Full Review

Laura Misch, Sample the Sky Review

A Sibling’s Harmony: Laura Misch’s Electronic-Jazz Synthesis on Sample the Sky

In the tiers of musical innovators in electronica, the figure of Laura Misch is a luminous experience, not as an appendage to her brother Tom Misch’s rising star, but as a compelling artist in her own right. With Sample the Sky, Laura steps boldly from the familial shadow into a spotlight well-deserved, intertwining her classical roots, jazz sensibilities, and saxophone virtuosity with the allure of her folk-like vocals, all framed in electronica.

Contrary to the parallel path tread by her brother, Laura’s musical odyssey has been a journey of independent artistry and rebellion. From the age of eleven, she chose the saxophone as her voice, which now speaks in full-bodied tones against the synthetic beats and textures that define her work. Her divergence from violin to saxophone marked her personal artistic rebellion and heralded the genesis of a unique sound that melds the folkish timbre of her voice with the sax’s soulful echoes.

Her experience gigging and composing alongside her brother is not without its influences—her sound does share Tom’s smooth jazz leanings. However, Laura’s work is her own—singular and sovereign. Her recent ventures into the limelight, including a sold-out headline gig and opening for legends like Roy Ayers and Soweto Kinch, are testaments to her growing influence and the magnetic quality of her music.

In tracks across the album, you hear the saxophone as a jazz instrument and a voice in the electronic milieu. Looped sax and synth lines create a bedding over which Laura’s gorgeous, folkish voice drifts like mist over a digital landscape. This unexpected foundation affords a lush terrain for exploration—a terrain that Misch navigates with an intuitive sense of direction and an innate understanding of the intricate balance between electronic production and the warmth of live instrumentation.

Sample the Sky is a narrative of artistic emergence. It celebrates the individuality of a musician carving her niche, challenging the traditional roles of instruments, and bending genre conventions. It captures the essence of an artist who respects her roots, acknowledges her lineage, and yet moves resolutely into a sphere entirely her own making.

Laura Misch, with Sample the Sky, does step into the limelight, casting a glow that reflects her past and a beacon for her future in the vast expanse of electronica and beyond. That’s the short of it!