I first encountered this track from the Red Bull Music & Culture YouTube channel where the Portico Quartet played the track at their live space. I was hooked right away.
Portico Quartet’s sounds are one of those where you’d just go "are they jazz? are they electronica? are they - nah screw it, its Portico Quartet.”
A very unique and inspiring mix of sounds - Hang Drum played with mallets, saxophone, electronic loops, short-stroked, almost RnB like drum beat, double bass and layers of cinematic strings and pads.
Their album title, “Art in the Age of Automation”, could not be more fitting as well - being a mishmash of electronically generated, "automated" sounds and some really tasty artistic riffs from the keys and sax.
Mix-wise, I particularly enjoyed how they treated the saxophone as a reverb-heavy, “airy” tone that sits at the very top of the ensemble, instead of sounding “in front” of everyone else, like many traditional sax-based jazz records.
You can learn more about Portico Quartet here:
About The Curator - Oliver Cheung
Oliver Cheung is a musician based in Hong Kong. Although he has recently released his debut instrumental progressive rock EP (titled Remembrance), it is only a part of what he wanted to create, as he pursue his passion in music and art with the question, “what else is out there?”
