Maryland singer Christopher Gallant has a D’Angelo-style falsetto so sexy that it should only be heard after the watershed.
This kind of thing is obviously his calling, though the 24-year-old attempted to resist it. “I tried to rebel against R&B because I felt like it was too close to what I was supposed to like,” he has said, citing Radiohead and nu-metal band Incubus among his more surprising influences.
The fact that he has performed on stage with both Seal and Sufjan Stevens demonstrates his intention to bridge the gulf between these worlds on his debut album, Ology.
His breakout single, Weight in Gold, was Zane Lowe’s first premiere when he launched his Beats 1 radio show last summer, and features both finger-clicking old school soul and bold blasts of futuristic synthesizer within its three-and-a-half minutes.
It took Gallant a while to settle into his groove, claiming that a music degree at NYU left him “kind of super depressed”. A move from New York to LA seems to have brightened him up, and a summer support slot with Laura Mvula will be London’s first chance to see him smoulder.
July 10, Somerset House, WC2 (0844 847 2461, somersethouse.org.uk/music)