It may come as a surprise to discover Emika (Ema Jolly) started her musical journey in a cupboard in secondary school. To be precise, she found an old beat-up PC with a 4-channel sequencing program in a cupboard and used it with a fellow classmate (and a myriad of other instruments) to create self-inspired hip-hop jams. From these simple beginnings, the Czech-born artist, residing in England then, went on to earn a Creative Music Technology degree from Bath Spa University and later to even work for the illustrious Native Instruments. After a terrible bout of illness, her bank offered a free trip to anywhere in Europe (with an account upgrade), and she opted for Berlin. Here she honed her own “uniquely haunting” sound, since critically compared to PJ Harvey, The xx and even Beth Gibbons of Portishead (Wikipedia // Discogs // AllMusic). Amidst her extensive discography are two remakes, one of which is this highly-creative interpretation of David Bowie’s ‘Let’s Dance’ which she describes as, “A new time-travel, gender twisting experiment in honor of one of my favorite artists.” Cleverly upending Bowie’s pop-rock staple, she pairs her down-pitch-shifted, now masculine-sounding vocals with ghostly undulating-synths, echoing together in a swirling whirlpool of groovily-pumping obscura to create this soothing, sultry reworking of the Thin White Duke himself. “Let’s dance, for fear your grace should fall, let’s sway, for fear this night is all.“
- Emika’s music can be subscribed to here, purchased via Apple here, listened to on Spotify here, and followed on Facebook here
This is great! She took one of my favorite Bowie songs and remade it as her own.
Those are my favorite covers, the ones where they really make it their own, agreed. 🙂
David Bowie did not like this artistic era (too commercial for his taste, he knew he could do commercial, but artistically it did not make him happy). China girl or Let’s dance are not her favorite creations.
He was more in agreement with himself on the album “Low”.
But I’m sure this version of Let’s dance would have appealed to him;)
Thank you for this discovery
Good Sunday
It is interesting. I read somewhere recently that someone said although pop music (or commercial music) is often considered to be lowbrow, it can be considerably difficult to create something that can appeal to so many people at once. That said, I very much love Bowie’s final album Blackstar and although it is not an easy listen, I believe it’s extraordinarily beautiful. My second favorite album of his was Hunky Dory. I do also have the side that loves pop music though, lol. Thank you for taking the time to share. =) ~Rann
Blackstar is an excellent album, I think he had fun on that occasion. Besides, we find influences from Low.
I’ll go listen to Hunky Dory 😉
thanks for the advice
Corinne