Perhaps you'll find 1Luv's debut album "Neophilia" described as "feathery light deep house" and with as much as deep house is influenced by the worlds of soul and disco, calling on the same sweet, fluttering female voices, Latin and Afro based dance beats, and combinations of frenetic and sweeping synth keys, those four words sum it up. But I'm inclined to say Neophilia ranges into a combination of deep house and slow-motion broken soulful R&B that's feathery light and heavy-sweet like molasses.

1. Pieces Of You
2. Neophilia
3. Above You
4. The Answer
5. Stay
6. Starz
7. Crazy Waitin' 4 U
8. If U Can Be Strong
9. Can't Live
10. Gonna Get 2 U
11. Above You (Dixon edit)

The album starts off on the feathery side with "Pieces Of You", a soulful R&B track with the kind of lightly played percussion and dramatic chord progressions you can expect, almost as a trademark, in many of Sonar Kollektiv's releases.

With the next track "Neophilia", things get a little heavier, but only slightly. The musical and singing style on this one takes after more of a jazz sound...scatting much of the time, where the voice and vibes mimic each others bubbling notes. The scat gives way to clearly soul styled vocals that take a strong lead on the song.

"Above You" is where the deep house side really steps in. It's got a 4/4 house beat, R&B vocals and that certain sleek, upscale, urban something that deep house always seems to invoke. "The Answer" slows things down with a straight Bossa Nova style, that shares its space with some nicely unexpected soul inspired moments. "Stay" breaks the mood down even further into the kind of dusky, syrup laced moodiness most often attributed to Morcheeba (maybe it's the Rhodes...truthfully it's also the vocals). Just past the halfway mark though, "Stay" breaks into an incredible soul jam with a really strong vocal performance and equally matching percussion and horns.

"Starz" presents an Afro-beat inspired house cut with deeply toned female vocals that take on a style reminiscent of work I've heard by Mark de Clive-Lowe. The music however, keeps a sound that's more organic than is typcially the style of de Clive-Lowe. "Crazy Waitin' 4 U" presents a more challenging percussive arrangement, deep, bassy, and with a slowly thumping bass kick that spends all but the last minute of the track all broken up. It's also the first song to noticeably introduce male vocals, in duet with the female and both sung in the album's established R&B style. "If U Can Be Strong" keeps up the Afro-beat influences, combined with the same dramatic, soulful R&B vocal style. There's a definite strength to this one in its deep, warm synth keys and unassuming-but-moving beats. When you really give yourself over to this track and soak up everything it offers, it's going to move you.

After a couple of more soul-heavy tracks comes a blatantly deep housey mix of "Above You" called the Dixon edit. The emphasis on this one is placed on the classic house 4/4 kicks and closed hi-hat pattern, as opposed to the originals percussive focus on the 4/4 kicks and snares. The snares that step into this mix take on a broken beat, afro-beat inspired styling. Dixon (aka Steffen Berkhahn) is also known as Wahoo when he's working with Georg Levin.

1Luv is Vancouver, Canada based musician, producer and DJ Jason Oculto (aka Dr. J) who has built his musical background with a mixture of jazz, Latin, funk, and house music. The voice you hear is that of Amalia Townsend (aka Miss Fuze), an active personality in Toronto, Canada's jazz scene who has roots in the West London scene and the Philippines as well. It's the West London influence that plays out strongest in her vocal delivery.

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Original Release Date: April 9, 2007

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