When you have the pulling power of someone like Calvin Harris, you use it to full effect and get some of the biggest names in the music industry for your most ambitious album yet. And that’s what Calvin Harris has done. With his latest LP, ‘Funk Wav Bounces Vol 1‘, featuring the likes of Katy Perry, Pharrell Williams, Snoop Dogg, the ever elusive Frank Ocean, Migos, Nicki Minaj, Khalid, and many more, the Scot has set a new precedent for dance music with his 5th studio album.
All my songs in 2017 have been sonically designed to make you feel fucking incredible
— Calvin Harris (@CalvinHarris) February 22, 2017
After announcing back in February that all his “songs in 2017 have been designed to make you feel f**king incredible“, Harris strips down his signature sound to the bare minimum, and builds up from scratch with more nu-disco and funk elements. The album is full of some incredibly laidback and chilled out cuts, with the Frank Ocean and Migos assisted ‘Slide‘ and Khalid and Future featuring ‘Rollin‘ coming off as the clear cut winners on the record. Special praise needs to be reserved for ‘Skrt On Me‘ featuring Nicki Minaj, which gives out a dancehall meets Caribbean vibe, and ‘Prayers Up‘ featuring Travis Scott‘s smooth vocals and A-Trak‘s scratching dexterity barely on display during the penultimate moments of the track.
The whole album is a perfect package of summer jams that will inevitably find their way into your playlists, be it for your long drives or house parties, but that’s where the buck stops. ‘Funk Wav Bounces Vol 1‘ feels more like a compilation (a brilliant one at that nonetheless) of singles featuring superstar artists, rather than a cohesive album that goes in a flow. A far departure from his pop meets EDM style, Calvin Harris has brought back funk in a big style in 2017, and it’s worth wondering whether other electronic music artists will follow the same route, or continue doing their own thing.
Stream the album in full below, and make sure you grab your copy from iTunes.