Connected

Despite living thousands of kilometres apart, South African DJ Kid Fonque (born Allan Nicoll) and the UK’s Jonny Miller connected over 10 years ago through a deep shared love of music and their respective scenes, and Connected represents the best of both of their worlds. “The more we got into the record, the more we started to want to tell a story about our connection to South Africa and our strong connection to the UK electronic music scene, which we're both very passionate about,” Kid Fonque tells Apple Music. Crafted during both countries’ 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns, the music leans heavily on the South African vocal talent they’d discovered over the years to create an album that’s both unique in its sound and strong in its identity. The album artwork, created by artist Zito Mowa, features both artists’ faces boldly illustrated against a bold backdrop, and signals a shift for Kid Fonque’s Stay True Sounds label, using Connected as a way to introduce a new look and feel for the collective in 2021. Here Kid Fonque and Jonny Miller talk us through the 12 tracks that allowed them to call their ideas together. Connected Beings (feat. ASAP Shembe) [Intro] Kid Fonque: “We decided to create a theme around the record through European electronics and South African vocalists. I briefed vocalist Sio and explained to her the vision of the record, and if she could put that into words. I didn't want Sio to do another poem because she was all over our previous record, so we got ASAP Shembe to speak her poetry because we love working with ASAP, too. It sets the tone for what's going to happen over the next hour.” Inertia (feat. China Charmeleon) Kid Fonque: “China Charmeleon is one of the most exciting producers to come out of Stay True Sounds, and South Africa, in the past year. He ran a record label from Mpumalanga with fellow musician Andile Andy, and they kept releasing music, but they didn't really have people listening and he was getting to the end of the road; there have b