Skillfully compressed so that it’s pulsing, thumping and breathing, the mix of Right Direction is an ultra-modern triumph, with a streamlined focus: a driving thrust that carries the listener right through to the track’s sudden denouement.
Featuring a wealth of keyboard voices, uprisings, washes and sweeps that glue together an unlikely but ultimately exotic and ethnic-sounding gestalt of sounds, the over-arching word for reviewing Right Direction is ‘impressive’.
Cleverly woven throughout are Josh Dreon’s dream-like vocals. At once, capable of sounding urgent and laid back (how?!?), his performance greatly enhances what’s on offer here. In particular the beautifully-integrated choice of backing vocals. While his voice has an appealing tone in its own right, the producer has employed an auto-tune device as an additional instrument: Dreon’s vocals robotically pick out the individual notes in vocal runs in the ubiquitous way that has been in vogue for some time now. But the real skill in this instance is in the choosing of the moments to do so.
There are some terrific builds to satisfying drops, with synths bubbling and burbling under busy percussive sounds, and the separation of these is first class. Finger snaps drive, wet snares slap away and then reverb-soaked vocals wash through on their own journey.
All-in-all, Right Direction is doing just that – heading that way. It achieves excitement and a blissful tranquility in the space of three tightly-arranged minutes – and you have to say, as I already have, that is impressive.
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