Richard X

Richard Philips, better known by his stage name Richard X, is a British songwriter and music producer. Gaining attention as a pioneer of the bootleg craze, Richard X has earned success as a producer and remixer. He has helmed hit singles for artists including Annie, Kelis, Liberty X, Rachel Stevens and Sugababes. According to an early issue of the now defunct Popworld magazine, Philips' alias comes from a postcard which was sealed with a kiss misinterpreted for the letter X.

Richard X is known for his "synthesised, grungy pop music", which was inspired by bands such as The Human League and Kraftwerk. His original intention was to "reinvent" pop music by making records that are "deliberately unplayable". Referring to his 'Girls on Top' bootlegs, Richard X says, "At the time it was inspired by anti the po-facedness of the electronica scene as much as anything. The production side, how it sounded – rough and spiky, electronic and modern – was what did it for me. Taking pop and putting it through a blender sound wise was the spirit of the times."

Clean Bandit

Clean Bandit is an English electronic group founded in Cambridge, England, in 2009. The group consists of Jack Patterson, Luke Patterson, Grace Chatto, and Neil Amin-Smith.

Their 2010 single "Mozart's House", released on Black Butter Records, reached number 17 on the UK Singles Chart. In January 2014, they scored their first UK Singles Chart-topping single with "Rather Be", a collaboration with Jess Glynne, featuring elements of both classical and dance music. "Rather Be" remained at the top of the chart for four weeks. In 2014, they achieved their first US Top 10 single with "Rather Be" peaking at number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. The group had its largest performance in summer of 2015 in Baku, Azerbaijan, at the closing ceremony of 2015 European Games, which had over 68,000 attendances.

In 2015, "Rather Be" won the Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording.

History

2006–12: formation and career beginnings

Band members Jack Patterson, Grace Chatto, and Neil Amin-Smith met while studying as undergraduates at Jesus College, University of Cambridge. At the time, Amin-Smith was leading a string quartet together with Chatto, who both attended Westminster School.

Remix

A remix is a piece of media which has been altered from its original state by adding, removing, and/or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, video, or photograph can all be remixes. The only characteristic of a remix is that it appropriates and changes other materials to create something new.

Most commonly, remixes are associated with music and songs. Songs are remixed for a variety of reasons:

Stereo Love

"Stereo Love" is a 2009 song recorded by the Romanian musician Edward Maya with the Moldavian-Romanian musician Vika Jigulina, released as their debut single in late 2009 from Maya's album The Stereo Love Show. The refrain is from "Bayatılar", composed by Azerbaijani musician Eldar Mansurov. It became a worldwide hit in nightclubs and rose to the top of French, Dutch, Turkish, Finnish, UK, Norwegian, Spanish, Swedish and Irish singles charts.

The song and the music video were both included on the compilation NRJ Music Awards 2010. The music video was filmed in Greece, as Edward Maya stated in an interview that Greece "was a place that I fell in love with". In 2011, the song was awarded as top dance song at the Billboard Music Awards.

Composition

"Stereo Love" is set in common time with a moderate tempo of 125 beats per minute. It is set in the key of C# minor with a simple chord progression of C#m-A-E-G#m.

Lyrically the song speaks of a passionate love between two people that is now dying, and their struggle to rekindle that flame.

Edward Maya

Edward Maya (born Eduard Marian Ilie; 29 June 1986) is a Romanian DJ, musician, producer, performer, and composer. He graduated from George Enescu Music High School in Bucharest and is currently a final year student at the Bucharest Conservatory.

Career

In and around 2006, Maya worked with many other Romanian artists such as Akcent, Vika Jigulina,. He worked also on the song Tornerò, which was performed by Mihai Trăistariu in the Eurovision Song Contest 2006. He added in an interview on Beat-Town.com that this song "was the beginning of my career"

In the summer of 2009, Maya launched his first song as an artist, "Stereo Love", reaching No.2 in the Romanian singles charts. Later that year, "Stereo Love" became a hit in clubs all over the world. While this success was followed by concerts worldwide, the song entered the top-5 singles charts in Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK. "Stereo Love" has received over 200 million YouTube views since August 2009.