Danny L Harle

Daniel Eisner Harle is a British music producer and composer who records under the alias Danny L Harle. He is signed to the London-based PC Music label and is a member of Dux Content with A. G. Cook. His songs have been described as among the more chart-friendly work from the offbeat label.^[2]

Biography

Harle is the son of saxophonist John Harle and has an older brother Matthew.^[1] He played the cello as a child but did not have a strong interest in music. At the age of 12, Harle learned bass guitar after discovering bands like Slipknot and Madness. He picked up free jazz and participated in the Royal Academy of Music's junior jazz group.^[3] In 2006, John Harle recorded Daniel's song "Caesar Hath Wept" with the Duke Quartet.^[4]

Harle went to Goldsmiths, University of London to study classical music.^[3] He began recording campy electronic music in 2010, influenced by Scandinavian skweee music.^[5] His thesis was chamber music that combined traditional musical instruments with video game consoles playing The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Street Fighter II: The World Warrior.^[3]

While at Goldsmiths, Harle reconnected with A. G. Cook, with whom he had attended school as a teenager.^[6] The two bonded over their shared musical tastes and interest in comedy duo Tim & Eric. This grew into a musical project called Dux Content.^[3] Since they did not have a vocalist, Dux Content focused on musical experiments like compound metres and changes in tempo.^[3] One of their earlier works was a collection of compositions for the Disklavier reproducing piano, released with Spencer Noble and Tim Phillips under the name "Dux Consort". Dux Content released its songs with strange renderings of digital avatars for promotional artwork.^[5] They contributed to the score for Alicia Norman's animated film Heart of Death and began considering a children's television show titled Dux Content's Jungle Jam. Harle and Cook explored how to build rhythms out of a vocalist's natural singing tempo and released the results as "Dux Kidz".^[3]

Harle's work with Cook allowed him to branch into pop songwriting and production. He initially struggled to replicate the vigor and simplicity of pop music. After producer Enchanté invited him to perform at a gallery in Stroud, Harle felt guilty at the prospect of playing music by other artists. He decided to write a song that would fit with 1990s dance music. The resulting track, "Broken Flowers", was released on Cook's fledgling PC Music label in mid 2013. Harle described the song as "completely frivolous", explaining that he was "trying to make the most completely conventional song."^[3] "Broken Flowers" uses rapid trance arpeggios, an organ bassline, and synthesiser parts similar to work by video game composers Koji Kondo and Nobuo Uematsu.^[7][8][9] It was viewed as one of the label's more mature releases for the twist in its rhyme scheme.^[5] Fact magazine placed "Broken Flowers" 79th on its list of the "100 best tracks of the decade so far".^[8]

	"In My Dreams" (2014) The airy vocals on "In My Dreams" have a hook similar to Nelly's "Dilemma" featuring Kelly Rowland.[10]
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Harle worked on the sound design for John Harle's 2014 album The Tyburn Tree (Dark London) with singer Marc Almond.^[11] That October, Harle released his second single "In My Dreams" with singer Raffy. It has a jumpy, upbeat rhythm with a xylophone part, and Raffy's vocals are cheerful but detached.^[12][13] Noisey ranked "In My Dreams" 8th on its list of the best songs of 2014,^[14] and Complex magazine placed the song 14th on its year-end list.^[15] For Christmas of 2014, Harle and Raffy recorded a cover of East 17's 1994 Christmas number one "Stay Another Day".^[16] He stated in February 2015 that, although he has enough tracks to make an album, he is focusing on recording new songs with Raffy.^[3] Early 2016 saw "Broken Flowers" make it onto the 'A List' of BBC Radio 1's radio playlists, recognition from the BBC marking a large step forward for the artist.^[17]

On 6 May 2016, Harle released the single "Ashes of Love" via PC Music, featuring guest vocals from Caroline Polachek, one half of American indie pop duo Chairlift.^[18] Harle would follow this single up with "Super Natural" three months later on 12 August 2016.^[19] Harle's most mainstream-friendly to date, the single features prominent guest vocals from Canadian pop star Carly Rae Jepsen. An official music video starring Harle and Jepsen, directed by Bradley & Pablo (who have also directed music videos by PC Music's Hannah Diamond and label affiliates QT and Charli XCX), was released one week later on 19 August 2016.^[20]

Discography

EPs

Singles

Remixes

Production

References

External links

• Official website
• Danny L Harle discography at Discogs