Ewan Hoozami / Fire In Me EP

Longtime buddy of the blog, Ewan Hoozami, has taken a bit a of musical ‘left at the traffic lights’ move recently

Not being satisfied with smashing up dancefloors of the UK and Europe with eclectic, beat laden party styling sets, or releasing sample heavy mashups, he’s taken to singing …

Ewan’s been pushing  his new sound in live sets since before Christmas, fusing scratching, rapping, singing and MPC work and has now given a first showing in this new style on the Fire In Me EP.

The title track sets the tone, with densely layered samples over his trademarked crisp beats, with the man himself taking the mic to introduce things. The little piano line in the background on this one is strangely hypnotic …

Top track for me is Through with Love, featuring another critically acclaimed Bristol beatmangler, Blacksmith, is stuffed to the gills with Bond-esque strings combining brilliantly with a buzzing electro bassline.

The last two tracks, Android Pillow Talk and The Quiet take vocal duties off Ewan and introduce Colleen Quinn into the mix. There’s something heavily reminiscent of another Bristol band from yesteryear, Alpha  about the first of the two tunes, with the crystal clear vocal sitting over a lovely crunchy bassy little number. Properly head noddable.

The last track is a re-reworking of a tune, All Quiet, which has featured on various forms on Ewan’s  Mildebeats and Wildebeats albums from a couple of years back, with an all new vocal from Colleen which pitches somewhere between energy levels of the previous versions.

All in all none too shabby, and even better, all on a ‘name your price’ deal from bandcamp.

If you’re feeling this keep your ears (?) peeled from the upcoming long player, Robot Soul.