“Firestone” by Kygo ft. Conrad Sewell, Thursday, July 11, 2024
Tropical House is a subgenre of electronic dance music (EDM) that is characterized by its laid-back, feel-good vibes and tropical-inspired melodies. It often incorporates elements of house music, deep house, and chillwave, and is typically characterized by a tempo of around 100-120 beats per minute. Instruments often played or sampled in the genre included steel drums, marimbas, ukuleles, other tropical instruments, synths, and drum machines. The lyrics are often about love, relationships, and the beach. The genre can be traced back to the ‘00s but became extremely popular in the ‘10s. Ed Sheeran’s “Shape of You” has been called the biggest song in the genre. Avicii and Martin Garrix were early popularizers of the subgenre.
SPARKS WILL FLY, THEY WILL IGNITE OUR BONES. Norwegian DJ Kyrre Gørvell-Dahll, or Kygo, was influenced by Avicci’s music and started emulating the late DJ’s sound in his created music. Kygo both wrote new music and remixed existing tracks, many of which were rock or disco tracks. In 2013, Kygo remixed Ed Sheeran’s “I See Fire,” sparking the DJ’s career as a go-to remix artist for groups like The xx, Ellie Goulding, and Kylie Minogue, among others. But it was the original song “Firestone” in 2014 that established Kygo as not just a remix DJ but as a collaborator and producer of original songs. Kygo doesn’t sing on his own tracks, so every song he produces features another artist. For his first hit, “Firestone,” Kygo teamed up with Australian pop singer Conrad Sewell. The song was a massive hit in Europe, Australia, Mexico, and Lebanon. It got some radio airplay in America, peaking at #35 on Billboard’s Pop Airplay chart and #8 on Billboard’s club chart. The song has proven to be a lasting hit with over a billion streams on Spotify.
WE LIGHT UP THE WORLD. “Firestone” would eventually appear on Kygo’s 2016 debut album, Cloud Nine. The DJ gathered other famous names for this record including John Legend, Kodaline, Julia Michaels, Tom Odell, and others. The subgenre that Kygo helped popularize essentially replaced the former most popular form of EDM--Dubstep, a far more aggressive, chaotic-sounding style. Besides Ed Sheeran’s venture into Tropical House music, the genre was highly embraced by K-pop with major Tropical House hits by Winner, SHINee, Taeyeon, Chungha, and many others. It’s still prevalent in (non-K-) pop music today, though pop producers seem to be embracing a larger sound pallet rather than completely replacing the sound on the radio waves. The genre even appears in rock and alternative, which is no accident given Kygo’s work with Kodaline, U2, and OneRepublic. The genre is perfect for the summer and makes clubs feel like summer. And as the world is warming up due to climate change, those summers seem to be getting longer and longer. It’s a pleasant genre that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere soon.
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