The sheer volume of music on Soundcloud is enough to make your head spin. Millions of hours of music of all genres that you have to sort through to find true gems. Naturally many really great musicians get swept away with the effluvia of mediocre music and sonic clones looking to capitalize on the success of the sounds of more established artists, which is why when true talent without any management, representation or PR catches our attention, we latch on to it, and sound the bugle. We’re sounding the bugle now for Boyewa’s “Sunday Night Raw”. 

Other than a very cryptical “Spirituality”, Boyewa makes no effort to explain his new single, which is the weirdest yet most familiar song we’ve heard in a long while. And perhaps he doesn’t need to, because in spite of the mumbling and gibberish that serves as lyrics for “Sunday Night Raw.” Boyega has sonic articulation more established artists only dream about. Using plonky synths, he creates a dreamscape, filled with synesthetic images of twilight and that sweet spot between wakefulness and sleep. Traditional drums provide the pulse for the song, though even they are put through a vocoder and grisled to provide edge for the song. The resulting sound actively references classic Bollywood show tunes, as well as contemporary film especially horror and mystery genres that milk the sounds we’ve come to associate with apprehension.

Boyewa chants his lines for the song, layering them over to provide a polyphonic refrain, lowering and heightening pitch for effect, he even throws in shredded guitar riffs for effect before switching the entire thing on it’s head and referencing classic 80’s pop with a simple synth piano refrain. Sunday Night Raw is both forward facing and nostalgic and it’s production is beastly.

Boyewa needs to come out of the shadows and embrace his genius because damn, he is quite the revelation.

Listen to “Sunday Night Raw” here.

The New Age wants to succeed but doesn’t want to let go of conventional music models, what gives?