Nick Hakim came out of nowhere a while back with his first official single, "Pour Another", and it was so good that it would have been easy to write it off as a fluke occurrence. This happens a lot, and the internet is filled with musicians desperately trying to recapture the magic of the that first single which put them on the map, but Nick Hakim is not one of those musicians. Shortly after "Pour Another", he treated us to the sonic triumph that is "Cold", and now he's come out with, Where Will We Go Pt.1. It's filled with even more mind-bendingly good music, and it will keep you captivated all the way through. Where Will We Go Pt.1 is technically a five-track EP (it includes a mini intro to start), and it also features the aforementioned "Cold" and "Pour Another" in the lineup, so the spotlight will invariably be on the two new songs titled "The Light" and "Papa Fritas". The former is, yet again, more proof that Nick is creating music on a much higher plane that your average indie artist, and because of this, we'd hesitate to size him up against any possible contemporaries. His work makes most everything else look cobbled together and crude. Simply put, Nick has decided to circumnavigate what's relevant in music at the moment, and instead craft songs that will move people regardless of what preferences they bring to the table. The piano work and quiet textures which just barely register on your speakers as "The Light" wafts through the air are impossible to ignore, despite their extremely understated quality, and you'll find yourself incessantly hitting the replay button as you begin to realize what it is your ears have been missing all this time. "Papa Fritas" is technically an interlude of sorts, but it works in tandem with "Intro" to elevate Where Will We Go Pt.1 from a mere tracklist into a musical project that flows seamlessly from beginning to end. Each piece would have no problem soaking up the spotlight by itself, but when they all link together, it's near impossible to think of something that has come close to this level of sophistication in recent memory. We wouldn't change a single thing, and we have our fingers crossed in the hopes that "Pt.1" implies we're going to be treated to more of Nick's work in the not-too-distant future. Purchase the EP on iTunes.
Nick Hakim