Pomrad + Shoko Igarashi

Pomrad

Pomrad, the alter ego of singer, producer and keyboard virtuoso Adriaan Van de Velde, combines 80s fusion funk, raw electro-dance, and 90s rave grooves with catchy melodies and dreamy yet gritty bass-driven pop music. In the electro-funk scene he is best known for his typical drippy sweaty funk and scorching hot ballads. His energetic live performances are both musically impressive and entertaining. He uses his craftsmanship as a trained jazz musician to play a laboratory of synths and samplers, combining it with weird dance moves, a sweet tenor voice, and a good dose of irony & humor.

On his new album, Silver Blue, Pomrad unleashes his inner pop songwriter and reinvents himself by singing all the lead vocals. The songs on the album are mostly expressions of desires and grief, each song telling a different story, using a different metaphor for the deeply melancholic longing for love, bliss, and euphoria, that all seem unreachable, unless you flee or escape into the magical fairytale world that music can be.

“Pure sunshine vibes!” – Gilles Peterson, Worldwide “Sweet and sunny... funky to the core." – XLR8R.com “This EP is totally BRILLIANT.” - Simbad, Worldwide

Shoko Igarashi

Shoko Igarashi was born in 1991 in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan. An accomplished tenor saxophonist, she is also a versatile flautist and plays alto and soprano saxophone fluently. She has already made her mark as both an arranger and a composer. Shoko grew up surrounded by dreamlike landscapes of abundant nature in the snowy countryside of Tsuruoka, a mysterious and surreal region renowned for producing the best quality rice in Japan, where she says, “the water and the air feel the purest," and where mountains and shrines overflow with ancient mysticism.

After beginning her musical career in Tokyo, she attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree of music. She then relocated to Brooklyn, New York where she began regularly performing live alongside innumerable talented jazz musicians. In 2018, she moved to Brussels, Belgium and founded the group Maniac Maison with her partner, pianist Casimir Liberski, and guitarist Lucien Fraipont.

Since 2018, Shoko has written and compiled a series of well-crafted, colourful electronic songs curating diverse influences such as Sly & the Family Stone, Earth Wind & Fire, Japanese City-Pop, '70s jazz fusion, and the anime film music that she grew up learning to play. Her nimble and seamless assembly of these very different elements into her unique sound is astonishingly natural. Her first official solo Album is released by Tigersushi records in May 2022 and received many great reviews by such as Pitchfolk, Mixmag, and Les inrocks.