L'Orange is a North Carolina-born beatmaker with a penchant for sampling early jazz records and vintage radio broadcasts, lending a nostalgic, time-worn quality to his music. He started making music during the mid-2000s; after a stint as a recording engineer, he began releasing his own recordings in early 2011, starting with The Manipulation EP. Later in the year, he released Old Soul, an album that heavily sampled the music of Billie Holiday, whom L'Orange describes as his muse. The Still Spinning EP and the full-length The Mad Writer followed in 2012. In 2013, L'Orange began a long, fruitful partnership with the Mello Music Group label, beginning with The City Under the City, in collaboration with Stick Figa. The first L'Orange album to feature rapping, it also included appearances from Open Mike Eagle and yU. L'Orange's next full-length, The Orchid Days, arrived in 2014. The album featured guest vocalists including Homeboy Sandman, Blu, and Jeremiah Jae. During the year, the producer also released singles featuring Mr. Lif, John Robinson, and Boog Brown. He then collaborated with Jae on a full-length, The Night Took Us in Like Family, which was released by Mello Music Group in April of 2015. A few months later, the label issued Time? Astonishing!, L'Orange's collaboration with legendary hip-hop eccentric Kool Keith. In 2016, L'Orange and Mr. Lif collaborated on a full-length titled The Life & Death of Scenery, which was released in October. A year later, L'Orange released The Ordinary Man, a solo album that featured guest appearances from Del the Funky Homosapien, Oddisee, Blu, and others. ~ Paul Simpson