Call on me
Off Planet welcomes a host of guest lead vocalists to the Django Django universe, in a move inspired by the acts that David loved when he was younger: “I’ve always really loved the whole ‘features’ thing, it was a big part of hip-hop and artists like Massive Attack. It’s just a way of switching up things. But if Jim and Vinny and I can’t crack the nut of the topline, we kind of think it’s ok to sort of get other people in to help. That was the idea behind that. A lot of them were tracks we had sitting around that nobody knew how to approach. Then we got someone in and straight away they knew how to topline it. That was a big help.”
Among the guest vocalists, was Rebecca Lucy Taylor (aka Self Esteem) who has worked with the band before. “I produced Rebecca’s first EP and released it on a little label I was running at the time. We’d met at SXSW and then in London years ago. I remember talking about doing a more dancehall, R&B thing then when she was still in (her first band) Slow Club. We finally got round to doing stuff, and we kept in touch. I’d made that beat, not really knowing why or what it was for. Suddenly I could just imagine her on the track (Complete Me) I sent it to her and very quickly she just sent back the topline. She just got the whole vibe.”
Few artists have the deft ability to genre-hop without alienating vast swathes of their audience, but for Django Django, and the four-part Off Planet expanding their sound palette to channel the vibe of their formative dance music influences, as well as introduce an array of guest lead vocalists, has yielded a galaxy-sized bounty. Take the Self Esteem-fronted Complete Me, a pulsing slice of early ’90s rave-pop, led by one of the UK’s most in-demand vocalists. Then there’s the Jack Peñate-centred No Time, a joyous slice of euphoria, pre-soundtracking the baking summer we’re set to have this year. Cuts that sound a world away from Django Django’s earlier work, yet share an exploratory through-line with them.
The guest appearance of Jack Peñate on the blinding No Time features an incredibly succulent lead vocal, routed through a Soundtoys-leaning chain. “It was put through Soundtoys EchoBoy and Decapitator and just a whole heap of stuff in that chain. Again, I just went to one I’d previously saved. He wanted quite a raw sound, I’d had this one which was a bit OTT. I was a bit worried it was too much but he wanted it, he liked it. I think it was right. The track is quite influenced by Roy Davis Jr.”