Currently an ‘Emerging Artist In Residence’ at London’s Southbank Centre; it is her fusion of styles and individuality that sets Aruba Red apart.
Her ability to switch effortlessly between brave hard-hitting socio-political lyrics and smooth soulful inspiration is seamless and her cutting edge live band are made up of some of the best musicians on the scene: Renell Shaw on Guitar (Orphy Robinson / Descendants of a Quest / Black Cherry Jam) and Kaz Hussain on Drums/Percussion (Joss Stone / Papa Makaku / Outlandish).
After rocking audiences last year at Glastonbury Festival, Abbey Road Studios & The Royal Festival Hall as well as being featured on Ras Kwame’s 100% Homegrown Show on BBC 1Xtra, Aruba Red made a big impression at this year’s Love Music Hate RacismCarnival in London.
Aruba Red has recently collaborated with award winning multi-instrumentalist Nitin Sawhney on his forthcoming album ‘London Underground’ alongside talent such as Paul McCartney, Imogen Heap and Natty. Her collaboration ‘Last Train To Midnight’ is currently receiving airplay on BBC Radio 1 & 2. She has also recorded with some of the most respected Afro-Cuban Rhythm legends including Grammy award winning Horacio Hernandez and John Benîtez as well as collaborating with one of Jamaica’s hottest Reggae stars Jah Mason on her song ‘Struggling’,which is currently receiving major airplay in Jamaica.
Aruba Red’s eagerly anticipated material: an undeniably fresh & authentic offering, is out now & available on iTunes. For more information, photos, gig dates or to hear the music please contact nancy@crownmusic.co.uk - 0207 371 5444 - www.arubaredmusic.com
Aloe Blacc Gig for Massive Attack's Meltdown at Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, and the weekend that followed...
Now that was a real special show...We first found out that this was going to happen about a month before the gig, when myself (Prash), Kaz Hussein and Renell Shaw would be stepping in for Aloe Blacc's band. As a big fan of Massive Attack I was over the moon at the prospect of performing at their Meltdown Festival, and it exceeded all of my expectations! Here's how it went down:
Wednesday 18th June 20086pm:
Aloe Blacc lands at London Heathrow and travels directly to the Royal Festival Hall straight after a 10 hour flight from LA for our very first rehearsal. This was the first time that any of us had ever met Aloe, although we had been studying his material in preparation for the show. For those of you that are unfamiliar with his music, check out: http://www.myspace.com/aloeblaccmusic
We then rehearsed for 7 hours straight and managed to put together the whole 45 minute set, transitions and all. Myself and Aloe also composed a new rendition to one of his other songs "Why do Caged Birds Sing?" that he previously hadn't planned to be in the set, so with the help of Kaz and Renell we included this in the lineup as well!
Thursday 19th June:11am:
The band regroup with Aloe at the Royal Festival Hall for day 2 of rehearsal - this consisted of ironing out any other arrangement issues, developing concepts and transitions. After this we could keep just rolling the set.
8pm: Having finished rehearsing for the day, Aloe and I made our way to our first gig since he arrived in the UK - an event called "Amplified" @ Rubylo, right in the heart of London, just off Bond Street. Armed only with a CD and his Trumpet, Aloe invited me to bring my Korg keyboard down to add a more live feel to the show - i gladly accepted. This was a real experience as it was the first time i had a chance to see him perform to a crowd, needless to say he smashed it! We also played 2 tracks just keys, vox and trumpet which went down really well. Clearly Aloe already had an established fanbase in the UK - I started thinking that the main event was gonna be pretty special.
Friday 20th June - Day of the Show:12pm:
The band meets for final run-through of the set, and agree everything is good to go. We stopped for a ridiculously big lunch courtesy of the Southband chefs then onto soundcheck.
4pm: Soundchecking before us was Terry Callier, one of the godfathers of Soul, and childhood friend of Curtis Mayfield. This sounded truly amazing. If you listen carefully during the intro of the live footage, it is Terry you can hear jamming on a grand piano where we were filming backstage.
7pm: The Doors open, and until 7:15pm the venue was completely empty!!! Apprehension set in. Then the call for seats was sent over the tannoys to all of the bars in the Southbank complex, and thankfully by 7:30pm the venue was almost full to it's 900 capacity limit.
7:30pm: The Show - check the videos to see us in action!
8:15pm: A satisfied Aloe Blacc + band leave stage after finishing off the set with his single "Beautiful". We were met by none other than Massive Attack who congratulated us on our performance and were surprised to hear we had only met 2 days before - I have to say that most definately made my day!
Saturday 21st June:11am:
Aloe Blacc visits Catch 22 Music in Reading to put together some tracks for a brand new EP! We managed to compose a full orchestral hiphop piece as well as a neo-soul track which will be finished very soon, so watch this space!
8pm:Aloe and Prash return to the Royal Festival Hall to check out none other than George Clinton and Funkadelic! (BIGUP yourself Renell for the tickets!)
11:30pm:DJ Zinc (of Tru Playaz/Bingo fame) came to meet us at the after party. We then drove to his studio in East London where Aloe wrote and recorded a banging vocal for Zinc's brand new album. After spotting a Rhodes keyboard in the corner of the studio, we put down some keys for one of Zinc's tracks on the new LP!
Sunday 22nd June:9am:
Aloe Blacc flies back to LA for another show - this guy is serious. I'm looking forward to finishing his EP and hopefully playing some more shows when he's next in the country! A big thanks go out to Massive Attack, Neill Quinton and the rest of the team at the Southbank Centre for making this show possible for us.
CHECK OUT OUR YOUTUBE SITE FOR FULL VIDEO LIST
Article 2 - Headspace in Spain
Having now fully recovered both physicaly and mentaly, it's time to spill the beans on how the Headspace- Live show at Beach Club in Lloret de Mar went down.......
01:25 GMT -
We meet the promoter for Gifted in central London. With a few a hours to kill before leaving for the airport, we proceed to the nearest bar to initiate the party vibes in anticipation of what was to come......
04:45 GMT - We take a taxi to the pinnacle of aviational transportational destinations - London Stanstead.
07:45 GMT - With tiredness setting in, and having tackled the customary baggage nightmares that are tradtionaly associated with doing live shows abroad, we take off for Gerona Barcelona airport.10:05 CET
We arrive at Gerona Barcelona to find the sun blazing and not a cloud in the sky. With a whole load of equipment to set up and sound checks to do, we had no time to spare so were driven straight to the club.
11:00 CET -
We arrive at Beach Club in Lloret de Mar. First impressions were good- having recently been refubished, with a fat sound system and the deco going up as we walked in, things were looking good. Despite the lack of sleep making the situation somewhat sureal, we got focused on the job in hand and got on with instaling our setup.
14:00 CET -
It was now about 30 degrees, and we were hot, sticky, hungry and totaly wired. With our setup installed, checked and re-checked, and the gifted deco up and looking sexy, it was time to address the next priorities - food and sleep. We hit a local eatery for a quick bite to eat before going back to the apartment for some desperatley needed shut-eye.
21:15 CET -
Aaahh that's better. Our batteries were now re-charged and our heads straightend, so there was only one thing left to do - ROCK THE PLACE! Curtis Mayfield was the CD of choice to get the vibes flowing as we got dressed and ready for the impending madness.
23:15 CET -
It was a warm and humid night as we walked down the main strip toward the club. There was an electric atmopshere on the streets of Lloret de Mar- the main strip rammed with scantily-clad ladies, skirt-thirsty guys, sunglasses salesmen, and their armed and uniformed counterparts. As we battled our way through the crowds spirits were high, the inevitable excitement and anticipation fully setting in.
23:55 CET -
We arrive at the club to find Carlos Francisco warming up the crowd, and with a couple of hours to go until we were on, a some final preparations were made before a few Havvanagh Clubs were ordered and we were warming up on the dancefloor!
02:00 -
Finally the hour had cometh - SHOWTIME! We took to the stage hyped and ready to rock. With a maticulously planned Headspace-Live set including two engineers, DJ, live synth work, a live vocoder and piano intro, improvised fx jams backed with brand new studio productions, it was time to give the people of Lloret de Mar some well-needed Headspace.
04:00 -
Mission accomplished!! As expected the set went down a storm, and we can confirm that the roof was ripped clean off Beach Club! With an overwhealming reaction from the crowd and even the bar staff, it's needless to say we were pretty damn happy with the performance. Still hyped, and with adrenaline still pumping from what can only be described as a manic, full-on barrage of live Gangsta House music, we took to the terrace to enjoy the rest of the night winding down over few cocktails.
07:00 -
With the night drawing to end, the clubs and bars closing and the streets emptying after another night of chaos, we strolled to the beach. As we watched the sun come up over the horizon, we spent a few hours reniniscing about what was a manic but wholey enjoyable 48 hours. With our return flight leaving soon, we enjoyed the last few moments before returning to the apartment for a few winks before returning to good old blighty to begin work on the forthcoming projects..........more Headspace coming soon!!
Article 1 - Jah Mason & C22 in Jamaica#C4C007
Just to let you guys in on some exciting news: recently we began a partnership with up and coming reggae licensing company, Blacksun. The first of our many projects together was flying to Jamaica to record heavyweight Jamaican artist "Jah Mason" on Natascha Eleonoré's (Aruba Red) song "Struggling". Since then we have completed an EP with Jah Mason which will be released this summer. Blacksun deal with the digital licensing of major reggae artists and promote them in the UK.
Check out the video of Prashant 'Engine-EarZ' Mistry in Jamaica with exclusive footage in the studio. It shows the whole recording process, from inception of the idea of the vocals, to capturing that take!
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