Loraine James – Don´t You See It?

NICK DUTFIELD
Oct 29, 2020
2 min read

Ad breaks and high streets from about 1985 crop up every now and again in my imagination, and they are normally made up of a rack of surnames; Bolingbroke & Wenley, Bradford & Bingley, Williams & Glynns, Rumbelows. Flymo hovers around as a harbinger of future times. Simon Schama would maybe dismiss this as overly reductive but in my head this is the point where New Order stepped in, with their lower case printing, their abstract nouns and even occasionally their unnamed-ness. The next thing you know (give or take 20 years) everything was all First Direct, Airbus, Innocent and Apple. But looking at my Spotify playlist right now, it seems replete with people and their names, with no mucking about either, first names AND surnames, all with capitals. It´s a bit weird as website IDs are full of stuff like Fr@ntikBænænå1297 and yet when it comes to music, keyboard-contorting disguises are out. It could just be that technology means groups are unnecessary these days (except for Disclosure of course, to remind us of New Order-ish name power) or maybe the Apple trend has been gnawed down to the core. The Rumbelows years are primed for a reboot.

So not far behind Arlo Parks, Duncan Gray, Jamal Bucanon and Rigoberta Bandini, it’s time to talk about Loraine James, and her awesome slice of wonky bleeping soul, Don´t You Know It? James is signed to Hyperdub and her latest EP, Nothing, gives us plenty of those deeper, beefier, chunkier moments that you might associate with the label. Don´t You Know It? is the standout for me though, as its off kilter, jittery soul vibe is a great balance of emotion and grit. There´s plenty to keep you on your toes, as well as heart-nudging lyrics like the hook;

“Do you see, do you see it now?

The harder you hold on, the more you´re losing out”

Also worth checking out is the Loraine James YouTube DJ set for FACTmagazine that was recorded back in August. I´d be lying if I said that it got me jiggling, but I was seized by a jerkiness that I´m going to call Rumbelow´s Return Syndrome.