Crush Presents…a night with British songstress Katy B.
Trained at the same stage school as Adele, Katy B shares an affinity for artistry fused with personal experience. Her debut record, On a Mission, is a dance record about dance music. She sings about relationships and going out at night over catchy bubblegum dubstep and jazzy soul beats. The album’s charm stems from a total absence of ego: Katy was never trying to be a superstar. Early recording sessions had to be worked around her university schedule. (She wrote her dissertation about the rise of UK funky). At that time, On a Mission wasn’t going to be an album with her name on it, but a sampler for pirate radio station Rinse FM to showcase dance’s new direction. DJs would submit a track and she would provide guest vocals.
Rinse soon realized Katy could bring something more than just a hookline to their production. She had a perspective on clubbing they never saw from behind the DJ booth: she was in the ladies room talking about boys she shouldn’t fancy, falling breathless under bass lines or asleep on the night bus home.
On a Mission was released in 2011, and peaked at the top of the UK charts. She was voted “Best New Dance Artist” by iTunes in 2011.
WHEN: January 25, 2012
DOORS: 9 pm
AGE: 21+
WHERE: Drom
TICKETS: $14 in Adv/$17 Day of Show
“The first reason to love Katy B is that she makes clubbing suddenly real again, writing songs like “Katy on a Mission” and “Lights On” that are warmly observed miniatures of how wonderful, funny, and occasionally sad going out can be. Their easy candor carries over into her songs about relationships. She is fascinated by liminal moments– the anticipation at the start of a night; the points where attraction and danger meet– and has a light, lilting voice far better suited to nuance than grandstanding. And she’s a tour guide for London nightlife, from the bubblegum dubstep of “Perfect Stranger” to the brisk UK funky of “Why You Always Here” and the jazzy soul of closer “Hard To Get”. Katy B went to the same stage school as Adele, and like her 21, On a Mission mixes the artful and the personal– but it’s as proudly modernist as Adele is soaked in tradition.” –Pitchfork
“Her strong debut album, “On a Mission” (Rinse/Columbia), was released in Britain this year, recalling less the dubstep and U.K. funky genres normally associated with the producers she has worked with (like Benga and Geeneus) than the crossover American club sounds of the early 1990s that are derived from the bubblier and more accessible side of house music.” –New York Times
