070 Shake070 Shake (aka Danielle Balbuena) is destined to stay a cult artist despite her many high-profile features – none bigger than on RAYE's 2022 smash Escapism, which, gaining traction on TikTok, won 'Song Of The Year' at the BRITS. She doesn't compromise.
The Dominican-American rapper-cum-singer from New Jersey originally impressed Pusha T, who signed her to GOOD Music in 2016 (she also opened The 1975's North American tour).
Balbuena generated buzz two years later after working with Ye (formerly Kanye West) during the Wyoming Sessions, elevating Ghost Town (alongside PARTYNEXTDOOR and Kid Cudi) off his micro-album ye. She dropped an EP, Glitter.
Balbuena would develop a distinctive aesthetic with experimental Auto-Tuned and multi-tracked vocals, post-trap beats, auteur production values and hyper-melodicism on 2020's debut Modus Vivendi, fluctuating between euphoria and melancholy. Tame Impala remixed the '80s-inspired Guilty Conscience, her commercial breakthrough.
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The mysterious Balbuena has now released a trilogy of albums, the latest Petrichor, with negligible promotion, rarely courting the media – fashion magazines aside. She's even reluctant to utilise social media, recently stating on Instagram that "I find it very difficult to communicate through this medium because it doesn't feel tangible."
In fact, her predilection to be "present" in real life was a theme of 2022's overlooked You Can't Kill Me – an extravagant electro-pop collaboration with Houston 'Synth God' (and Ghost Town co-producer) Mike Dean. Alas, Balbuena is best known in the mainstream for her romances – notably dating celebrity offspring Lily-Rose Depp, star of Robert Eggers' Nosferatu. But she does interact freely with crowds.
Inevitably, there's been little publicity for Balbuena's second Australian tour as she hits the summer festival circuit – Beyond The Valley and Wildlands. Tonight the enigma is performing a Naarm/Melbourne side-show at 170 Russell – substantially smaller than the Northcote Theatre where she played a packed Australian headlining premiere in 2023 while in the country for Splendour In The Grass, the venue downsized from The Forum.
Still, it's a big win for her devoted fanbase. Balbuena is shy, often hiding behind those iconic curls, but comes into her own in intimate spaces, chatting easily.
On her last run, Balbuena's support was Naarm/Melbourne trap'n'B newcomer Lithe – who subsequently blew up internationally with his single Fall Back and received ARIA nods. This go, she's joined by another local emerging alt-R&B/rap act in Cleffy (Samuel Maunge) – his broody style similarly complementing, rather than contrasting, hers.
Maunge burst out with Meet You At The Graveyard but has been lowkey since his 2023 album Clean Sheets, dirty walls. He's an enthusiastic performer, rushing back and forth through smoke machine vapours. The emotional highlight is march 2023 – sombre on record but uplifting live.
Over the past year, Balbuena has toured concertedly behind Petrichor – and the evening's setlist privileges its songs as she launches with Sin, a piano ballad that explodes into brazen rock.
Indeed, the most famous member of the old 070 posse has largely archived her early oeuvre – including material from the Modus Vivendi era, although she revisits the synthy Guilty Conscience. However, Balbuena's day ones start jumping when she delivers 2016's KAYTRANADA-esque Honey.
Nor is Balbuena tempted to capitalise on her credible collabs – like the recent Joke's On You with progressive techno DJ/producer Anyma off his album The End Of Genesys, let alone Fred again..'s viral Danielle (smile on my face), which samples Modus Vivendi's Nice To Have.
Petrichor – its evocative title a sensory word for the scent of rain that follows a dry patch – represents the ever-changing Balbuena's boldest foray into alternative, as she reunites with Canadian indie-type Dave Hamelin.
The star expands beyond any hip hop paradigm into blues, goth and grunge (she actually covered the traditional In The Pines for Modus Vivendi). Electric guitar predominates over synths.
Balbuena has some unusual guests on Petrichor, too: Courtney Love (for a shoegazey remake of Tim Buckley's folk Song To The Siren that was memorably transformed into etherealwave in the '80s by This Mortal Coil), the US country singer Cam and City Girls rapper JT.
All this has instilled Balbuena's show with fresh energy. In 2023 the dynamo performed solo to backing tracks, ad-libbing. But, while her stage production remains spartan, with Balbuena initially appearing dramatically as a silhouette, she's now accompanied by stellar live musicians in Venice Beach axeman Josh "Stolen Nova" Landau and keyboardist Johan Lenox – the band's music director.
The instrumentalists play behind a transparent curtain, revealing themselves at the end. Yet their presence gives Balbuena's repertoire a new intensity, the mixing additionally outstanding. At times, it's almost like a heavy metal gig. Curiously, Landau was just in Australia with TV On The Radio. At one point Balbuena jokes about borrowing his jacket.
Sin segues into an epic rendition of the Petrichor fan fave Elephant – which, together with her hypnotic standalone Black Dress, Balbuena previewed last tour. A triptych of songs from You Can't Kill Me soar: the poetic lead single Skin & Bones, broken beat odyssey History and anguished Wine & Spirits (Balbuena concluding with an audible sigh).
Another peak arrives with Petrichor's centrepiece, Winter Baby/New Jersey Blues – a beatswitching number capturing both '50s rock 'n' roll swagger and doo-wop nostalgia. Balbuena seats herself for the cinematic Blue Velvet, amplifying its Brazilian bossa nova rhythms.
Balbuena officially closes with a cavernous Love, again off Petrichor. Though previously resisting the artifice of encores, she reappears for Ye's Ghost Town – as is now her custom, albeit surprisingly predictable for an unpredictable act. Gauging by the audience response, music fans haven't lost their fervour for Ye's music regardless of his countless controversies.
In 2026 Balbuena is as individualistic – and brilliant – as ever. In one monologue she declares, "Something in my life says it's just the beginning" and mentions a new album. We need it.
