How to Dress Well has always been a trendsetter

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      It goes without saying that Tom Krell, the man behind the aptly named How to Dress Well, has exceptional taste in sartorial stylings. But the producer’s talent for creating new fashions goes well beyond clothing.  

      With the release of his fourth studio album, Care, Krell has once again cemented his place as a pioneer of musical movements. Beginning his songwriting career with a lo-fi full-length album, Love Remains, How to Dress Well’s atmospheric synths and falsetto vocal patterns prefigured the explosion of James Blake.

      2012’s second LP Total Loss drew on the reverbed snares and expansive synths also popularized on Frank Ocean’s record of the same year, while How to Dress Well’s 2014 album What Is This Heart saw him moving away from experimentalism. Featuring live acoustic instruments and poppy hooks in place of hazy synth lines, Care places the artist at the forefront of the mainstream sound, using hooks that wouldn’t appear out of place at the top of the Billboard 100.

      A master of sophisticated arrangements, How to Dress Well’s elegiac tracks now sit firmly within the alt-R&B or future-R&B movement—a genre that, with the advent of artists like the Weeknd and FKA Twigs, is currently taking over superclubs and underground venues in equal measure.

      Grappling with the themes of emotional trauma and weaknesses, navigating difficult circumstances, and negotiating intricate love affairs, Care sees Krell exploring the human psyche with the keen eye of a philosopher.

      How to Dress Well plays the Biltmore Cabaret this Thursday (October 20).

      Follow Kate Wilson on Twitter @KateWilsonSays.

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