Drgn King on Bar None Records

Got a single in today from Drgn King on Bar None Records across the river in Hoboken, hopefully doing alright in the wake of that ridiculous storm that rolled across the city. Drgn King based in Philly is the combined effort of Dominic Angelella and Brent “Ritz” Reynolds, coming from the same place as yesterday's Wishes and Thieves single in a lot of ways. Dominic was playing in just about every band and genre around town while Brent was holed up, freelancing behind the sound boards producing hip hop...somehow these two get together and start writing what became the tracks from this single and their self released full length, "Paragraph Nights" out in 2013. It's that long road story of countless hours of paying dues combined with an incredible amount of experience across genre's, when finally given the opportunity to put it all together you end up with "Holy Ghost" the A-Side track.
A stompy 4/4 beat bashes out of the clear silence, an alternating kick and snare/clap setting up the rock solid foundation for Dominic to soulfully deliver his catchy laid back layered vocal that can run up into that high falsetto range no problem. It's no surprise this is cleanly produced all kinds of surprises working in layers in service of this straightforward rock beat. It's exactly the kind of thing you can almost hear how these layers could have been constructed in this collaborative process when you start with something just asking to be filled out in this way. Applause and weirdo synth flourishes, that playful, exhaust-the-catalog-of-samples quality give this a kind of Flaming Lips feel, like something off Yoshimi, so unbelievably huge and shiny, it's impossible to not be attracted to it's scale and ambition.
B-Side's "Son of Wolfman (ft. Peedi Crakk) comes out with a dark distorted dance beat with Dominic machine gun ratcheting vocals over a deep groove synth and double time percussion hits. Going almost industrial with this chugging along, gravelly direction, there's a hint of far east melody structures, an almost airy flute element breaks through the menace. Peedi shows up and raises the bar on this crazy vocal rhythm while the backbeat randomly drops out behind his rhymes which don't stop to pause for a single breath.

Get this from Bar None Records who says:

Singer/songwriter Dominic Angelella and hip hop producer Ritz Reynolds are the masterminds behind Philly group DRGN KING. This unlikely duo met by chance at a recording session - Dom had been playing in almost every band in town and Ritz had been hunkered down in the studio producing tracks for the likes of The Roots and Mac Miller. Discovering a mutual love of The Flaming Lips and Wu Tang, they set out on a song cycle that led to Paragraph Nights, their debut full length due out January 2013. Their debut single, "Holy Ghost" is a positive, fun loving pop song with an infectious beat that simply leaves you in a good mood. Bruce Warren (WXPN/Paste) says, "This is otherworldly soulful pop for now people."