ANCHR's Artist of the Week: The Blaze
Oui! Oui! Croissant! The ANCHR Artist of the Week this week is The Blaze, and since they are French, I thought I would greet all of our French speaking readers in their native tongue. The Blaze is a duo of Parisian electronic musicians and music video creators, who also happen to be cousins. Guillaume Alric and Jonathan Alric blessed the world with their partnership for the first time when Jonathan was in film school and asked Guillaume to help him out with a music video soundtrack he was making. Now, they make the smoothest sounding ambient EDM your ears crave.
The Blaze aren’t exactly “new”. Their first album, DANCEHALL, came out in 2018 and was ridden with bops, but their latest album, JUNGLE, is so hot, I didn’t want to keep them to myself and wanted other people to see if they dig them as well. When I first started collecting records, one of the first albums I put on my list was DANCEHALL. Songs like “Heaven”, “She”, and “Faces” are impossible to not move to. I actually dare anyone reading this to put on “She” from The Blaze and try not to move. It’s impossible. JUNGLE, however, is forty five minutes of incredible music. I can’t wait until I get this album.
JUNGLE is a “no skips” for me. Tracks one through ten all hit. I particularly like “Lonely”. I feel like if Daft Pank were still active in 2023, they would have made something like this. Thankfully though, we have The Blaze to create this song and make it even better with such lovely singing and lyrics. Some people may be able to relate, but there’s times where I don’t want to do anything except be by myself. “I’d rather be lonely. Just to be lonely” spoke to me. I have yet to go to France, but listening to this song, makes me think of what going to a club in Paris would be like.
The first time I saw them live was at Concord Music Hall in Chicago in 2018 shortly after they released DANCEHALL. I went into the show really liking the album but left liking it even more after seeing them perform the songs. It turned into a dance party midway through the show. If anyone’s music that they’ve been exhausting has gotten stale, The Blaze would be a great band to mix it up with. If any millennials are reading this that had a Sega Genesis, I feel like their music would be in that Ecco the Dolphin video game. IYKYK.
They presently don’t have any Chicago dates on their tour, but I’m hoping something will be announced soon. In the meantime, they’ll be at Coachella this weekend for any of my festies heading out to the desert this year and for anyone who streams Coachella that may want to check them out. See all of their tour dates here.