I just had an opportunity, as you know I listen to the new tracks, to take a closer look at the track “Evolution” by House of Allegro, and I must say, they’re off the hook. The combination of Michelina from the USA and Alec from the UK presents an incredibly interesting combination of UK Future House and American dance music.
The most memorable aspect of House of Allegro is how they are able to perform in such a cohesive manner since they each have their own musical background. Michelina has exposure from the side of the entertainment industry while Alec has technical production experience. The outcome is 11 tracks that are as upbeat as they are moving.
This is why one could consider “Evolution” as an appropriate title for the album in question. This is particularly the case with songs where one can really notice how their sound has evolved over the years. They have stuck to that alt-pop / house music foundation that fans adore but there is clearer, crisper sound.
It is also important to note that House of Allegro has been quite active this year and releasing many tracks independently and/self-releasing. That kind of work ethic is beginning to translate into the recognition of labels and even winning remix competitions.
The album is already getting attention from Public Pressure, as well as booking the group gigs around London. I was happy to see it because this is one fine independent act which I think will make it big soon. If you enjoy dance music with elements of pop and house beat, I would suggest checking out “Evolution”.
All in all, House of Allegro appears to be on the rise, and I would like to find out more about their future steps. They have a style that I believe can appeal to a broader audience, better described by the tagline ‘It’s not just country music anymore’.
Listen to Evolution
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What inspired the concept behind “Evolution”? How does it reflect your artistic growth?
Initially, our goal was to release some of our more DJ-friendly tracks that we were playing in our sets, like “My Turn” and “Move Like That.” As we’re constantly producing music almost every day, we realized we had around 10 finished tracks that would take too long to release individually as singles. After releasing a single each month for six months, we decided it made the most sense to bring all these tracks together into an album!
How did it differ from your previous works?
Previous singles and eps were all a product of where we were as artists. The production in this album has been a great improvement after Alec got some great mentorship in mixing and mastering from the London Sound Academy (LSA). This before was almost guess work which sometimes worked sometimes didn’t. Whereas now it’s more of a formulated thought through process to level out the dynamics, as well as the structuring and arrangement of the songs being more thought through to carry the emotion of the songs.
The title “Evolution” suggests change. How would you say your sound has evolved on this release?
Michelina actually came up with this name instantly and it stuck, usually we would have a few days of bouncing ideas. The reason behind the name Evolution is it represents our evolution as in growth and also our evolved style as a duo. Also, the mixing quality, sound choice, the progression through the songs, all feel much stronger than our previous work so we thought this name to be a good fit. – its all about our journey of growth and what we feel works!
What were some of the biggest challenges you faced while creating “Evolution”?
This album has been the smoothest and easiest release so far. Some of the songs were created in just one day, such as Fugly, created at Qube studios initially on the basis of a joke. When we really enjoy what we are creating the the process works very quickly.
Other songs such as Move Like That took a bit longer as we waited for collaborating artists to trial parts. Ultimately for this song we used the sample ‘Move Like That’ for the rap which worked best during live performances. The great thing about collaboration is even if it does not work, we still have made some connections that we know can work for future songs.
Other songs such as Serenity were a long process as the original was 5 minutes long. Having to cut this and keep the best bits was a challenge in restructuring. Our last struggle, which is still not resolved, is a typo in the name Heartbreak Goes Like.
So this song originally was called Heartbeat Goes Like… hence the lyrics, but it was spelled wrong in the release, it is still ongoing to get this updated but for now there are some versions known as “Heartbeat Goes Like” and some as “Heartbreak Goes Like” – but I don’t think anyone would notice ha ha and its about the song itself so we are not stressed. Having to get in contact with the distributor as an independent artist is not the easiest task though!
How does “Evolution” fit into your overall discography? Do you see it as a continuation or a departure from your previous work?
Evolution is a continuation from our previous work. We are not set on limiting ourselves to any specific genre but we wanted this more future house/garage album to be a bit less experimental. Our last few self released singles – Goodbye, and Where Are You Going Now, and Lucky One all had a LOT going on – which could have been a bit of a sacrifice on dynamics.
For this album we wanted to strip back a bit from that, keep a solid bass and drums with complimenting vocals and instruments, and not overdo it. We notice that some of the best songs out there may only have 3-4 elements, so have realised the necessity of simplicity.
Were there any new instruments or production techniques you experimented with on this song?
We recently got a vintage plugin called Vibes Rewind – on Kontakt 7, which is tape recorded samples taken from old analog synths. This plugin has a lot of character, and is used on a couple of the songs. This and FabFilter Twin 3 for some of those basslines.
For the drums on most tracks we layered about 15 different drums, approximately 4 hi hats, 2 shakers/riders, 2 tambourines, 2 snares/claps, two kicks; all cut with surgical EQ-ing as to stop phasing issues, then on top of that we layered some interesting FXs as percussion, then added some Ableton shapers onto reverbs and other effects to really spice it up – then pushing the majority of this through sends and parallel compression, not to mention some panning techniques! This complex process creates a huge range of sound from what may sound like some simple drums, keeping the beat evolving throughout.
Some other mixing techniques included a lot of LFOs on certain points on the EQ creating a subtle morphing effect on the instruments, as well as Gating techniques and heavy sidechaining using Kickstart which we love. When it comes to the mixing, this is the first release after Alec had finished his mixing and mastering course at LSA.
He has been formulating the mix in a much smoother way, starting the songs off with the mix in mind, keeping the loudest individual track volume (usually the kick or vocal) below around -8db before mastering, which gives enough headroom for this process. The mastering was done with Ozone 11, and removes any guess work. There is a long chain that Alec uses on Ozone and adjusts it for each song depending on the dynamics and sound.
What do you hope listeners take away from “Evolution”?
Listeners can expect a juxtaposition of authentic, polished, high-energy dance tracks, with euphoric, emotional drops, and a bit of light-hearted fun thrown in. We hope they take away a variety of blended House of Allegro ideas transformed and solidified into songs in a meticulous order.
Looking ahead, how do you see this album influencing your future musical direction?
This album was something we needed to get out of our system and share with the world, giving our listeners a chance to enjoy our music at shows and revisit it on streaming platforms. Once this promotion period wraps up, we’re excited to focus more on DJ sets and live performances. So far, we’ve only accepted a few gig requests and haven’t actively pursued this side of our career.
While this approach hasn’t been the most effective for promotion, it has allowed us to dedicate our time to refining our sound and building a discography of over 25 songs—all created in less than a year—with even more in the pipeline! As always, we’re open to exploring new collaboration opportunities along the way.
Moving forward, we have two signed House and Garage singles scheduled for release in the coming months. Following that, we’ll be diving into a backlog of unfinished dance songs that will still feature elements of our signature House and Garage sound, but with a stronger focus on Michelina’s incredible vocal talent. We aim to release these tracks in early 2025 to kickstart the new year with a bang!
Lastly, if you could describe “Evolution” in three words, what would they be?
Bold, Forward-Thinking, Fun.
