There’s a sly hint of predestiny in Simon James aka Woolfy’s backstory. When he was 8 and his music industry dad moved the family from London to LA, they initially crashed at Giorgio Moroder’s place. Today Woolfy is known around the world as an indie-disco troubadour with an unmistakable English-inflected vocal delivery, usually caught somewhere between drawl and “mesmerizing falsetto”. The artist’s earliest outings were on Rong records starting in 2005, before being signed to James Murphy’s legendary indie dance stable DFA for two more EPs and a 2009 long-player. Meanwhile, a series of full-length albums and singles as one half of Woolfy vs Projections on Permanent Vacation (now simply Projections), have seen him firmly cemented as a leading voice in both the modern disco and Balearic “revivals”. Whereas Projections’ style fuses AOR, cosmic funk, and early Ibiza, Woolfy’s solo material tends to draw on the influence of the classic pop, indie-rock, shoegaze and new wave that sound- tracked James’ musical coming of age in the 80s. Songs such as the runaway success ‘City Lights’ (Future Classic, 2014) reveal a rogue indie-pop sensibility, leading to comparisons such as “Kings of Convenience jamming with James Murphy on the beach”. Woolfy’s forthcoming solo output on Ritual Release finds him one foot still on the dancefloor, the other in a more personal space and turning towards traditional songwriting.