Last Thursday we attended the industry night at the ACM SUMMER LIVE week-long festival held at the fantastic Electric Theatre and organized by students from the ACM Guildford.

The evening began with some heady electronic folk, presented with a Nordic twist, by the sensational self-produced pop artist BRUCH .

Her show gave us an exciting kick-off with slugs of fabulously saucy slap-bass [Harry Miller] plenty of salt-spray rhythms [Lloyd Griffiths] and an eagle-high voice that was experimental enough to sound as if it was jetting into silver-bird territory one moment, before getting cleverly husky & sophisticated ‘n’ clubby the next. This was gorgeous jazz-pop with acidic soft-centres. What a great start to the evening…

Next was Anni Kaismala aka DWARA who brought a melange of folk ‘n’ urban sound along with enigmatic poetry and starry vocalism. Her set had Arabian emotions, dark rivulets of sensation and, we thought, there was something almost Grace Slickish about the warm & indestructible voice.

 

 

 

London based shameless pop artist CONAN MAC created an auditory happening that was some-place between the fizzy power of Hanson and the sun-bleached, harmonic expressionism of Beach Boys. Super summer fun!

BILOXXI provided guitar-based melodies and politically motivated pop-rock sounds, centred around Oliver Coulter and with Alistair Oakes, Finn Fox and Teri Stevens. This band gave us a tight-packed confection of groovy bass-lines, articulate vocals, shingle-taps of light rhythm and swaying palm-tree compositions.

Swedish rapper/singer & songwriter Josefin Larsson aka LÚNA from Örnsköldsvik creates her own astonishing & highly creative cool-liquid tones that find influences in hip-hop, trap, hardcore and even classical.

We loved her highly politicized, whirlwind energy and her fabulously creative performance poetry… “Pussy Grabs Back...” Yep, it’s true, at ACM it does.

 

 

 

 

The top DJ/Producer/Trumpeter HADRON SOUNDS from Freiburg, Germany brought his tech-savvy, international house-dance-party squad: The Hadron Sounds Orchestra comprising of Hadron on trumpet and electronics, vocals from Lauren Nicole, Jade Maria, and Soraya Grosso, and with Tom Blunt drums, Jake Tweddle guitar, Carlos De Los Santos on bass and Ross Barnes on synth/sax.

Their new track titled “Lonely” with Jade Maria was cool and efficient jazz with some ripe EDM moments and lots of fan-faring excitement.

Pop anthem princess EVA-LINA “back off, I’m not your property...” represented self-empowered females everywhere with her astonishingly catchy numbers that were the [best] side of naughty and the [fiercest] side of insightful.

She’s a canny operator, and was in lively high spirits on the night and comes over as “the complete package” in other words she’s: bewitching, charismatic, self-confident and sharp-witted.

 

 

 

 

KING KUDA created gorgeous alt-dreamwave sensations based on the amazing velvety vocals of Ollie Gocher and with twinkles of guitar, cresting riffs and spindrift ‘n’ cockle rhythms. This is an amazing band and we expect great things from them.

Neon Islands and Chinchilla topped the fabulously exciting bill. Such an exceptional array of talent, yet again, from The Academy of Contemporary Music (ACM)

Words and Pictures: @neilmach 2018 ©

Main Photo: LÚNA ACM #SummerLive