Jude Woodhead’s vocals soar ascend above electronic ecstasy.

 

At only twenty, classically trained South Londoner Jude Woodhead already sounds fully formed. Emerging out of the same London scene that brought us King Krule, his latest release For The Birds joins the melodic ideas of world music with a slick modern electronic approach. Jude’s collaging style ends up feeling as big as his most surprising influences: Paul Simon and Jeff Buckley.

For The Birds enwraps itself around a tender Arabic vocal line. It’s all nuance and subtle build-up, as a four-on-the-floor beat and beautiful synth hooks float out of the building sonic mass. It’s music guided by the euphoria of crossing boundaries.

“I began work on ‘For The Birds’ way back in 2015, but the instrumental was finished about a year later,” says Jude. “It was originally based around a Lebanese vocal sample but the final version was sung by an artist friend of mine called Rachida. The song has been through many forms; I started the tune in 2015, but the bulk of the work was done over a period of about two months in 2016, when I was living at uni.

“I was pretty isolated at University and the music I was making was kind of a reaction to that; trying to make the kind of tunes that reflected what I wanted out of life at that point. This track has been shelved away a couple of times, and almost deleted at one point, but it feels good to have it finally coming out.”