Meet Yellow Days, the 17-year-old Haslemere songwriter with a timeless feel, and bags of potential

12 October 2016, 15:30 | Written by Dan Carson

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The project of 17-year-old Haslemere resident George van den Broek was on my radar a few months back, before dropping off as so many promising artists do; some to sign their first deal and return with more polished studio cuts, some to fade back into normal life away from industry humdrum. Yellow Days was never going to do the latter.

"Your Hand Holding Mine" remains true to the short string of demos that first caught everyone's attention on his SoundCloud: the skewed, wonky synth lines (inspired by a community of German and Spanish beat makers he follows on SoundCloud), static telly crackling feedback and van den Broek's earthy croon are all present, stark and refreshingly undiluted. It's not that this - his first release on new home Good Years (Mick Jenkins, Lil Silva and early BANKS) - feels bare though, far from it, there's a warm sentimentality to his wordplay, a gloss coat of remarkable emotional intelligence layered over blues guitars and sparsely arranged beats. He explains over email, "What the tune means for me is when your first love ends and once you were sure you'd be together forever, but you're on your own now and the song is written from that point." A boundless young talent with an admiration for timeless vocalists such as Ray Charles and Howlin' Wolf, Yellow Days is in it for the long haul.