‘About time vocal artists had their moment!’: In conversation with A Little Sound

By Jed Dixon, Epitome Curator

A Little Sound has been a fixture of the Drum and Bass scene for years, her vocals woven through Born on Road releases, festival stages and countless club nights. Now, the singer, songwriter and DJ is bringing her biggest headline show back home to Electric Bristol on 6th March. Ahead of ‘A Whole Lotta Noise’, Epigram sat down with her to talk Bristol’s influence on her sound, the art of singing and mixing simultaneously, and why vocal artists are finally having their moment.

It wasn't long ago that A Little Sound was a student herself in Bristol, attending the BIMM Music Institute. However, her musical journey from Bristol didn't begin in a lecture hall but, 'more so the underground raves that I was attending whilst living in Bristol', she explains.

The musical diversity of Bristol offered her something different to the commercial DnB found at festivals, and 'the Born on Road guys’ helped A Little Sound develop this curiosity further. Born on Road is, of course, the Bristol-based DJ collective founded by Kelvin373 and Aries, who helped open her eyes to more jungle and rolling tracks and ‘add a different flavour’ to her sets. Working alongside the Born on Road label and artists under it (like Gray, Selecta J Man, and Golddubs) was a formative moment in her developing music taste.

She highlights Kelvin373’s influence in particular, recalling how he ‘used to play a lot of dancehall when we’d hang out and taught me a lot about the culture behind jungle and DnB’. This gave A Little Sound the basis to explore her own path, supported and encouraged by experts in the field. ‘I never felt restricted to one sound’, she reflects, ‘they would listen to anything I brought to the table’. This freedom to experiment led to the creation of the distinctive performance you can see today.

If you've ever seen A Little Sound live, you'll know about her unique style of performing, singing the vocals whilst also taking control of the decks. Despite the rising tide of this type of performance today, a few years back it was almost unheard of, it took effort and innovation for A Little Sound to finally feel like she was 'gaining control of her set'.

Jumping on vocals for a few songs at other DJs’ sets was a good start for the beginning of her career, but as she explains, 'I was needing to find another way that I could perform under my own name'. Learning to DJ herself over lockdown allowed her to stop ‘relying on someone else when performing live’, she says, which ‘felt like a really fresh and unique way to host a set as a vocalist’.

These days, this style of performance is becoming more common, with artists like Becky Hill, Nia Archives and Jazzy giving it a go. A Little Sound credits Koven and Riya as early inspirations during Covid and recognises ‘it feels super rewarding to be alongside some of the first to do it’. She seems over the moon with more integration of live singing in DJ sets looking like the future – ‘it feels about time vocal artists had their moment!’

Her road to this innovation began far before just lockdown though, as she has been posting videos online since she was 11 years old. To any budding artists looking for originality, she urges ‘keep an eye on what’s going on around you and see how you can apply it to your own journey’.

She cautions against losing sight of yourself in the algorithms – ‘you need to post the video you didn't think would do well’, and it just might be the one that connects with people. All of this speaks to the value of persistence over perfection, reflected in A Little Sound’s own gradual rise to the top.

Regardless of her journey, the result is a live show that has clearly resonated with many. For those unfamiliar with her catalogue, she presented us with a shortlist. ‘Twilight’ is as good an entry point as any, ‘the perfect blend of a melodic hook and a heavy drop’. ‘Override’, A Little Sound adds, is a ‘newer release and showcases how my sound has evolved over the past few years’. Topping it off is ‘Reload’, which ‘highlights the influence Bristol and Born on Road has had’ on her writing, and has a heavier drop – more in line with her preferred style when mixing.

All three will no doubt feature at her Electric show on 6^th March for ‘A Whole Lotta Noise’, alongside a genre-hopping, personally curated lineup. ‘I think there are too many lineups offering the same billing and very similar genres at the moment,’ she says, ‘so I wanted to do something a little different.’

Joining A Little Sound on the 6th will be Bladerunner, Circadian, Esme Banks and Mia Pia, bringing ‘a bit of something for everyone’, with some 140, jungle and a high-energy DnB finish. She frames it as a ‘journey’, with energy and intensity building as the night progresses.

As for what’s next, she’s looking forward to ‘more music, playing shows and territories for the first time and continuously building my community and sound.’ There may be a debut album on the horizon at some point, but for now she’s happy to just carry on making A Lotta Noise…