Be careful when googling Hackney singer NAO. You could either end up exploring a world of slinky electrofunk by an exciting new voice, or sitting in silence finding out more than you bargained for about the National Audit Office.
I also recommend using all your internet skills to avoid Taylor Swift’s song Bad Blood, and Ryan Adams’s cover of Taylor Swift’s Bad Blood, in order to hear NAO’s Bad Blood. Her original song lopes along so sexily it makes Prince look like, well, someone who works in the National Audit Office.
Two EPs and a Wolf Alice remix into her career, she’s a bit of a mystery so far, keeping her full name under wraps and putting her hands, rather than her face, on her EP sleeves.
You may have seen her and her huge hairdo singing with Disclosure this year, though, and can do so again this week. She’s the voice of their song Superego on their recent Caracal album.
She’s also covered Frank Ocean on Radio 1 and worked with George Reid of AlunaGeorge, which should give a firmer idea of the soul/funk/electronica worlds she straddles.
A major headline show in London this week will show why her debut album ought to be one of the breakthroughs of 2016.
Dec 1-2 (with Disclosure), Alexandra Palace, N22 (0870 444 5556, alexandrapalace.com); Dec 3, Heaven, WC2 (0844 847 2351, heaven-live.co.uk)