Wouter Hamel

Wouter Hamel is a singer-songwriter and composer whose work straddles the realms of jazz, West Coast pop, funk, neo-soul and electronic music. Throughout the Dutch-born Hamel’s six-album catalogue, he has worked with the likes of Benny Sings, Michael Leonhart, Andy Platts (Mamas Gun) and Benjamin Herman (New Cool Collective). Hamel first made waves in the early 00s as a jazz vocalist. This put him on the map to record his successful Silver Harp-crowned debut LP Hamel, which contains songs co-written by Benny Sings. From here on out, Wouter Hamel enjoyed an eclectic career from album to album. At the start of the past decade, Hamel released third album Lohengrin and Pompadour, which stylistically embodied extreme opposites. The former explored a more monochrome acoustic sound, applying a more introspective lyricism, whereas the latter was an extravagant, neon-lit spectacle, with Hamel fully leaning into his gifts as a charismatic stage performer. The next two records Hamel released, Amaury and BOYSTOWN, became more fluid and refined artistic statements, homing in deeper and more candidly on Hamel’s identity, sexual orientation and relationships. Amaury drifts across the back alleys between bittersweet balladry and high spirited funk; BOYSTOWN meanwhile explores a more grand cinematic side, with songs filtered through the lens of Brian Wilson and 70s AM Radio.