Rebecca DGD “Feels Like Rock’n Roll” (SINGLE)

Rebecca DGD 5 is an acquired taste, but once you’ve buckled in for the ride, you won’t regret it. Her new single is titled Feels Like Rock’n Roll, a sort of contemporary elixir to the tribalization of music and culture. Indeed, the track starts out with DGD 5 speaking as if this is either a case of spoken word, or sermon, coupled by guest vocals for the chorus. A

BANDCAMP: https://dawggonedavis.bandcamp.com/

An electric guitar calling to mind the nineties strums in the background, with a decidedly acoustic and slightly faded drumbeat thumping to underscore. Whatever Feels Like Rock’n Roll may not have in out-and-out easy listening, it more than makes up for in terms of sonic scope, sheer rampant creativity, and bold and daring originality. It harkens back to the times when music and musical acts could actually take risks.

To reemphasize and paraphrase contemporarity, part of what inspires me about Rebecca DGD 5 is the beacon acts like this represent. Essentially the democratization of creativity thanks to the internet, allowing artists of all kinds to self-represent through platforms like YouTube and Spotify, building their bases organically. The result is genuine freedom of choice, for artist and consumer, allowing for really interesting creative decisions to be made.

Listen to Rebecca DGD 5’s Feels Like Rock’n Roll and you get a little bit of the artistically anarchic vibe of the sixties, say Jim Morrison going on a riff during a key Doors track, or a chorus led by the anonymous band The Residents. What’s being communicated to you isn’t just music, but art. This adds an affable personability to the artist being represented, in the case of Rebecca DGD 5 a wonderful ode to freedom and unapologetic personality. “Hit by a spark, Lordy it left a mark/God gave me the capacity, For some serious audacity,” she chants at the beginning of the track.

Music projects like Rebecca DGD 5 can be a hit or miss. After all, with such great exposure for musical acts far and wide, it can be easy to get lost in the noise. More than ever, the question is, what makes one special? What takes an act to the next level? In the case of Rebecca DGD 5, it’s the unusual mixture of the elements. It almost feels like a sonic Great British Bakeoff. Musical components seemingly untetherable to each other are put to good effect, all in one, impressively multilayered track.

SHAZAM: https://www.shazam.com/song/1819364373/feels-like-rockn-roll-feat-chago-williams

That it works is the icing on the cake, let alone simply the innovation involved in getting each of these components to the table. It’s deserving of salutation, let alone that the single does grow on you. I had no idea what I was listening to at first, but accepting the music on its own terms was like an audible seduction. By the time I was fully immersed by the song at play, I began to intuit something even when still learning the lyrics. It’s been a long time since a song has complimented some sort of internalized state, but that’s exactly what Feels Like Rock’n Roll did with all its intentional imperfections.

Mark Druery