Sebastian Azul – Singles
Sebastian Azul – Singles Review
It’s been at least a couple years since we last featured Sebastian Azul up on our pages, and it’s about time we checked in on what this artist/producer has been up to. From what it looks like, the London-based entertainer has been dropping all kinds of singles online over the past couple years, and has notably ramped up his production in this last one here…a couple tunes in 2021 and 2022 sure, but 2023 looks like he’s been reaping the benefits of his creativity and hard work, harvesting material of all kinds.
“Desist” traces back the furthest, originally released in 2021. I could see people digging this – but that’s fairly standard when it comes to Azul’s music. It’s not his first rodeo, as they say – you can even tell from the pages here at sleepingbagstudios, where you’ll find reviews on singles he released back in 2018 and again in early 2021 – Sebastian’s always up to something. He’s got Mell300 bringing the energy to “Desist” at the start of this set of six tunes I’ve been listening to, and that’s a wise choice. Guy’s got a metric ton of personality and that level of rizz you wanna hear on the mic for sure, and in addition to that, you can hear he also adds a cultural element to help diversify the sound of a song like “Desist” and further branch it out to be more of a hybrid cut overall. You add in the sensational chorus hooks and the singing you hear in this track, and you’ll find yourself a winning recipe for a track you’ll wanna tune in for. Hooks are strange and fickle things when it comes right down to it – they don’t always need to make complete and total sense, you know what I mean? Having the word “Desist” be one of the main hooks you’ll hear in this tune, shouted out loud, is ultimately a bit of a bizarre choice. We’re essentially talking about desisting resistance, you feel me? Even that’s implied…it’s a conclusion you have to draw to based on the rest of the lyricism surrounding it – otherwise, you’d have the most excited and amped-up vocals basically saying STOP & nothing more – you following me? It basically works grammatically in the same way that a double-negative would, which turns the situation into a positive – make sense now? So really, what’s being said here, is more along the lines of let your guard down…stop resisting what you know you want…”Desist” and quit fronting, because there’s a better way to have a good time. I suppose what I’m saying is that most writers would have probably selected a different word than “Desist” to communicate what Azul is ultimately getting at in this song, but if you’re paying attention to the rest of what’s surrounding that vocal hook in the lyrics, I’d imagine you’ll make enough sense of it. Good start though – “Desist” should have no real problem securing an audience with the vibe that it has.
“Hang In There” is a bit more problematic. It has some great points to it – the music for example, it’s got a jazzy sound to it, and ultimately, it’s actually quite extraordinary. Lots of exotic sound in this beat and some real uniqueness to what we hear – all that works out great, and I’m really enjoying “Hang In There” when it comes to the music specifically…but the rest of what’s going on here complicates things. For starters, the vocal melody itself is just a hair or two different than songs that are already out there, and it’s kind of doomed to be that tune that’s gonna remind you of this or that when it comes to what we hear from the microphone. Now…all-in-all, that’s actually kind of a NORMAL thing – we all end up kind of discovering similar melodic patterns based on what we’re exposed to & whatnot…sometimes we subconsciously drift a bit too close to what influences us and what we personally like to listen to, that’s all. That being said – I’m always gonna be the guy that advocates on doing what the song is calling out for – and like I’ve said a bunch of times on these pages of ours, if something we’re doing isn’t necessarily adding something significant, there’s a much stronger chance that it’s taking something away instead. I don’t know that I hear a song like “Hang In There” and feel like it NEEDS vocals, you feel me? This would be one truly strong tune as an instrumental beat, but with the vocals, I feel like it gets severely watered down. Precila is doing a decent job with the material she’s got…in my opinion, she sounds like she’s likely a better singer than what we’re hearing on this particular tune…but yeah…I think it’s less about where she could have potentially been better, and much more about whether she should be in this song at all, you know what I mean? As always, I never expect everyone out there to necessarily feel the same way that I do or hear what I hear, but for me, I’d have left “Hang In There” as an instrumental for sure. That’s what I’m saying about it not being completely on Precila – I don’t think there’d really be anyone out there that could come in & knock this vocal melody out of the park when it’s not the main strength of the song. The main strengths are right there in the music…if that’s the case, don’t overcomplicate it.
All the proof you need of what I’m saying to be true is right there in the following track, “Let’s Try Again,” where everything completely fits. Simple as that. There’s nothing out of place, there’s nothing that sounds recycled, the energy is fresh, the material is strong – and the vocals belong here as a result. A lot of what a singer needs comes through confidence in the material and feeling the moment – to me, it sounds like Ray Lewis is right at home on this track. When things are right, they’re right, and there’s really no mistaking it for anything else. The whole art of making music is doing your level best to stay as objective as possible and not convince yourself to settle for anything less, you feel me? Sebastian knows what I’m talking about, and it’s also how he knows that I’m being honest with him in my critique of his tunes…I call things like I hear’em, always have, always will. Listening to how right things are going for him and Ray on “Let’s Try Again” makes me almost wonder if I was being too polite with my comments on “Hang In There” – but my goal is always to encourage the creative community, not break it down. If Azul feels like “Hang In There” came out exactly as he envisioned it would, then I’d be the first to give him a high five and congratulate him. I’d still disagree with the guy of course, but I’m not here to be the end-all be-all of what people respond to in music; I’m just another voice on the internet that’s willing to say what he feels. Ray’s a heck of a singer with a whole lot of spark to his energy and range to go with it – heck, he’s even got a bit of MJ in him if you’re listening to what’s happening in the background vocals. It’s a quality performance, but my point all along has been that you get to that by having confidence that the material is bulletproof – “Let’s Try Again” is basically a single-worthy tune by every definition y’all.
Of course, not every great song needs to be defined by whether or not it’s ‘single-worthy’ – that’s merely a measurement of accessibility more than anything else, and music can obviously be made for a variety of reasons. Take “Oh Mama” for example…as I understand it, Sebastian put this together to honor his mother after she’d passed away (R.I.P.) – you don’t need a song like this to go on to be a hit, and to be truthful, I don’t know that you’d WANT a memory like that playing over the airwaves everywhere you went either, you know what I mean? Azul set out to make a tributary track, and he’s accomplished that with “Oh Mama” – that’s pretty much the end of the story and there’s not much else that I really need to add to that. Do I think it’s a hit or a miss? I think that he did what he set out to do, and I appreciate where he’s coming from. Music is about more than just something good to listen to – it can be about catharsis and healing and all kinds of other things – honestly, I’m simply happy that the art was there for Sebastian when I’m sure he needed it most. We lean on the things we need to in times of tragedy, and I’m sure making “Oh Mama” helped him when other things in life didn’t have the same effect. That’s all this track needed to do, and it’s done that…it’s by making songs like this that Azul will eventually be able to make others, you feel me? You need to push through the pain and break through to the other side of it, otherwise it continues to hover over you and shroud your creativity forever. I’ll say this – the hook resonates and sticks with you immediately after a single listen; I put this on, and then I had to go do something else for a while, but I continued to remember it like it was still fresh and vivid in my mind long after. I dig the use of Sebastian’s original language to tie this concept together, and it was a nice touch to have added in his own mother’s voice as well at the beginning & end of “Oh Mama.”
What you can’t see without having a look into it yourself, is the line that exists between what Sebastian has created before this year, and afterwards – but I’m tellin’ ya right now, it’s something you can hear if you’ve got a functional pair of ears, or perhaps even just one good one. To say that Sebastian Azul’s music is on the right path would be a monumental understatement – this dude seems to be surging right into his prime. To myself personally, it’s something I could have told ya blindfolded – I can absolutely hear the difference between what he’s created before this year and what he’s created throughout 2023. That’s not to say you can’t hear a progression in his work that leads to this point in time – of course you can! But again, it wouldn’t do him any favors to not highlight just how significantly he’s upped his game; it’s something we can all genuinely hear in a track like “Sorry Just Won’t Do.” Combined with “Let’s Try Again” in this particular set of songs, I felt like it was radiantly apparent even in a small sample size that Azul has made large strides with his material. Listen to the hooks of “Sorry Just Won’t Do” will ya? They’re perfection, straight-up. With Molly at the helm to supply the vocals, “Sorry Just Won’t Do” has absolutely everything it needs – she’s clearly a superstar with a brilliantly expressive voice, but once again, this is also a matter of material. In my opinion, what we’re hearing in 2023 is the result of Azul making more informed choices about what will connect to the audience of listeners out there. For me, there wasn’t a better song in the set of songs I’ve got here – “Sorry Just Won’t Do” is that combination of pure sincerity and sound you wanna hear, built on unmistakable accessibility that no one could miss. Molly’s a real key part of this equation if you ask me…this goes back to my earlier point about doing the things that a song is calling out for, and how when things are all in the right place, you can hear it, 100%. Sebastian deserves real credit for finding the right voice for this particular moment – Molly crushes this song and sets the gold standard for what Azul should be seeking out when it comes to the vocalists he uses in his tunes. From the music to the microphone, there’s not a thing about this song that I’d change.
From what I can tell, “Special” is technically the song that ushered in this new era of Azul’s music, and it’s already charted strong on his list at Spotify, reaching the heights of his top three to-date according to the numbers. And I get it – it’s got a highly relevant sound for what’s out there right now in the scene, and it has a solid performance from Sheddie Young that really fits the vibe as spot on as Molly did in the song I was listening to just prior to this. On a personal level, “Sorry Just Won’t Do” is THE cut of the bunch here – but that’s my opinion. “Special” ain’t all that far off if you ask me – the more I spun this song, the more I loved it…so if you were to say that “Special” was your favorite in this list of six singles, I’d totally understand…nothing has been overlooked here, and it’s crystal clear to me that Azul was on a mission in 2023 to do things differently. Whatever the changes he’s made are behind the scenes, he’s tapped into a way to get the best out of the music he’s writing and producing…now it’s all about holding himself to that standard of excellence he’s achieved as he continues forward from here. “Special” makes sense to me as a hit in modern day music…it’s stylistic in a very glossy & flashy way, but it also has that sincere connection I’m personally looking for when I’m listening to tunes, and you can thank Sheddie for bringing out the best of this song in that regard. What Azul makes isn’t always music that takes the easy route, you know what I mean? When you’re featuring different singers and different ideas all the time, it becomes much more like solving a puzzle and knowing which piece goes where to create the full picture – but you can hear that Sebastian has the vision required to see it clearly based on everything he’s put out this year. Definitely impressed with where this guy is going, and I feel like between the three singles released in 2023 in this set of six, he’s made it completely clear that he’s headed towards the best years of his career right around the corner & giving you every reason to listen.
Find out more about Sebastian Azul from his official page at Instagram right here: https://www.instagram.com/sebastianazul5150
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