RESONANCE

A lyricist, lawyer and a Londoner, Essa initially released music under the name Yungun in the early noughties, in the midst of UK hip hop's own "golden era". He earned praise from artists such as Nas and Mark Ronson, and performed and recorded with such luminaries as De La Soul, Wu-Tang Clan, Guru, Slum Village and Pharoahe Monch.

His classic debut album 'The Essance' originally dropped whilst he was at law school, 20 years ago (which was recently given a full re-issue on First Word). This was followed with a collaborative album with DJ Mr Thing ('Grown Man Business'), then some years later with 'The Misadventures of a Middle Man' in 2014. Essa also released a track on Juneteenth 2020 entitled 'Justice', as a powerful reaction to George Floyd and the BLM movement. It saw support from the likes of Gilles Peterson, and raised money for an assortment of access-to-justice organisations.

Joining Essa on the boards throughout this new project is acclaimed producer and DJ, Pitch 92.

Born in Dublin in 1992, Pitch grew up in Germany & Switzerland, where the sounds of Madlib & Dilla fired up his neurons. Under the encouragement of friends ASM, he began experimenting with an MPC at the ripe old age of 12. He relocated to the UK in the late noughties, where he was quickly engulfed into the Manchester hip hop scene, becoming a longtime member of The Mouse Outfit, touring across Europe and featuring heavily on their first two albums.

Since going solo in 2017, he's released full hip hop & soul album projects with Iyamah, Jerome Thomas (Melting Pot), Verb T (High Focus), Confucius MC (HHV), Illaman (Potent Funk) and MC DRS (Space Cadet), as well as two solo albums ('Intervals' & '3rd Culture') and production work for artists such as Ocean Wisdom, Jehst, Foreign Beggars, The Four Owls and First Word family, Ruby Wood and Tyler Daley (Children of Zeus), to name just a few!

This new project from the duo is co-produced, mixed and mastered by Viva Cee, an extraordinarily versatile up and coming writer/producer, known for fusing international sounds with contemporary black music styles.

Across the 13-tracks, we have the posse track 'HeavyweightS', which features the likes of Doc Brown, Klashnekoff, Kyza, Tony D & Reveal amongst others. There are a bunch of additional features too, including West London legend King Kashmere on 'Sick', multi-talented Nottingham MC Karizz (formerly Karizma) on 'All For The Love' and 'Back Around', and several appearances from Brotherman.

The album exudes true-skool quality from beginning to end, encompassing soulful, jazzy boom bap throughout, from the opening title track, to the reflective single 'Right Now', the uptempo bounce of 'That's The One'. with a sprinkle of skippier double-time flavours on 'Almost There' and 'Seasoned', all seamlessly sequenced.

In Essa's words:

"Resonance is literally a shared vibration. It's connection through sound. The title felt fitting for this connection between me and Pitch. There was chemistry from before we even met, as we had long admired each other's work. We first collaborated during the 2020 lockdowns for a freestyle called 'Do You Relate No. 1' over a beat he'd made specifically for me. It was the first time I tried out a new, vulnerable, stream of consciousness writing technique, which I've since used throughout this album. Pitch's beats have an emotive quality that makes the words just pour out of me. So we resonate with each other for sure, but the plan is for the messages to resonate with the listener too. These songs are personal, but the themes are universal and we hope you feel a sense of solidarity from them. Do you relate?…"

'Resonance' is scheduled for release on digital and vinyl, August 2nd 2024.