Courtesy of Edo Lee’s Facebook.
This New York City producer is one that I have shown many people in the past year. Edo Lee is starting to emerge in the online DJ community with recent shouts from a rapper in our own local network, Ace Cosgrove. I discovered Edo Lee — also known as Adrian Lee Hayman — last year listening to a platinum 8tracks playlist. The title track of the playlist, “Black Coffee,” is a lo-fi, jazz-filled instrumental hip-hop piece with a lovely Fitzgerald vocal sample.
This week, Lee released a fresh track for the first time in six months. “Birdcall/Melt feat. Tru-Type” fuses a blend of mystical, wind melodies on top of a hip hop percussion. Lee’s usual jazzy textures are intricately weaved into the track with a few soulful piano compositions and a bit of a reminiscent saxophone recorded and played by Lee himself.
Across all of his tracks, his mixtures of interesting vintage samples combined with world sounds form original works of art. A quality in Lee’s work that highly appeals to me is how “New York” all of his songs sound; his even blend of jazz, lo-fi textures and hip hop beats all make for a distinctively appealing New York flavor.