Social Music by Benjamin Luhis

‘’I come from a dual heritage family – one from the Caribbean, the other working class from Nottingham. For this project, I wanted to celebrate both of those worlds. That mixture. I challenged myself to make an honest record about that world’’. Benjamin Luhis is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and producer from Nottingham, UK.
SOCIAL MUSIC is an exploration of jazz, raw funk, 70s R&B and electronic music. Created within the mindset of breaking away from the dependence on studio techniques such as looping or sampling, Benjamin Luhis has created a mini-album in which the listener will notice the organic qualities of the record and pick out those perceived imperfections on every new listen.

‘’Doing my usual thing of reading album liner notes and then looking up musicians and producers online, via The Roots, I came to Voodoo by D’Angelo and it totally changed everything for me. The dynamics of this album blew me away. It was so gritty. I always wanted to make a record which had such sonic depth and emotional content’’.

After developing his song writing and production skills whilst being a mainstay in the live bands for artists such as Ronika and Nina Smith, Benjamin Luhis took to recording in various studios, living rooms and rehearsal spaces in Nottingham before deciding to mix the album at JT Soar with Phil Booth (who has worked with artists such as Sleaford Mods, Slumb Party). ‘’Between listening to avant-garde jazz, post punk and deep funk cuts, we nerded out over retro synths and watching old sketches by Peter Serafinowicz and Robert Popper on YouTube. I chose to work with Phil at JT Soar because it is the DIY punk & alt rock venue in my hometown. I know I couldn’t have created this record in a more clinically designed space’’.

The inspiration for the album title comes from a 1980s TV interview with Miles Davies in which he rejects the term jazz (in that period) as it he finds it restrictive. A musician should be able to create whatever they feel in that moment of time.

‘’In a world which is ever changing at a frantic pace, it’s easy for individuals and for peoples’ stories to go unnoticed or ignored. I wanted this to be a mini album that reflects how a lot of people feel right now. Angry and a bit lost... vulnerable. I intentionally decided to not add the human voice on this particular record and distort the focus of my artwork – I wanted to see where these songs and images took each individual listener. I collaborated with traditionally trained jazz players and post-punk saxophonists. I flipped my name, always a source of confusion for people, to be a reminder of Britain’s complex relationship with the Caribbean. I wanted to play with everything that ‘isn’t supposed to be’ and just show what we can achieve by not sticking to the status quo’’.

Benjamin Luhis is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and producer from Nottingham, UK. His music is an exploration of alt-r&b, jazz, broken beat and EDM. As an artist, Benjamin Luhis is particularly interested in the sonics of sound; how tone, timbre and duration elicit deeper emotional connections to music and the collective experience.

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