Quiero Un Hombre Femenine

MIKE feat. Lila Ramani “Should Be”

MIKE typically raps on the tracks he produces but in the case of “Should Be” he’s silent, keeping the focus on a vocal sample that’s mostly pitched up to the point that it’s unintelligible and a live vocal from Crumb’s Lila Ramani that’s so distant in the mix that it’s also pretty much unintelligible. The magic of this song is in the way MIKE triggers the vocal sample in uneven intervals, which gives it a “live” feel and makes your ear hang expectantly on moments of absence. The arrangement is filled out with fragments of piano, harp, and strings that fall into place just enough to cohere musically, but loose enough that you focus on the abstraction. Beyond mentioning the details, what does this sound like? Basically, it sounds like ghosts in two different heavens singing to each other from across the divide.

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Empress Of “Femenine”

Lorely Rodriguez doesn’t always sing in Spanish on Empress Of tracks, but in the case of “Femenine” it would have been counterintuitive and absurd to do anything else since the key lyric of the chorus translates to “I want a feminine man, a Latin who dances for me and only for me.” (Fingers crossed for you, Lorely!) She sings this like she’s manifesting her desires, but I think it’s the music that’s more likely to do the trick. It sounds sweaty and lusty, but also very deliberate and controlled. I was not surprised to learn this is a Nick Sylvester production – you can hear his immaculate taste in keyboard tones all over this, the way the bass guitar subtly creeps around in the background whenever the synth bass isn’t carrying the low end, and the particular crispness of the claps on the breakdown.

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