With the release of the single "Play Me A Christmas Song", Stephen Dowd manages to bottle the very specific, blue-hued silence that falls over a living room once the wrapping paper has been cleared away. It is a curious thing, really, how a melody can act less like a sound wave and more like the smell of a candle that was blown out five...

With SidekoDJ releasing "Pride", I found myself unexpectedly gripped by the sort of urgency usually reserved for escaping a burning building or perhaps rushing to tell someone you love them before the train doors close. This isn't background music for a polite dinner; it commands attention with the insistence of a siren cutting through the fog. https://open.spotify.com/track/2kl59JzvaBh03hW8D44anb?si=a3dc052508114649 The melody initiates with a rhythmic chiming, saturated in...