Up all night to get biblical…
[Video][Website]
[4.91]
Katherine St Asaph: The combination of crushstuff, Michelle Branch cadence, and Jock Jams EDM is giving me severe middle school flashbacks. Except even in middle school I knew the angel/devil-on-the-shoulders conceit belonged on the funnies page.
[6]
Iain Mew: The unusual piano shuffle and tendency towards exaggerated Drama make me think of a certain strain of post-Winehouse UK pop, and this is the song we cover today that strikes me as the most obvious route for a Paloma Faith move into dance. As it is, Angel Taylor uses a grizzled John Newman directness that at least gives the song’s devils and angels on shoulders some proper heft. The best bit is how the breaks carry on the spirit of the piano loop even at the point of maximum compression.
[6]
Crystal Leww: “Up All Night” is very straight-forward vocal EDM, except wow is that vocal fantastic. Angel Taylor is dramatic, humming and hawing, emotions totally heightened, metaphors turned all the way up to 100. Her vocal is raspy and rich, unlike the Foxes and Matthew Komas of the world, but not very much like the Kelli-Leighs and Yolanda Quarteys of the world either. I like how weird this is: “There’s a demon in me telling me to believe that you and I are more than just friends.” What a wonderful image.
[8]
Micha Cavaseno: She says she’s waiting for someone to fix her relationship with this mystery fella. Which is funny, because I found something that will fix the infernally squeaky quality in her voice.
[2]
Patrick St. Michel: One of those weird moments where singing pales heavily compared to the drop, even when the drop in question sounds like a million other drops heard at Ultra Music Festival.
[4]
Anthony Easton: I love the vocals, which sound like early Pink, and the writerly details. When it moves into semi-bosh, it’s expected, but it isn’t awkward. Add the finger snaps, which complicate the rest of the percussion, and this isn’t the worst thing I’ve heard.
[5]
John Seroff: Brash and brassy Angel Taylor holds up her end of the bargain, providing strong pace, buoyancy, and legitimate diva energy. Then Arty steps in with the inevitable and unimaginative EDM crescendo to nowhere. From that point on, where they overlap, Taylor suffers for it. So did I.
[4]
Thomas Inskeep: Pretty standard trance-pop with a stronger-than-usual-for-this-genre singer. I wouldn’t actively listen to it, but I’d put it in a cardio playlist.
[5]
Alfred Soto: If “forced hilarity” isn’t on your list of worst things in the world, then “pneumatic EDM” should be.
[1]
Will Adams: The past few years have seen a handful of trance producers, most of whom operate under Above & Beyond’s Anjunabeats label, crossing over in tandem with the rise of EDM. Producers like Mat Zo, Audien, Tritonal, and Arty have dialed down the tempos, scaled back the atmospherics, and blown up the drops: in short, they went house. (This micro-genre has been dubbed “trouse,” because the only thing people love more than a binary is a portmanteau). A pessimist might view this as the crumbling of uplifting trance; an optimist will get excited. I’m mostly in the latter category: these producers’ trance backgrounds allow them more sensitivity in their mixes. Where many big room producers beef up the low end to speaker-blowing proportions, the trance kids seek balance. “Up All Night” easily falls to the house end of the spectrum — with many thanks to Angel Taylor’s fantastic soul vocal — but Arty’s drops ebb and flow, as if the synth chords and vworp bass are dueling.
[7]
Brad Shoup: An internal rhyme that uses the same word twice is a bad one, especially if that word is “me.” Which is a crying shame, cos this is a fun homeopathic-disco tune with stops at a blasting boshy riff. But the world needs more songs about getting stiffed on a ride!
[6]