Review
Genre and Mood
Katalyst and Stephanie McKay make Day into Night out of reggae and soul, and the press release that announced it promised a classic summer tune. It is groovy and bittersweet at once: the Monkeyboxing reviewer heard a warm, beautiful summer evening, tinged with melancholy.
Song Summary
Day into Night came out as a single on 18 April 2011 and opens Deep Impressions, the album Katalyst released that September. The label’s description is short and exact: a reggae soul number, with McKay’s sweet vocal melodies flowing over driving bass and guitars. Monkeyboxing added the detail that defines the sound, a tremolo guitar, and a reading of the story: the singer’s man has left, and she is trying to convince herself he is coming back while knowing he is not. That gap between a sunny groove and a sad story is the song.
Musical Breakdown
The Groove
The sources describe the band rather than the order of events: driving bass, guitars and the trembling tremolo guitar on top. No source maps the song section by section, so listen for how the bass and guitars hold one steady, rolling feel from start to finish.
The Voice
Over that groove, McKay sings melodies the press release calls sweet and effortless. Her part carries the story of the man who has gone, sung over music that sounds like a summer evening.
Concepts in Focus
tremolo is a trembling effect, on electric guitar usually made by an amplifier or pedal that makes the volume pulse. It is the first thing Monkeyboxing names here, and it gives the guitar a shimmering, wavering edge that suits a song about something slipping away.
A <a href=“https://korczis.github.io/sonic-playground/concept/featured-artist/” class=“concept-link font-medium text-primary-700 underline decoration-dotted underline-offset-4 hover:decoration-solid dark:text-primary-400” data-concept=“featured-artist” title=“A guest performer credited on another artist’s track, usually as “feat.”: a rapper’s verse, a singer’s hook or a second voice. Features bring together different styles and audiences and are central to hip-hop, R&B and dance music.“>featured artist is a guest credited on another artist’s track. Katalyst is a producer, and on Deep Impressions the voices come from outside: Stephanie McKay on this track and on U Can’t Save Me, Bootie Brown of The Pharcyde, Steve Spacek and others. McKay is the most familiar of them: she had already sung on his 2007 album What’s Happening.
The bassline is what the release calls driving: in reggae and soul alike the bass often carries the song, and here it is the engine under McKay’s floating melodies.
Artistic Context
Katalyst is the Sydney producer Ashley Anderson, active since 1998, who co-founded the label Invada with Portishead’s Geoff Barrow in 2001. Deep Impressions, released on 16 September 2011 by Invada, follows What’s Happening (2007) and mixes, in the words of its announcement, soul, hip hop, funk, jazz, reggae and electro. He named it for the many styles that, as he put it, left deep impressions on him as a producer. McKay is an American soul singer from New York and, in the release’s words, one of his favourite soul singers. A year later he signed to Stones Throw and joined the collective Quakers, whose MCs include Aloe Blacc, heard here in Aloe Blacc – I Need A Dollar.
Impact and Reception
Deep Impressions was nominated for the 2012 ARIA Award for Best Urban Album. Day into Night is the door into it, a summer song with a heartbreak inside. Play it and listen for the tremble in the guitar.
