{"id":51186,"date":"2016-10-18T15:38:08","date_gmt":"2016-10-18T20:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/?p=51186"},"modified":"2016-10-17T17:58:57","modified_gmt":"2016-10-17T22:58:57","slug":"shura-nothings-real","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/2016\/10\/18\/shura-nothings-real\/","title":{"rendered":"Shura: Nothing’s Real"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"19925412\"I remember when Shura first released \u201cTouch\u201d two to three years back. After hearing the song\u2019s somber yet funky melodies, I excitedly scoured the internet for more of her work. Well, seeing that Nothing\u2019s Real<\/em> is her recently released debut, I did not find more Shura songs when my curiosity was piqued years ago. Still, I kept her on my radar, awaiting the day where she would come out from hiding and release new material. When Nothing\u2019s Real<\/em> was announced and released, I listened to the album the first chance I could and my first impression was of surprise, but in a not entirely pleasant fashion. My expectations steered me in a direction Shura obviously was not planning on arriving to.<\/p>\n

I envisioned an album full of \u201cTouch\u201d clones; Twangy bass lines being highlighted by long, smooth, filtered synths all layered over a good drum beat with excellent soulful vocals in the spotlight. While the superb vocals are ever-present, the album has a more poppy vibe than I anticipated. All-in-all, Nothing\u2019s Real<\/em> is much more of an 80\u2019s inspired electropop album than an electronic soul album. Songs like \u201cWhat\u2019s it Gunna Be?\u201d and \u201cWhat Happened To Us?\u201d rely heavily on addictive choruses with easy to remember lyrics about tense romantic situations. Though the formula is easy to identify, the instrumentation is good and Shura\u2019s vocals are so on-point that they carry most of the album.<\/p>\n

She emphasizes each beat in a way that makes every sound in the mix pop. Her voice is so smooth and easy to listen to. I know I must sound like I have a huge crush on her, but I believe that this album would be nothing without the voice of Shura on the foreground. \u201c2Shy\u201d and \u201cTouch\u201d both do an excellent job at showcasing the vocals. These two songs are also fantastically dynamic. In fact, the overall mixing of the album is above industry standard. Besides the more exciting parts, which is forgivable from an engineering standpoint, each individual element of a song can be easily dissected by the ears and each track maintains appropriate volume levels.<\/p>\n

Nothing\u2019s Real<\/em> strikes a nice balance between the new and old pop formulae. While the album sounds like it was made in 2016, it feels like an 80\u2019s pop album. Shura has certainly set herself up for a promising career with the release of this album. Providing she adapts to push herself further away from the sound\u2019s similar artists, I think she could continue her success.
\n
\nRecommended If You Like: a-ha, Chvrches, Mystery Skulls
\nRecommended Tracks: 4 (Touch), 3 (What’s It Gonna Be?), 2 (Nothing’s Real), 11 (2Shy), 7 (What Happened to Us?), 8 (Kidz ‘N’ Stuff), 9 (Tongue Tied), 10 (Make It Up)
\nDo Not Play: None
\nWritten by Shane Blair on 10\/17\/2016 <\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An electropop album that sounds like it was made in 2016, but feels like an 80\u2019s pop album.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1609,"featured_media":51187,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[5839,2962,5838,2934,5837],"class_list":["post-51186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hip-hopelectronic-rotation","tag-electropop","tag-indie-pop","tag-nothings-real","tag-shane-blair","tag-shura"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/19925412.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1609"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kjhk.org\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}