Decibel Festival

PillowTalk is Sammy D, Ryan Williams and Michael Tello. Based out of the famous Lower Haight District in San Francisco, PillowTalk’s music fuses classic R&B, boogie and disco with underground house and techno with an original feel. With releases out on Visionquest, Life & Death and Wolf + Lamb, 2012 is shaping up to be a huge year as they hit the road with the live band.

It all started when they found themselves up late, gathered around the baby grand piano in Ryan’s kitchen. Tello would be strumming on guitar and Sammy would be fiddling around on the Wurlitzer. It all just came together organically…without knowing it, melodies would form, songs would appear and before anyone realised, Sammy would be singing some off-hand hook and, hey presto, you had what Arthur Russell would call; “first thought, best thought” compositions.

Soon, these impromptu and improvised jam sessions were recorded on iPhone apps before being taken to ‘the lab” (a space about two blocks away) and from there they were transformed into alluring, charming, dance-pop ‘songs’.

With experience of, and backgrounds in, so many genres, Pillow Talk are making some seriously inspiring and beautifully original music. If you’re trying to pin down their exact sound you may have to refer to their motto of ‘D.A.G’ (destroy all genres – a term borrowed from a famed underground San Fran DJ). With influences ranging from the Beach Boys to Sam Cooke, from Freddie Hubbard to Harry Nilsson, and from Larry Heard to Theo Parrish, you can tell these guys are ruled from the right side of their brains. Having just started composing, this trio are still finding their own true groove, with their full potential yet to be explored…

A delightful debut single (‘Love Makes Parks’ on the revered Visionquest imprint) is soon to be followed by a beautiful full length on Life and Death, before following that up with another finely crafted EP for NYC house darlings, Wolf + Lamb. As well as that, a live show is in the works, soon to be debuted later this year. We look forward to following this fresh and exciting new sound and realize some of your deepest secrets are revealed “Pillow Talking”, so we are just lucky to listen in…