Another mine of talent has been unearthed. This time revealing 25-year old North Londoner Alex Clare to our ear drums.
Treading Water, the first single from upcoming debut album The Lateness Of The Hour, begins simply with wistful chimes and Clare’s smooth vocals. An underlying crescendo of rhythm that couldn’t sound more out-of-place in the first thirty seconds, strikes a ‘what the eff’ chord in your brain until the song drops into a full throttle d’n'b masterpiece.
His vocals, reminiscent of a mixture of Jamiroquai and Maroon 5′s Adam Levine, remain clean and seemingly untouched sitting perfectly in the mix – a refreshing renewal from the nasal auto-tuned cries of other d’n'b vocalists.
Clare is far from a one trick pony too. The upcoming album houses an eclectic mix of tracks that present grinding dubstep to celtic charms. A recommendation would have to be his blinding cover of Prince’s iconic When Doves Cry.
The bearded brilliance of this new Glasto star follows the likes of James Blake, taking a genre and back-handing it into a new dimension with expert precision and poise. This is one exciting new venture to watch for in 2011.
