Pomo’s Takeover of Montreal’s Music Scene

Posted by Cierra Radojcic in FringeBlog on April 7, 2014

David Pimentel is bringing a colourful zest to Montreal’s music scene. You may have heard of him as Pomo, or you may be familiar with his other project Nouvel Age. Either way, if you’re familiar with his music, you’re into the right things.

Originally from Vancouver, Pimentel moved to Montreal to work on his music. His beats are spreading like wildfire, and this spring he will release his first EP titled The Other Day just in time for the warm weather.

From a young age, David was pushed by his parents to play classical piano and pick up the guitar.

“It sucked,” said Pomo. “But, I’m grateful today that I stuck with it. It really molded the foundation for what Pomo is. These are the two instruments I feel most comfortable with. Although, I do love to mess around with drums, I don’t really consider myself to be a drummer.”

He has refined his taste in music over the years and feels that he is heavily influenced by jazz and neo-soul.

“I really focus on the chord progression in music, Pomo is structured a lot around that.” Pomo explained.

His work brings the old funk together with new funk, which gives a twist on the older music that shaped him growing up. Some of the artists that inspired what he is doing today are Prince, Michael Jackson and Robert Glasper. Their unique traits seem to have persuaded his style.

“I love working with singers. Antony is so talented,” he said, referring his partner Antony Carle from Nouvel Age. “So it made sense when David told me he was tuned towards music with strong vocalists, such as Erykah Badu and Lalah Hathaway.

J Dilla was really influential in my work as well, especially for his rhythms and harmony in his chord progression production,” he added.

The music Pomo creates cannot be confined simply to one type of genre.

“[It’s a] funky electronic, with a lot of synths! Or, whatever I feel like at the time […]. Mostly music that makes people dance,” he explained.

“I try to maintain an old school method of production,” he continued. “The level of musicality you needed back in the day made it much harder to produce music, as compared to now with computers and software so readily available.”

Things started to really kick off for Pomo when Kaytranada, a Montreal local, put one of his tracks in his mix and HW&W Recordings. Following this success, Pomo was asked to do a couple of records for their label.

“They give me complete freedom,” he said.

Besides working on a couple of tracks with Kaytranada, Pimentel also did some work with Noisey UK and released a mix for them. He has already started touring outside of Canada and recently played a show out in NYC for Gramatik’s label Low Temp.

“I met so many great and talented people,” he said about his experience at the Gibbz release party.

Pimentel released his newest track “Aerobix” just a few days ago at a weekly party called MELT, where he is a resident DJ. Prior to this, he shared with fans a new track called Vibrator.

“It is a bit different than what I usually produce,” said Pomo.

David plans to begin a tour of his live show after the release of his EP in the spring. He plans to incorporate as much physical playing as possible.

“I love DJing, but playing live is much more fun. It’s more passionate, you are able to really feel the heart of the song and tweak it depending on how you feel in that moment.” Pomo said.

Pomo is swallowing the Montreal music scene, so be sure to catch him alongside Jacques Greene and Nosaj Thing this coming 4/20 for an all-night party called Noire hosted by SJU and many others.