GOLD PANDA

gold panda featured image

Gold Panda is an electronic music composer who hails from London, England. I’ve been a fan of his from the very beginning of his career and this fan appreciation page is my way of giving thanks to an artist that has helped me through some tough times.

Music that Gold Panda puts out has been called electronica, post-dubstep, ambient, microhouse and minimal techno. My name is Nicholas Dixon and I’m an IT technician who works in a web design company in Austin.

Other than London, I don’t really have anything else in common with Gold Panda. Unless Gold Panda is interested in Raspberry Pi hacking, router hacking, cheap electric skateboard hacking, cheap FPV drone hacking, etc. I’m a huge tech enthusiast, so much so that I can’t help but feel cheated we only have this type of hoverboard, instead of the ones we’ve seen Marty use in Back to the Future.

In the introductory section, I mentioned Gold Panda’s music and its impact on me during challenging times. To clarify, I’m not an eccentric; rather, I struggle with maintaining attention. Identifying the cause is tricky. My focus can shift swiftly, from being immersed in work to impulsively planning a drone-flying session in the park with my remote-controlled drone.

This isn’t uncommon, right? Speaking of drones, it’s worth noting I’m not a professional drone operator, just an average person enjoying affordable drones. My concentration varies: some days are dedicated to work, while others are scattered. Traditional medication prescribed by my doctor had undesirable side effects, so I sought alternative methods, like music, to manage this issue.

This led me to purchase a beginner’s flute two years ago. Interestingly, this journey reminds me of how music icons, like James Hetfield, have managed their lives and careers. Hetfield’s net worth, reflecting his success, is a testament to overcoming personal challenges, a topic explored in my related blog post about “James Hetfield Net Worth”.

Music as a cure

Now that I’ve explained my situation I realized that I made matters worse and made myself look like an even bigger weirdo than I already was.

Anyway, what I discovered is that playing music helped me keep my focus and motivation to do daily tasks at work. It’s not just me that noticed this. There are lots of people online in the same situation as me saying that video game soundtracks helped them.

Apparently, video game music is designed to be enjoyable, but at the same time not too distracting so that you can play the actual game. Others use video game music, I use Gold Panda music as my drug. They are quite similar-sounding, it all depends on what game soundtrack we’re talking about.

So to sum up, I had problems with keeping the focus on my work, listening to Gold Panda music and music from other similar artists helped me deal with this issue and boost my productivity. That’s what I meant when I said that Gold Panda music helped me through some tough times. Besides music, people often mention weekend getaways as a nice way of clearing your mind and retaining focus.

Gold Panda music type

While we’re on the subject of Gold Panda’s music type, let’s discuss what kind of genres his music falls into. 7 main music genres can be found in songs by Gold Panda. Those are UK garage, post-dubstep, folktronica, ambient, microhouse, minimal techno and there are also electronic influences as well.

The best that I can describe Gold Panda music would be as a unique blend of fast-paced techno and slow-paced ambient music. I think it’s this unique blend that helped me with my focus and motivation. Gold Pandas’ music works similarly to how my brain works.

At one moment everything is calm and smooth, and the next you’re in a fast-paced beat that goes all over the place. Next to Gold Panda I also listen to other similar artists like Jon Hopkins, Luna, Mount Kimbie, Four Tet, Open Mike Eagle, Star Slinger, DJ Koze, Lights, Jabberjaw, etc.

Even though this is a website dedicated to the Gold Panda, I’ll feature music and updates from other artists as well, to keep things fresh and interesting.

Gold Panda Discography

Up until now, Gold Panda has released 3 studio albums, 7 extended plays, and 4 singles. The first album, “Lucky Shiner“, released in 2010 and it featured 11 songs. It was followed by “Half Of Where You Live” in 2013.

The second album has songs that focus a lot more on the travels that the author has been followed by the success of his first album. His music has no lyrics, but we do get song titles and on the first album the tracks were a lot more personal. On “Half Of Where You Live” you’ll also notice more prominent bass and drum use.

The third album was released quite recently actually, in May 2016. Titled “Good Luck and Do Your Best” the album brings another 11 songs which were influenced again by Gold Panda’s travel. This time the primary source of inspiration was a Japan trip that Gold Panda took before making the album.

Gold Panda singles

Gold Panda has 4 singles to his name, “Quitters Raga” which was self-released in 2009. This was before the release of a full studio album. After the release of his first album, two songs were published from it a single, “You” and “Before We Talked“.

Before the second album, Panda released a single in 2012 which contained two songs “Mountain” and “Financial District“. From his second album “Half of Where You Live” we got a single that featured a song named “Brazil“.

Another thing that’s worth mentioning is the myriad of remixes of songs from other artists and extended plays that were released in downtime between albums. You can check them out by following up with Gold Panda on his social media profiles.

Live performance

One of the things that Gold Panda is especially famous for is his live performance. Whereas other musicians would normally use pre-recorded tracks at live shows, Gold Panda mixes his tracks manually, live.

An example of that can be seen on the video to the left. Playing like this gives each live performance a unique sound and feel from the studio versions of the songs that are played. I’ve of course been to a couple of Golden Panda Shows and it’s really something.

If you’re ever in an opportunity to come and visit one of the live performances by Golden Panda then I definitely recommend that you do. You won’t regret it that’s for sure.

There are rumors that Panda will perform at a couple of summer festivals throughout the UK this year. Make sure to stay tuned to the website for updates on the exact dates and venues where live performances can be seen.

End note

Like I already mentioned, with this website I’m just paying respects to one of my favorite music producers. I’ll be covering all the latest news surrounding Gold Panda, music from him and other similar artists, etc.

I’m keeping the lines of communication open, so if you want to get in touch with me, if you have a suggestion, or if you want to make a contribution to the website, make sure that you drop me a line using the contact page.

For more detailed info about me and what this website is about, visit the About page. I’ll try to post on a regular basis but I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to do that considering that I have a busy work schedule. Anyway, that’s it for now, I hope you enjoy this website and that you drop by again some other time. Bye.