it be a commerical success.

Huge fan of Kings of Leon and while I don’t think their latest album Come Around Sundown is as good as their last album, it’s definitely something I’ve been on heavy rotation. Peep their latest visuals for ‘Pyro’, which comes off the aforementioned album – out now. I love what these guys bring. I need to see them live at some point.

It’s good to see the girls in Dirty Money doing…Something. I don’t love this, Swizzy’s drums are nice though. Last Train to Paris drops this week.

Think we can all relate to this here song right now, I lie? Don’t be fooled, this dudes last album was pretty fly. Where’d he go? Whatever the case, he’s got an EP dropping January 18th called Playback.

John Legend & the Roots perform ‘Hard Times’, which can be found on their joint album Wake Up! which is out now. This album has grown on me a lot over the past few weeks, winter warmer for definite.

The crooner’s dropping a new LP come December 21st entitled ‘Best Night of my Life’. Not particularly exciting news, but here’s the video for the first single taken from that.

Sounds very much like a po-faced Drake number, that Drake probably wrote and should have been left for Drake.

Foxx, hop off the wagon you’ve been on since winning an Oscar in ’04 and do something fresh in your own lane mate. Cheers.

P.S. I love Foxx as an all round entertainer, but his music/albums he produces are just… well… a bit dry really.