Echo Juliet - Lift Your Face to the Sun / Total Darkness

Echo Juliet is set to return with two new EPs, 'Lift Your Face to the Sun' and 'Total Darkness', both released via her own label Invisible IDs. This follows her debut, Abandon Reality, which saw fans and critics drawing comparisons to Four Tet, Bonobo and Gold Panda, and earned early support from tastemakers and DJs including BBC 6Music’s Tom Ravenscroft, Steve Lamacq, Nemone and Riley & Coe, as well as NTS, Rinse FM and Worldwide FM.

Echo Juliet is the alias of Emily Jones, who uses her first love of percussion as the defining element of her sound. The Essex-born producer and DJ swapped her classical music training for Ableton, a midi vibraphone, and decks. Her colourful productions dwell on the fringes of club music, leaning towards the leftfield. Combining high energy excitement with dreamy textures, she draws influence from deep house, broken beat, garage and classical percussion.

“To be honest if you told me ten years ago that I would be doing this, I would have laughed in your face!” says Emily. “We didn’t have a lot of money when I was growing up, so I was fortunate to have some free percussion lessons at school. I loved playing but I got rejected by four music colleges to study classical music, couldn’t afford to try again and so I gave up trying to be a professional musician,” she explains.

Later, Emily learnt to DJ and eventually produce her own music. “I had always said I wouldn’t be good enough to produce electronic music but my boyfriend bought me a copy of Ableton as a surprise so I had to give it a go,” she says. “I loved being able to use my percussion skills in a new way, then a producer showed me how to make a whole track and I was hooked. He helped me for free and told me to pay it forward later, so now I’m working to empower other women to produce,” she continues.

Emily has been an activist for several years, commissioning research on gender representation in music and appearing on BBC Woman’s Hour. She co-founded the Future Proof project for Bradley Zero’s Rhythm Section label which aims to improve representation in electronic music, she teaches music production for Saffron, and is a director of DJ community Selextorhood.

“I wrote these tracks during some tough times” says Emily when asked about inspiration for the new releases. “Making music became an antidote for what my family and I were going through. I built a daily ritual of producing and then walking in green spaces while listening back to what I made.“

“The combination of music and nature was so helpful for me. And it brings me hope to have created something I love out of difficult experiences. I hope this music can bring joy and light for others too."

Highlights from the two releases include sparkling broken beat building into a pulsating house groove on 'Lift Your Face to the Sun', UK-funky meets marimba euphoria in 'Total Darkness', and 'Halfway in Light's' 90s-inspired deep house which has received praise from garage luminary Todd Edwards.

Echo Juliet - 'Lift Your Face to the Sun / Halfway In Light' is released on the 5th of March via Invisible IDs.
Echo Juliet - 'Total Darkness / More Questions Than Answers' is due for release on the 16th of April via Invisible IDs.