Leak 04-13 (Bait Ones)

About

There are certain stories in pop culture that become the stuff of legend and Jai Paul’s tale is undoubtedly one of them. Like so many artists in the 2010, the Northwest London-born singer, songwriter, and producer first garnered interest on social media. By 2011, his magnificent, beguiling demo tracks “BTSTU” and “Jasmine” had earned him a deal with indie label XL Recordings—plus heavyweight fans such as Beyoncé, Drake, and Ed Sheeran. It’s no wonder: These were shimmering electronic tracks that swelled with assuredness in a unique sonic terrain, offering an early contender for the first proper era-of-internet-age pop. The world seemed to be his oyster. But then, in 2013, a copy of his work-in-progress debut album was stolen and uploaded to the internet. Some people thought it was a publicity stunt and that Paul himself had leaked the record. It was a hurtful sentiment, one that led the already enigmatic artist to shrink into the shadows for nearly a decade. In 2019, <i>Leak 04-13 (Bait Ones)</i> finally got an official release. In a way, the fact that it’s unfinished adds to Paul’s mystique. We’ll never know exactly how he had intended to improve on this collection of song, but there’s something about the slightly raw nature of each track that fizzes with excitement and possibility. Synthesizing R&B into something plush, technicolor and new, the record flickers with all the sounds he’d grown up with: There are emulations of the radio tags you often got on LimeWire download, splices of ’80s-style synth-pop, and samples of the intricate Bollywood percussion and vocals he’d heard in his British Indian upbringing. Those original two demo tracks remain utterly singular, but this album expands on Paul’s universe. Take the sheen of “Genevieve” with its propulsive choru, his breathy, sleek cover of Jennifer Paige’s “Crush,” the crunchy intensity of “100,000,” or the bubbling, yearning romance of “All Night” (with swoony lines like “I’ve been searching for a love like this/For the rest of time/Alway, I’ll remember this”). Then there’s the breezy, Ravi Shankar-sampling “Str8 Outta Mumbai” which is shot through with sheer euphoria. .

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

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