When it came to sorting out our plan of action for The Great Escape, it soon filled up predominantly with emerging solo artists and a smattering of bands and I really thought we should make it over to a set from a rising production outfit. I knew in making that choice it would most definitely be my suggestion to pay a return visit to the Vevo stage at Wagner Hall to give Manchester duo, Shy Luv a look.
Myself and Raj were on a very tight schedule to accommodate all of the shows we wanted to pack in on the last night of the festival, meaning we found ourselves ducking in and out of a number of shows, to cram in as much as we could. That’s one good thing about The Great Escape though, you can do this, because everything happens within power walking distance, and especially good if you’re working up to achieve your goal on your fitbit. Thus, we turned up at Wagner Hall to find that Shy Luv were already a short way into their stride.
From their former guises as the Karma Kid and Armeria,Sam Knowles and Jake Norman respectively, had already established careers for themselves as producers but they decided to pool together and form Shy Luv, and the first of their material began to hit the web during the last throes of 2016. Steadily the duo’s funk-punk, electric, disco beats have been scaling up on the hot tip of the tastemakers radar and I too felt a grip of curiosity about then when the promo for their debut EP “Shock Horror” found its way into my inbox.
There was much attention surrounding Shy Luv, the funky sounds they were producing up there on the Vevo stage were made for Saturday night, grooving. That’s what everybody in that room was doing, myself included. Infact, I danced my way into the venue to “Joyrider”. What we saw of the set, ran by so slick and smooth. These guys know how to translate their songs from a studio mix deck to a stage set-up and entertain their audience (unfortunately, something that was not always the case from some other shows we wandered in and out of during our time at TGE).
We were caught up in the moment with Shy Luv, we were partying it up! I’ll definitely be keeping a closer eye on them, they really won me over.