Forget everything you know about Soulspeak. While the Beijing-based producer may be best known for his funk-infused, soulful hip-hop beats, his debut release under the alias Kai Luen unveils a completely different side of his musical personality.
Set for release on Shanghai’s SVBKVLT label, The Hollow Ghost offers 10 tracks of dark soundscapes. Bass grooves and layered beats have been replaced by songs predominantly composed from field recordings made on tour.
“The amount of noise everywhere in China – apart from the countryside – is ridiculous,” he explains. “This album deals more with sound design and the idea of using noise to create grooves.”
Just don’t expect Soulspeak (real name Jeff Liang) to stay in Kai Luen’s sonic lane for long after this month’s release show at The Shelter. Diversity is part of the producer’s musical DNA. Last year, he released two solo EPs on Beijing electronic label Ran Music, a second collaborative disc with “China’s best freestyle rapper” J-Fever and an album with the future jazz group Flash Beats Bones.
Liang attributes his broad taste to public radio in his Los Angeles home town, noting: “I could hear Parliament-Funkadelic, Sun Ra and John Cage within the span of 20 minutes.”
Admitting that he “pretty much held onto a radio from the time I was in middle school to the time I was in college,” Liang began playing guitar at 9. Encouraged by his parents to pursue classical (because “I wasn’t so great at math”), he balanced more formal musical studies with his growing habit for collecting vinyl in high school.
Then came China. After Liang’s grandparents implored him to discover their homeland, he moved to Qingdao before settling in Beijing after the Olympics. He laughingly recalls attending his first Beijing hip-hop party, Season 6: “I remember thinking this was really random that there were all these Chinese kids dressed up like 90s New York.
“But then the DJ began to play these obscure independent hip-hop tracks, which blew me away,” he adds. “It turned out to be Wes from the Park, which is a hip-hop radio station broadcast in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.”
Shortly after, he connected with three-time DMC China champion DJ Wordy. Their collaborative project, Wordy Soulspeak, released two albums and performed at the massive EDC Las Vegas festival.
While DJ Wordy’s relocation to Shanghai has put the duo on hiatus, Soulspeak has plenty of other plans for the year. A third album with J-Fever is in the works, which he describes as “more based on ideas around theatre with elements of hip-hop that we want to make more schizophrenic.”
He’ll also be working with As Bo, who he reluctantly describes as “the Chinese Tom Waits”; planning a solo project composed of beats created from recordings of his children and their toys; and, later this month, releasing an album with Shanghai-based Ttechmak (the electronic persona of Australian trumpeter Toby Mak) on Ran Music. He describes the latter record, Land in the Love of Robots, as “heavy beats and altered horns [that is] very soulful, but not jazz at all.”
This willingness to explore new possibilities is permeating China’s electronic underground. Soulspeak is keen to shout out other producers experimenting with sound, identifying Li Shijia, throutin, Damacha, Jason Hou and Zhi-16 of Do Hits! as producers to keep an eye on.
“The thing I like the most is young people who have their own sound,” he explains. “Artists who are interested in stretching the boundaries of what is possible within the field, rather than regurgitating something that happened before.”
Shanghai: Apr 22, 10pm-late, RMB50. The Shelter, see event listing.
Beijing: Apr 23, 10pm-late; RMB50. Dada.
The Holy Ghost will be available at SVBKVLT's Bandcamp and Land in the Love of Robots will be available at Ran Music's Bandcamp.
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