Channel Focus – Rock

Jeeni Blog

Helping the next generation of talent to build a global fanbase

Channel Focus – Rock

Jeeni’s rock channel is one of our busiest and most prolific stops for our Jeeni artists. They populate the channel with countless different approaches and understandings of the rock genre. From Manchester-based guitarist, Julience keeping the classic era alive with epic guitar-focused ballads to New York’s rockstar veteran, Eden James who’s been releasing stellar rock-pop records since 2008.

Here’s a brief breakdown of some of Jeeni’s most viewed rock artists.

Giack Bazz: https://jeeni.com/showcase/giack-bazz/

Giack Bazz is an explosive, relentless multi-instrumentalist songwriter based in London. The artist started igniting stages with his painfully honest lyrics and his screaming telecaster in 2015. He has since released three solo albums that were critically acclaimed (Blowup magazine, Decade, Rumore). In 2020 he released the 366-song effort “Impression A.I.” which featured artwork by Damien Hirst and consisted of an “Audissey in sound” of over 6 hours of original, genre-bending music. The release is currently awaiting Guinness World Record authentication for “most songs on a digital album”. Now Giack has conjured and completed a new collection of songs of conventional length:

Inspired by Jeff Buckley, Paul McCartney, and Jamie T “Just a Little Bit More Famous” is a spiritual sequel to his 2017 sophomore album, “Giack Bazz Is Not Famous” and is set to release in late 2022.

In just five short years, Giack Bazz has crafted a spectrum of ideas and concepts with his discography that a lot artists don’t get around to in their lifetime. Although Giack has expanded his sound to stylistic corners that he even had to create himself, his sound has typically always been centred around alternative, experimental rock, inspired by the likes of David Bowie, Thom Yorke and Devendra Banhart.

A Year In Provence: https://jeeni.com/showcase/a-year-in-provence/

Brand new to Jeeni, A Year In Provence consists of five members: Matt Potter (Lead Vocals/Guitar), Adam Bacon (Bass), James Fermer (Backing Vocals/Guitar), Dan Wing (Lead Guitar) and Jack Smith (Drums). Originally all from Kent, United Kingdom. AYIP met in 2016 but after undergoing a few line-up changes, 2020 produced the current line-up. Influences for their music include the likes of; Catfish and the bottleman, The Black Keys, Two Door Cinema Club, Oasis, Kings Of Leon, Circa Waves and many more.

In March 2020, the whole world was hit by the covid-19 Pandemic but for AYIP, it was a blessing in disguise. They decided to get back together and start writing some new tunes. During this time, they decided to change the band from a 4 piece into a 5 piece by bringing on James Fermer which added a new texture that they never knew they needed. By the time that May, 2021 rolled around, they had finished 8 songs and were ready to go out gigging again with brand new music which finally happened in July 2021.

A Year In Provence have extensively gigged the Tunbridge Wells and surrounding areas music scene. Their next aim is to start moving to the London and Brighton music scene. They also have a range of merchandise that will be available soon!

Julience: https://jeeni.com/showcase/julience/

Julience is a UK-based singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He draws inspiration from pop and rock music. His songs show his love for the 1960s until the early 2000s while updating traditional sounds to stay fresh and up-to-date. Julience’s songs have powerful hooks and harmonies. A heavy guitar sound is consistent throughout. Julience grew up in the Southern part of the Netherlands. He moved to Manchester to pursue music. He loves writing and playing music that combines prominent elements of guitar-driven pop and rock.

Rock music is very robust; time and time again, it has come so close to disappearing only to revive itself and evolve to fit better into modern music climates. The difference with Julience is that he refuses to dilute the music he loves to conform to fit anything other than himself. Even in the infancy of his discography, he’s gained recognition and respect for keeping an older form of rock alive in the present day. Julience has been featured on over 30 playlists on streaming platforms with titles like ‘Punk Goes Pop’, ‘Retro Now Rock’ and ‘Rock ‘n Roll isn’t Dead’. Jeeni is excited to be able to feature Julience’s fantastic throw-back tracks on our rock and guitar channels as they release.

Respite: https://jeeni.com/showcase/respite-band/

Alt-rock quintet hailing from Glasgow, Scotland. Respite blends elements of punk, post-hardcore and pop music, with lyrics and vocals heavily inspired by pop-punk and emo. Influenced by bands such as Don Broco, Mallory Knox and A Day To Remember, Respite deliver catchy and energetic earworms with a subtle depth.

Having supported acts such as Hawthorne Heights, Trophy Eyes and Like Pacific, the band are currently preparing the release of their debut EP, after the launch of their first single, “Chemical Sleep” which debuted 3rd of October.

Respite joined forces with Jeeni earlier this year and since then, Jeeni has been hard at work trying to elevate, uplift and support this fantastic group by providing an ethical worldwide platform for their hard-hitting and refreshing craft. Respite is: Andrew Vaughan & Euan Macqueen as guitarists, Ross Crawford on the bass, Reiss Mcleod on the drums and Sam Nicholson on the vocals.

Eden James: https://jeeni.com/showcase/edenjames/?view=videos

Eden James is an indie rock-pop recording artist, winning multiple music awards from his native home of Australia and achieving a number one hit in Greece. Classic Rock magazine UK recently reviewed his new album 'All the Good Blank Are Taken' saying “Oozes urban cool and Springsteen swagger… a concise collision of catchiness and class.”

The rock songwriter's latest album features Bruce Springsteen's and Paul Simon's band members, and was produced by the iconic Tim Leitner, known for his work with Billy Joel and Tina Turner. The new LP is Eden’s fourth studio album and was released on July 9th, 2021. The album has spawned twenty-six (26) global music and video awards in 2021 and peaked at position 24 on the iTunes Rock Albums Chart Australia.

Eden James' debut album ‘Never Setting Sun’ launched a chart-topping hit single and received critical acclaim. With the release of his second album he appeared on the Rockwave festival bill with The Killers, Placebo and Moby. Eden was the second top billing on the Vibe stage for the largest music festival in Greece. His international tours and performances in Japan, United Kingdom, France, Norway, Sweden, Greece, Poland, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand and the USA have resulted in an ever-growing fan base. His music can be streamed and downloaded on all major stores and platforms.

Check out Jeeni's rock channel here: https://jeeni.com/channel/all-channels/rock/

If you'd like to contribute to Jeeni's rock channel, reach out to our marketing team at doug@jeeni.com or ella@jeeni.com

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10
Jun

The Death of Letitia

Jeeni has returned to Crowdcube to raise more funds for helping new talent. Jeeni founding director Mel Croucher says, “We’re ahead of our original schedule, but there’s still so much more to do. We need to scale our online platform globally now and build our mass artist showcases. Jeeni raised £100K in 6 days and we're working hard to get more investors on board. Then we can hit all our targets, and give our new artists the recognition they deserve.” If you want to see our pitch click HERE. Mel has been writing the best-loved column in top-selling tech magazines for over 30 years. Now he’s agreed to share his work with all our members. He’s a video games pioneer and musician, and to to find out more about Mel check out his Wikipedia page. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Croucher. Here’s one of Mel’s latest! Black lives matter. Unless black lives feature in a videogame, in which case they don't matter a toss. I still remember the feeling of hope and despair when I played Daley Thompson's Decathlon for the first time. That was way back in the Olympic year of 1984, and it was a primitive sports simulation from Ocean software for a little home computer called the 48k Sinclair ZX Spectrum. Daley Thompson was an Olympic gold medal winner from Notting Hill. He had a fine body, and a great moustache, and according to his skin he was the son of his assassinated Nigerian dad. Anyway, I fired up the game and there on my glowing colour monitor was the pixilated figure of Daley, the great black athlete, running along a red cinder track. The thing was, the programmers had made him white. No, I couldn't believe it either. A huge crowd of spectators also appeared in the gameplay, and every one of them was as white as a Ku Klux Klan convention in a chalk pit. It's not as if no black characters ever appeared in videogames. Almost all the assassins, hoodlums, terrorists, monsters and mobsters were black, and their purpose was to be killed off willy nilly. Apart from Michael Jackson. He was the hero in a Sega videogame called Moonwalker and his role was to rescue kidnapped children and take them home. So there was nothing creepy about that, was there. Mind you, wee Michael was mostly as white in the game as he was in real life. For a real black and white issue from the early twenty-first century, I have revisited Ethnic Cleansing, developed by Resistance Records for PC desktop machines. That's the one where the white player gets sent off on a quest to murder blacks. It is equal opportunity racism, because you also score points for killing Latinos and Jews. And speaking of equal opportunities let's hear it for the computer character Letitia who appears in an update of Deus Ex, which is set in a cyberpunk future. Letitia lives on a rubbish dump, she is as horny as she is simple, and she speaks minstrel drivel in the sort of deep-South accent last heard in a Mel Brooks parody. You couldn't make it up. Except that's exactly what they did. And shame on you Mary DeMarle for writing it, Amanda Strawn for acting it, and Square Enix for publishing it. In the USA, over 70% of all African Americans play video games, but they make up less than 3% of game developers, which tells me quite a lot about the state of the play over there. This side of the pond, things are much better, where we have over 10% of people working in game development of a BAME demographic. That's a higher percentage than their number in the national working population, and way higher than in UK publishing, tv and music. This is good news, but it's where the good news ends. Last time I visited a major gaming studio in pre-lockdown, I did see several black faces. One was on security at street level, one was behind the reception desk, two were behind the counter in the canteen, and one was swilling out the bogs. The number of black and minority ethnic decision-makers in the UK computer gaming industry is shockingly low. As a result, race has lagged way behind gender and sexuality when it comes to stereotypes in gaming. Mainstream game designers tend not to question a norm, and they rarely rock the boat by refusing to carry out a questionable storyboard handed down to them by predominantly white hands from above. Most game designers I come across have less creative imagination than Rufus my Irish Setter, not to mention a much poorer sense of loyalty and the inability to lick their own genitalia. Video games have always followed movies in characterisation, and they are painfully stiff with stereotypes. Historically, lazy, myopic creatives have allocated blacks four roles - the violent black, the servile black, the sidekick black and the comedy black. I am removing sports games and music games from my list, since they exhibit no imagination whatsoever, but simply copy real people from the real world, unless you happen to be Daley Thompson or Michael Jackson, of course. The blame for all this lies squarely with the course leaders who purport to teach video game creation in universities and colleges. I have never met a creative course leader who is darker skinned than me, and I'm a sort of mottled puce. They may well instruct their students to bung in a character of the negro persuasion as if to fill some sort of racial minority quota, a bit like when those tv adverts suddenly started to feature blacks doing non-traditional things. Like working in building societies, and driving new cars. The change is coming through the independent video game creators, the so-called home-brew developers, and the change had begun in the UK way before the Black Lives Matter movement gathered such momentum. Creative change always comes from the mavericks and rarely from the corporates. As for the people who play the games, next time you come across a racial stereotype you know what to do. Take a knee. To the groin of the writer, programmer and publisher. The Death of Letitia, from Deus Ex: Human Revolution Click HERE to visit or return to jeeni.com

26
Apr

Profiiit ‘Alexander’ Album Review

This indulgent and impressive album from East Coast rapper, Profiiit might be his most creatively realised and polished project yet. Relatively new to Jeeni, Connecticut rapper, Profiiit has taken the hip-hop and rap channels to another level with his hard-hitting and thoughtful brand of introspective US rap music. He has recently contributed the entirety of this new album, ‘Alexander’ to his showcase. Check out his showcase on Jeeni here: https://jeeni.com/showcase/profiiit/ Throughout ‘Alexander’, Profiiit refuses to fall into the rut that so many rappers succumb to; repetitive beats, aimless song structures and uninspired lyrics. The way that Profiiit crafts these tracks, gives the impression that they’re important and demand your attention. Sometimes, Profiiit won’t feature his vocals until halfway through a track, because he’s not afraid to allow other components, features and instruments to shine and have their own moment before he contributes his poignant lyrics and flow to the pieces. Possibly inspired by Kendrick Lamar, recorded spoken word samples heard throughout add an intimate and real level of substance and insight into Profiiit’s life and backstory. Something that makes a huge difference compared to other artists is Profiiit’s evident prowess in editing down tracks, trimming off fat and streamlining his work. The songs get to the point when necessary and take their time at other moments, depending on the tempo and momentum held in the album’s listen. A tasteful and moving use of samples can be expected across this album, particularly in closers ‘Sodapop’ and ‘Red Baron’. Instead of just chopping up samples to construct the instrumental/beat and repeating sections over and over, samples are sometimes played unaccompanied for impact and as an effective means of progressing the tone and mood of the songs, this can be heard in ‘Yale (Josephine)’. A perfect selection and amount of featured talent embellish ‘Alexander’ without distracting or diminishing from Profiiit. Peso Dollaz provides a melodic, trap-esque verse for the second half of ‘sant_thegod’ that does well do diversify both the track and the entire album. East London Jeeni artist Jada Freeman provides her soulful singing for some essential backing vocals and hooks in ‘Triggaotto’. And the talented and upcoming Cool Que gives a semi-sung mumble-rap verse on ‘D.R.E’ which is a fantastic contrast from Profiiit’s clear, and distinct rapping. A fantastic and layered project from Profiiit, listen to it in full on Jeeni here: https://jeeni.com/showcase/profiiit/ How can Jeeni support artists like Profiiit? JEENI is a multi-channel platform for original entertainment on demand. We’re a direct service between creatives and the global audience. • We give creatives, independent artists and performers a showcase for their talent and services. And they keep 100% of everything they make. • We empower our audience and reward them every step of the way. • We promise to treat our members ethically, fairly, honestly and with respect. • Access to artist liaison and a supportive marketing team.

05
Jun

Jeeni announces FREE Membership for all Musicians, Performers and Fans, whilst artists keep 100% of everything they earn.

Live venues are out, but your audience is still there. That's why we have turned our online streaming service, from subscription based membership to absolutely FREE. We are determined to support all Musicians, Performers and Pros to earn money while the COVID-19 pandemic prevents them from playing live shows. As the entertainment industry pumps out new ways of thinking to support creatives in this troubled time, we as a team are agile and committed to change the platform day to day if necessary. In the meantime we have spent the last week working hard behind the scenes to make sure Jeeni is there is help and removed membership fees and restructured the platform so you can get paid directly to your bank account or PayPal account, with no hidden fees or charges. So How Does It Work? Jeeni is an online showcase that puts your talent in front of a global audience. We do all the work and you reap all the rewards. No hype, no adverts, no scams, no rip-offs, no fakes, no charge. We give you all the tools you need to showcase your talent, and reach out to your target audience in safety. You will be able to keep 100% of everything you earn from the sale of your music, donations, live streaming and merchandise. We have responded fast to update the platform this week to reflect the changing offer, our sole purpose to support musicians and performers in such uncertain times. We are looking for members of the Independent Musicians and Performers Community Group to join us and help us beta test and develop the platform faster, so we can scale and showcase your music globally. You may not have a showcase and just love listening to your favorite bands or acts for free, but as a FAN you can also join and help us test the site. So what's the catch? There is none... you have nothing to lose, everything to gain, all in a completely free and in a safe environment. Jeeni promises to treat you ethically, honestly and with respect, so that you can stay creative and stay safe. Check us out and join us, just two easy steps entirely for FREE. www.jeeni.com

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