SLC R&B group is recording new album

SLC R&B group is recording new album

(Soft Touch)


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SALT LAKE CITY — After releasing the EP “Touch” in late March, local R&B group Soft Touch has already begun recording a new album, set to be released later this year.

The group is made up of four members: Jake Burch and Cam Sackett from Salt Lake City who started the group together last year, and Erik Maloy and Riley Parsons from Provo.

Soft Touch was started as Burch and Sackett began helping on one another’s solo projects, but through a mutual desire to create something different than they had ever played before they formed Soft Touch.

Both Burch and Sackett come from different musical backgrounds, and although the music they play in Soft Touch is unlike their previous work, the influences of their musical backgrounds can be strongly felt throughout their EP.

Burch has played the saxophone since he was 12 and has played in a variety of jazz bands throughout the Salt Lake Valley. And in Soft Touch, the saxophone plays an integral part throughout the EP and can be heard significantly in the songs, “Little Secrets,” “Neverending Story Infinity Part 1,” and others.

The way the songs are written is also influenced heavily by Burch’s jazz background.

“A lot of the stuff that I do in the band harmonically is jazz chords,” Burch said. “It’s something that plays a large part in our style for sure.”

Soft Touch
See: June 27, Kilby Court

Listen:bandcamp.com

While Sackett also played jazz, he was equally influenced by the death metal he listened to as a teenager.

“I started out playing the guitar, and really got into playing death metal and stuff. I really like high vocals like Sigur Ros as well as death metal vocals,” Sackett said. “But this is a break from everything else I’ve done.”

Burch and Sackett started Soft Touch as a duo, but last summer Maloy and Parsons began playing with them in the live shows, and the addition has brought new dynamics to the band’s sound.

“Obviously going into a band setting is going to bring a much bigger groove,” Burch said. “It can have a more pronounced rhythm section feel, and on top of that we are able to put another layer with more of that bigger groove feel.”

“Since we like to dance, we wanted to do something a little more ‘poppy’ sounding but still have that R&B groove,” Sackett added.

Because of the change to a more upbeat sound, the group has also seen a change in the lyrics.

“Lyrically, the new record is more about love when you’re young and naive about it,” Burch, who writes a majority of the lyrics, said. “The EP was a much more sexual record, lyrically. Which is interesting because a lot of us are Mormon conservative types, but we wanted to take a positive approach to that subject.”

The band is in the process of recording the new album now, but will still be playing an upcoming show on June 27 at Kilby Court. You can listen to the EP “Soft Touch” on bandcamp.com now.


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About the Author: Brock Allen -----------------------------

Brock Allen is a Montanan and a communications student at Brigham Young University-Idaho. Formerly a KSL.com intern, he regularly contributes as a music writer. Contact him at olaf.sant6@gmail.com.

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