Darkly brings us a haunted and eerie pop sound that you can’t help but want to dance along with. It’s kind of like the love child of 80’s pop and modern dance music. He began playing music around ten years ago, but only really started song writing and producing music about a year ago, and by the sound of it, he’s done a pretty solid effort.
One to live up to his name, Darkly injects a good dose of eeriness into the fun dance vibes, with plenty of 80s pop, post-punk and new wave thrown in.
Rather than taking influence from specific individuals and musicians, Darkly told Happy “I’m a big fan of post-punk and new-wave music from the late 70s early 80s and then more contemporary work like the dance-punk scene in the mid 2000’s, as well as a lot of dance music. I was really into the future garage scene and a lot of the darker, more sparse house and early dubstep. Contemporary pop music is also an influence”. It is through this variety of music that Darkly created a seemingly unique genre for himself.
A couple of his earlier singles Blind Spot and Touch are quite upbeat and funky, they’ve got a bit of a resemblance to some of Cut Copy’s more recent stuff; heaps of cool beats and catchy vocals, and they definitely reflect his love of dance and 80’s music. They both also incorporate some really eerie and dark sounds in them, which makes for really cool listening. Darkly produces in Logic Pro using “A mixture of synths, samples, percussion and drum loops”, so this is where those creepy and eerie tones are born.
His latest track Reflection has some different sounds to his earlier work. It starts off with some super dark and ghostly sounds, then kicks into some pretty sweet dance beats. The synths and percussion loops really stand out, even when the tempo and beats picks up you still know that they’re lingering in the background. Reflection still hints at his 80’s inspiration, but also brings in deep, heavier beats that weren’t as prominent in Blind Spot and Touch. But despite all its sinister undertones, this track has a lot of pop influence and will certainly get you up and moving.
Darkly has currently got some material recorded that is waiting to be shared with the world, as well as some more stuff in the works. Saying that he is looking to play shows more frequently throughout the year, the next few months will be keeping him on his toes!
