While Madonna‘s off recording songs for her upcoming Greatest Hits and stealing babies from Malawi, two of her producers have been hard at work with their own solo projects.
Mirwais, producer responsible for a majority of both Music and American Life (as well as a few Confessions tracks), has been involved in a new collaboration project with Arabic singer, Yasmine Hamdan–a collaboration now known simply as Y.A.S..
The goal for the grouping, along with the desire to create some killer electro-pop, is to reconstruct society’s association of “Arab” in Western culture. As the producer said in a French interview with Le Courrier:
“The idea is that today, in Western culture, we hear about Arabs everyday – in a bad way, because of terrorism, etc – but we lack of cultural representations coming from those countries that could mix with the western culture…”
As of now, the duo’s album, Arabology, is available in digital form–in France. Though I’ve not been able to find much regarding the album, I did happen upon a Spanish review of the album. My favorite part? Their description of the fourth track, “Oloulou”: “Los beats del estribillo son enfermizos.” (“The beats of the refrain are sick.”) Massively infectious beats and super-slick vocal delivery, as though Yelle took down the BPM and got a little experimental. Look (hope?) for this album to get an international release sometime later this year.
Over in England, William Orbit, responsible for Lady M’s impeccable Ray Of Light, as well as some of Music) is putting the final touch on his tenth solo album, My Oracle Lives Uptown. According to his blog, the mastering is actually being done today at Abbey Road, before a series of interviews with radio in the next few weeks.
In the meantime, fans can listen to samples of the upcoming album on both his MySpace and his blog. As usual with Orbit, the songs incorporate a stunning selection of trippy, hazy electronica tingles and ethereal melodica. Just try not to be distracted by all the LSD friendly images littering his websites–no, I have no idea what that’s all about either. Watch for Oracle to drop on May 4.
DL: William Orbit – Optical Illusions (Radio Edit)
DL: Y.A.S. – Yaspop
