Bonobo & Arooj Aftab
“Fire on the Water"
Ninja Tune (available via Bandcamp)
Earlier this year, I couldn’t stop raving about Arooj Aftab’s stunning performance at the Detroit Opera House. Singing in both her native language of Urdu and English, there’s something transfixing in Aftab’s delivery — so much so that it completely shut up the crowd as they were ushered into their seats. When was the last time you saw an opener own the crowd like that?
On Aftab’s collaboration with earthy house producer Bonobo, she’s once again stealing the show. Their collaboration is called “Fire on the Water.” It’s featured on Bonobo’s most recent album, Distance in Static, which was released earlier this year on Ninja Tune.
There are some major collaborators here — Nicole Miglis, Joy Crookes, Nilüfer Yanya — and yet Aftab shines through. She offers the perfect complement to Bonobo’s trip-hop, worldly approach to chilled-out, loungey house music.
“Fire on the Water” was one of the first singles released from Distance in Static. It stands out as one of the best and by far one of the most human tracks on the album, arriving with a gentle guitar over a static click before Aftab’s voice soars in. From there, it’s nearly two minutes of tension building before the drums fully arrive to match the power of Aftab’s voice. Violin players, a cello, and bass help anchor Bonobo’s piano and synth.
While it’s easy to give all the credit to Aftab’s stunning voice here, this is clearly the beauty of a collaboration that absolutely works. Too often when singers and producers team up, the singer’s voice can sound distant or removed from the music itself, like it wasn’t recorded in the same room — or even on the same planet. Here, you can actually hear the room it was made in. (Neil Young’s Broken Arrow Ranch studio in Woodside, California.) You can feel the texture of the track.
It’s a testament to two artists working wonderfully in tandem.
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