Balearic Breakfast | Episode 217 | Pulsating and ethereal vibrations... (Meeting Saucy Lady / Darren Morgan's mix)

Colleen 'Cosmo' Murphy broadcast the 217th episode of Balearic Breakfast on her Mixcloud on March 25th 2025.

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About this episode. – Before embarking on her 2025 Spring Japan Tour, Colleen took the time to prepare this second episode for us, invinting Saucy Lady to discuss her brand new album and letting Darren Morgan craft a beautiful mix. While the Family was talking on the chat, I was surprised to hear how much the two mixes we heard were complementary, presenting Pulsating ethereal vibrations! But I will let you have a closer listen to them and I'm sure you'll have the same visuals I did!

Of course, we could not help but think about Colleen's friend, the great Andy Williams, as she shared these thoughts on the chat with us: "It was very strange as in the next segment Saucy Lady and I talked about Andy Yamwho? who is on her new album. Hours later he passed away. Tragic."

The Balearic Breakfast Family enjoyed Darren's mix too, our friend MachoGrande 70 saying "This is a glorious mix" and dancing_james sharing with us "On this sunny day solar gain is huge in my house and I have to confess I am now danving around with my top off. I blame Dr Bangers. If you now have a terrible mental image you too can blame Darren 🤣" All in all, this was a very nice episode, and being able to exchange a few words with Colleen while she's on tour is always a real pleasure!

On March 26th, Colleen shared these few words with us: "Yesterday’s Balearic Breakfast is now up on my Mixcloud (and please give me a follow while you’re over there :). As I’m in Japan this week’s show features two guests. First up is Japanese-American DJ, singer, keyboardist and producer Saucy Lady who delivers an uptempo soulful mix. We also have a chat about her new album ‘Love Fest’, out now on her own label Dippin’ Records.

We did the interview earlier this month and had a chat about the special guests on her new record which includes Andy ‘Yam Who?’ Williams who duetted with her on a cover of Bobby Caldwell’s ‘What You Won’t Do For Love’. Hours later Andy sadly transitioned to the next realm. It’s so sad to hear us talking about Andy in the present tense and even suggesting they may collaborate again. Both Saucy Lady and I will be DJ-ing at a special benefit for Andy’s family in May and we will share details once it is announced.

The other mix is a very Balearic mix from my good friend Darren Morgan of Love Machine and also part of The London Loft family. Its a beautiful mix and I’m sure you will love it.

I’ll be taking next Tuesday off as I will be returning from Japan the day before and I’m sure I’ll be broken with jetlag so I need a week off. But Balearic Breakfast will resume on Tuesday, the 8th April hosted live from my record room. In the meantime you can catch up with past shows on the Balearic Breakfast playlist on my Mixcloud. Thanks for listening."

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Colleen on her socials, 25/03/2025: "I’m halfway through my Japanese tour so its time for the obligatory photo dump ;). Its been very emotional being back in my h(ohm) away from h(ohm). First stop was Nagoya where @club_mago pulled out all the stops and brought in Klipschorns and Klipsch Belles for the party and we had an amazing time. I took a little walk around the city in which I lived in 1989 when I was a radio DJ for JOGZ run by the Chubu Broadcasting Company (swipe to the last photo of me dancing in the radio studio - some things never change). My 21-year-old self would have never thought I would be returning 36 years later as a club DJ - I hope I made her proud ;).

Back in Tokyo I reconnected with old friends @norihisamaekawa and @kenhidaka both of whom I have known since my first Japanese tour in 1997. And I also joined friends @markdeclivelowe and @nickdwyernz who is working on a fascinating film series about Japanese jazz kissa culture so it was fitting we went to his favourite spot Jazz Haus Posy.

Then it was off to Obihiro in Hokkaido and we had so much fun at @boars_obihiro . @naoe_fire performed an amazing fire dance and the next morning the BOARS posse greeted me at my hotel (after no sleep) and sent me off on the train to Sapporo where they joined me for two more nights.

Coming back to Sapporo and Precious Hall is like coming h(ohm). This is the first place I DJ-ed outside the USA and its one of my favourite places in the world. Satoru-san and his staff are like family - we have 28 years of history. And it was lovely playing with @kanikanita Saturday night and with @kuniyuki_takahashi_music and Yano for last night’s listening party - we went deep :). I also got play a few of the new Japanese jazz records I picked up earlier that day. Arigatou to @morihirorecords for coming up from Tokyo!

Today is a day off so I took a long walk around Sapporo and Odori Koen and did a bit of shopping at my favourite spot (Tokyu) Hands.

Next up is @bar_inc_osaka on Thursday, @woal_music_life in Takasaki on Friday and @dj_bar_bridge_shinjuku Tokyo on Saturday. Maybe by that time I’ll be over my jet lag. Thank you to all who have made my trip so uplifting. Arigatou gozaimasu. 🙏"

Listen back to the 217th episode of Balearic Breakfast:

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THE PLAYLIST

Saucy Lady's Mix

(NOL) Crown Heights Affair – I See The Light (Young Pulse retouch)

(2025) CON FUNK SHUN – Got 2 Be Enuff (JKriv Edit 2025)

(2025) Da Lukas (feat. Di Martino & Saucy Lady) – In Motion

(2025) Saucy Lady – Falling In Love

(2024) Bellaire x Aaron K. Gray – Never Stop Dancing (Kelly G. Extended Shelter Dub)

(2024) Audiowhores – She's Gone Dance On (Club Mix)

(2025) Jay Vegas – Don't Want It

(2024) DiscoGram – I Wanna Dance

(2009) Modaji – Outboard Jeopardy

(2024) Saucy Lady, Yuki, Omar, Young Pulse – I Can't Shake This Feeling

(Young Pulse 'Baby Powder' Remix)

(2011) Shuya Okino (ft. N'Dea Davenport) – Look Ahead

(2025) Saucy Lady (ft. Derrick McKenzie) – Silver Haze

Darren Morgan's Love Machine Mix

(2020) Hirini Melbourne – Waiata Ki Te Ra

(1979) Henri Texier – Hocoka

(1980) Yello – Blue Green

(1982) The G!st – Love At First Sight

(2024) Harri Pierson – The Most Balearic Record In The World

(NOL) Andi Hanley – Flight

(1983) Judi Tzuke – Shoot From The Heart

(2025) Alix Brown & Louis Fontaine –  Tormento

(2024) Laurent Bardainne & Tigre D'eau Douce – Meilleur

(2025) Wham! – Blue (80s Extended Unreleased Vocal Mix)

(1988) Kriss – Hey Mister Mister

(1989) Malcolm McLaren And The Bootzilla Orchestra – Call A Wave (DFC Dance Mix)

(1982) Alice – A Cosa Pensano

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SAUCY LADY'S INTERVIEW WITH COLLEEN

[Colleen]

Greetings, Balearicans! In the studio with me right now is the singer, songwriter, and DJ, Saucy Lady. She has a new album out, her fourth album, actually, and it's called Love Fest, and it's on her own record label, Dippin' Records. Hi, Saucy, how you doing?

[Saucy Lady]

Hey, hey, how you been?

[Colleen]

Good, you good. You and I played together at your really cool night at Vera's in Boston, gosh, nearly a year ago now.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, that's a monthly slam-funk party that we have. It's been going on for a couple years. That venue is relatively new, but it was a different venue a few years before that, and I had been there for, in total, in that area, that spot, for about seven, eight years or so. So that party's sort of been going on for a while now, so yeah.

[Colleen]

I see you have a lot of guests, and thank you for the invitation. That was a lot of fun, a lot of fun. I just wanted to talk a little bit about your musical upbringing, because you have a really interesting story. If you could tell our listeners kind of what life was like growing up, because you were surrounded by music.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I was born in Japan. I'm half Japanese, half American. My father's American. My mother's Japanese. And so I'm mixed heritage, and I was visiting the U.S. quite a bit every summer. I'd go to the Cape Cod in the East Coast.

And so growing up, I listened to a lot of jazz and classical, because that was what was playing through the speakers. My father was a big audiophile and collected a ton of records. He used to sell a lot of rare jazz records as well. And so I listened to a lot of that, even since I was in my mother's womb. I was listening to some free jazz and wild stuff. And then I got into hip hop as an adolescence. And then I came to the U.S. for college and grad school. And during college, I was working as a radio DJ for my school radio, college radio, which was great back in the 90s.

[Colleen]

Yes, and in the 80s when I did it.

[Saucy Lady]

We got a lot of records and CDs. And so I got to listen to a lot of variety of music. And I was an urban music director at the time. I also even interned at Jive Records in New York City one summer. The late 90s, before they went, before iTunes took over and changed the whole industry. But before that, I got to really get a sense of the industry at that point.

But another point I forgot to make is growing up, I learned to play piano, play classical piano. I studied classical voice for many years. From like five, I studied piano and then classical voice. I started around 12. And so I did a lot of like operatic arias, you know, training. And in college, I was a music major. So I continued to study. And then after I graduated, I took some private lessons with some jazz vocalist teachers. And so I studied jazz vocals after graduation.

So some of that still kind of stays with me when I sing. I do a little bit of that sort of ad lib scatting here and there. It just comes out. So...

[Colleen]

You have a wonderful voice. And it's so interesting to hear that you did operatic kind of singing because that is difficult.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, that's what I trained to do for many, many years. These days, I don't. But I was in choruses, multiple choruses in the Boston area. And I sang at Fenway Park, Symphony Hall, and Carnegie Hall, and like those big venues. Those very exciting times. But then I wanted to be a solo artist.

[Colleen]

Right. I mean, how did that come about? Because you started DJing in Boston around 2009, I believe.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah. Actually, this is March. So it will be 16 years ago this month in the Boston area. And just a couple of years before that, I had started recording my first album. So...

[Colleen]

... diversify.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, yeah. I think that came out 2011.

[Colleen]

Right. Now, at this point, you're creating a persona, Saucy Lady. And I love this persona. I mean, she looks fabulous all the time, first of all. I mean, you have to check out Saucy Lady's website. The photos are outstanding. You look great. And the thing I also love is that you really play with fashion and you play with music. And I find there's some humor in this, too. Can you tell us a little bit about who Saucy Lady is?

[Saucy Lady]

I think Saucy Lady is someone that everyone has a little bit of. It's someone who has a little bit of attitude, who knows what she wants and is sexy, is open to being sexual and can go a little bit wild. My best friend in college, we used to be roommates together. She had told me, I'm very saucy. And I didn't know what she meant, really. So I was like, what do you mean? And so she described what it was. So I thought, wow, that's kind of a cool name to use for like, you know, usernames and things like that. I started using my Saucy Lady as sort of like an email and things like that. So when I came up with a DJ name, I was like, oh, that's perfect. We'll call it Saucy Lady. But then that, yes, became its own persona.

And, you know, I was like, I need more headgear and outfits to perform. I don't perform lately, but when I was performing, I was very, very careful about how I presented myself visually. I think it's important to look your part when you are on stage performing, not necessarily DJing all the time, but I'm talking more actual singing and performing on stage that way.

[Colleen]

Absolutely. Do you think also maybe this is one side that many of us have, you have an extroverted side and then you have the more introverted kind of private side that you protect a little bit?

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I think so. I guess, you know, when you're recording an album and you're trying to reflect on things, you know, you do need time alone. So I didn't have a lot of alone time growing up. Also, I was an only child, so I'm kind of used to that. But that helps you become creative. And so that's maybe my introverted side, maybe. But, you know, I love to party. I love big socials and Butterfly. I love hanging out and seeing people. But I do get tired after a night out, right? The next day, I need downtime. So I guess it's sort of that, you know, you have both sides of the spectrum.

[Colleen]

Yeah, have the balance. Now, you started DJing in Boston 16 years ago and you were collecting your own records. You said you grew up around a great big record collection, but you obviously have made your own record collection.

How did this kind of all come about? And what's the dance scene like in Boston?

[Saucy Lady]

So to answer your first question, you know, when my father was playing a lot of records in front of me, I wasn't allowed to touch records. So I was really like not allowed near the turntable. So I knew how valuable they were. But as I got older, he bought records for me. And I think the very first record I got was Kumo D. I go to work. I was 12 weeks single. And I played that so many times. So that was my first record.

But anyway, and then I started to buy my own records later in life, like after college and so forth. Yeah.

[Colleen]

Because some of your sets are all vinyl sets, that's why I'm asking. Because there's a lot of DJs that don't play any vinyl at all. And you are also a vinyl DJ. Some of your parties are only vinyl.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah. And I love the way it sounds. And it just there's something to it that's different from digital. And sometimes digital DJing is great. It's wonderful in so many ways. But I also get bored in some situations. So there's something exciting about playing records and having sort of that risk of, you know, things not working as you expect. Yes, living on the edge. Yeah.

But this party that I have, the monthly party, it does show that Boston folks do dance. There are break dancers. There's also a house community. It's not a big one anymore, but it still exists. And also Gen Z, newer generation of people are coming out open-minded, also being somewhat familiar with some of the music from even the 70s. So it's pretty surprising.

So yeah, Boston, there is a scene. It's not a big scene. And in the Boogie area, like that music, it's not very known. But we're changing that.

[Colleen]

So yeah. Before we get back to the music, I wanted to ask you about your record label, Dippin' Records. Now, you've released four albums yourself. Some have been on other labels as well. You've also done singles for Big Love, Razor and Tape, I believe Midnight Riot as well. You've done loads of work.

What made you start Dippin' Records? It was a couple of years ago. And you've been releasing other people's music too, not just your own.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I got kind of tired of waiting for people to release my music and also sort of like, hey, do you like this music? What do you think? And even though I believe in my heart, it's great and it should be heard by the public. Sometimes it's not the taste of the person listening to it or the label. It's just not the right fit. And so I wanted to make sure that I can still put out things when I know it's great.

And that's why I just had to be somewhat independent there. And I still want to release some music if it fits other labels too. But I also wanted to give opportunities to other artists that I thought were great, but were not getting the exposure or the opportunity to put music on vinyl. So that's why I wanted to start that.

[Colleen]

Which other artists are you working with who are on your label at the moment?

[Saucy Lady]

Well, we have so far an artist from Boston area named Lee Wilson. He's been releasing a million songs and doing collaborations, but I realized he didn't have a lot of vinyl releases. And I thought it was important for the DJ community who actually play records to be able to play his music too. So and it's also something that I liked, so I wanted to play out. Yeah, he's another artist. And also Fabio Santana, and he's based in Brazil. And he has another album that he is working on right now. And it's sort of final touches. So we're talking about releasing maybe a single from there first.

And so yeah, and then Yuki and I both have other projects that we're working on with other people as well in a band. So that's something that's in the works that we're looking into releasing in the future.

[Colleen]

And Yuki is Yuki Hirokane Saka, who is your musical partner. And you do a lot of, you co-produce all your albums with him as well, I believe.

[Saucy Lady]

Yes, yeah. I just realized I didn't introduce Yuki. But yeah, he is my partner in crime. And he does a lot of the production with me. And the four albums that we worked on together, we worked on pretty much all most songs we've heavily collaborated together on.

[Colleen]

Well, let me get back to the music. And when we come back, we'll talk about your new album, Love Fest, on your label, Dippin Records. This is Saucy Lady on Balearic Breakfast.

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And you've been listening to DJ Saucy Lady on Balearic Breakfast. She's been listening to her mix, and I have her here with me. And I wanted to talk about your new album, which is your fourth album.

And it's called Love Fest, and it's out on your label, Dippin Records. The first thing I wanted to ask about it is some of your albums have had themes, like Supernova has a theme of space. Love Fest does exactly what it says on the tin. It's songs about love. Could you tell me, first of all, why you like to do thematic albums, and then why you chose this particular topic?

[Saucy Lady]

I think it's important to be sort of cohesive with an album. And it's different from a single. I had recorded some of these songs already and released them digitally, a couple of them. But I thought it made sense to put them all together because they were all, again, about love. And I have about half of the album is about covers, and the other half are original tunes. And yeah, it was great recording. I mean, a couple of them are pretty, yeah, brand new, haven't been released.

[Colleen]

One single I've already played on the show is your cover of Surface's Fallin' In Love. And this is a song I always like, but it's a mid-tempo groover, you know, it's just kind of bopping along. And you brought it to like house tempo, and it really works. Could you tell me how that all came about? Is this a song you used to DJ out as well?

[Saucy Lady]

I did, but I didn't play it very often because, again, it's mid-tempo. So I definitely thought it needed a little boost in that tempo. But it was a suggestion made by a friend of ours, friend of Yuki and I, who is a big, he loves to dig for records, and he's Japanese, and he's a big fan of Saucy Lady.

He buys all of my records. And he's like, you should definitely do this song. And I was like, oh, it's kind of a bit known, and I don't always like to do something too obvious. But then I realized the vocals are very close to my range, and I thought the sound is very similar to Saucy's sound. So I thought, well, it's actually not a bad idea. People are familiar, so they're going to recognize it right away. And so by bringing it up in tempo, we wanted to make that the first song in the album, since with the groove being at the top, you know, it'll help with the audio being loud enough and good for the club. So that's why we have it very first track.

[Colleen]

I love how you're thinking about vinyl pressing correctly. That is so great. Because, you know, sometimes you have, like, the song that you want to play out is like the inside cut. And of course, you know, the audio, the sound just gets squashed as you get closer in it. So that's really great, more expansive. You also cover Bobby Caldwell's What You Won't Do for Love.

And you also cover it with a friend of mine, who I also have worked with in the studio and someone I've known for a long time, Yam Hu, who was first in a band called Fuzz Against Junk when I first moved to the UK on Euphonic. And then he started doing his own productions. And he and I have collaborated. He's worked on a few remixes with me. He's a great guy. But I have to say, all the years I've known him, I didn't know he sang. He never even sang in the studio when we were working together. So how did you get him to do that?

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I didn't know either. So he actually suggested me to record that song for his label originally. And so Yuki and I, actually, it's funny, Yuki had his own album in the past where we recorded the same song, but it was like really just vocals and piano. It was a very stripped down version, which I really liked. But since we already recorded it, we're like, oh, we don't want to record it again. But then I thought, well, you know, Andy's saying he's going to put some vocals on it. And I thought, well, this might be interesting. So yeah, I was like, let's just do it.

And then we recorded it and he sent his vocals and we kind of layered it with mine. And he's not singing like the verse or anything. It's not a prominent part.

[Colleen]

It's like he's underpinning you like an octave lower.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, but I always love hearing men, male and female vocals together. There's something great about that. And so it added a really nice tone, so I loved it.

[Colleen]

I agree. I love duets, especially, you know, the two different types of voices. And it's a kind of a lost thing. I mean, I think about all these kind of great collaborations like Donny Hathaway and Roberta Flack, or there's so many great ones. And I think it's something that needs to be brought back because the textures sound really good together.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I've done a few in the past, and I did Saturday Love, and It Seems to Hang On, Ashford and Simpson. Also Tell Me, you know, SOS Band. These are covers we did with different male vocalists. And I love all of them. And there's something so magical about it. There's like a chemistry. And it's just obviously men do not have the sound that I can, you know, output. So there's something special about that. And so I love doing duets.

It's hard to find a great duet to cover, though. There aren't so many. So it's always a challenge to find the right one. I've done a few, but maybe we'll do something in the future. Maybe with Andy or Yambui.

[Colleen]

Yeah, that'd be cool. You also have a couple drummers as guests on the album. You have Jay Mumford and also Derek Mackenzie, who is a drummer for Jamiroquai. How did that all come about? Because usually you don't get drummers as collabs. You'll get like the featured keyboard player. You'll have like a soloist on, you know, a trumpet or something or a duet.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I think drummers, I mean, drums are really the most important ingredient initially for any track. So they mean a lot. And so with Jay, I've known him for many years. We've also collaborated on a few songs before. And we've always talked about, you know, wanting to do another track together. He loves everything that, you know, you and I work on.

And so we finally got a track that would, you know, be very fitting for him and the tempo. And so, yeah, we got him to record and that went well. He loved it. And Derek, Derek McKenzie is someone that, you know, Yuki and I both really admire. And he has such an incredible disco, you know, rhythm and that no one else can really copy. So we were very honored that he was down to record. And he was so nice about it, everything. And it was incredible.

[Colleen]

Oh, great. Well, you have two other covers on the album that we didn't talk about. Chic Sao Paulo and M2M's Love Lock. But I kind of want to move on to the originals as well, because you have three originals. What If, Break the Ice and Silver Haze. Silver Haze is a beautiful ballad, by the way. I love that one. Can you just tell us a little bit about that song?

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, I just was inspired to record something that had some of the elements that some of the newer R&B vocalists do these days. Like, for example, I love Devin Morrison. I discovered him through just listening to Spotify, actually. And I just love his sort of 80s sort of sound that he adds to the synths and his vocals. And then I learned about other vocalists similar to that style. And I realized I need to record something like that, where the voice is very airy, a slower tempo, some elements of the 80s keyboard synths.

And so we did that. And then we, of course, needed the right drums. So we got Derek for that. It was great. I loved it.

[Colleen]

Yeah, that's great. Well, what's going on now in the future for Saucy Lady? You have some like DJ gigs coming up, I assume. And what's coming up on Dippin Records? And what are the plans for the album?

[Saucy Lady]

So right now, there are a couple of songs in Japanese that I had recently recorded. It's pretty much at the final mix stage. So we want to release that through, I think, through Dippin. So that'll be the next, probably the next release. And, oh, we also have the cover of I Can't Shake That Feeling by Click. And we covered that with Omar. And so that was released digitally last year. But we have a vinyl version coming out this month, I think actually in a week.

[Colleen]

So that's great. That's a great song. I love what you did together.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, so that'll be on a 12-inch, 45 RPM. So the sound should be pumping. Yeah, and also we're in the middle of recording a jazz funk album.

So that's like a whole sort of new venture. And I love boogie and all that disco, but I want to move away a little bit from that and sort of be a little more experimental, a little more spacey, you know, a little bit of that Bonnie Liston Smith vibe with a touch of, you know, Blackbird and, you know, vocals like that, a touch of Roy Ayers. So, you know, the stuff we all love.

[Colleen]

Yeah, that sounds great. And then you'll get to sing a different way.

[Saucy Lady]

Yeah, it'll be different. It would probably not have verses and stuff. It'll just be more. Yeah, well, we'll see what happens. I don't want to spoil too much until it happens. We're in the middle of recording it, yeah.

[Colleen]

Exactly. Well, for those of you that want to find out more about Saucy Lady, definitely check out her website, but also go to her Bandcamp, because that's where you can order vinyl and download her music digitally as well. Good luck with the album. It's fantastic. I'm really happy for you. You've been just working really hard.

[Saucy Lady]

Thank you, Colleen. Thank you for having me and knowing so much about the album already and doing a little research. Thank you.

[Colleen]

I listen to all of it. And, you know, I do my research. I do the due diligence, as do you. And hopefully I'll see you in Boston sometime soon. Yes, very soon, hopefully. All right, well, take care.

[Saucy Lady]

Cheers.