Ptelicans, French producer Pastel and Philly soul voice Nic Hanson join forces on ‘Driving Solo,’ a warm, bass-led funk single born in London jams
Some songs are engineered. Others just happen. “Driving Solo,” the new single from Ptelicans featuring producer Pastel and vocalist Nic Hanson, belongs firmly to the second kind. It grew out of unplanned jam sessions in London, where a Philadelphia-born soul singer and a French-Polynesian beatmaker realized they heard rhythm the same way. No brief. No strategy deck. Just a bassline and a feeling worth chasing.
That origin story explains the track’s whole personality. “Driving Solo” runs on a low end that rolls rather than pushes, patient and warm, the kind of foundation funk lives or dies on. Hanson floats over it. His phrasing is loose in the best way, relaxed enough that you can hear him smiling through the take, and his tone carries echoes of the Philly soul tradition he grew up inside without ever leaning on it as a costume. Pastel, meanwhile, resists every temptation to overproduce. The arrangement stays airy. Instruments enter, say what they need to say, and step back. For a record this groove-forward, the restraint is the flex.
The Voice Has History
Hanson is not a newcomer so much as a secret hiding in plain sight. Now based in Paris by way of Philadelphia and New York, he has quietly stacked more than 200 million streams across collaborations with Bakermat, Moon Boots, Jafunk, edbl, and Elijah Fox, moving fluidly between funk, soul, hip-hop, and dance music. His co-write and vocal on Moon Boots’ “Keep the Faith” went to No. 1 on KCRW, and Elton John spun his single “Cheaper Than Coffee” on the Rocket Hour radio show years before the algorithm caught up. He describes himself, half-jokingly, as an underthinker. On “Driving Solo,” that instinct-first approach sounds like a superpower.
Pastel brings the other half of the equation. The French producer has built a reputation in the francophone soul and groove scene for tasteful, texture-rich production that prioritizes feel over flash, and this collaboration slots him into a lineage of producers who understand that the space between notes is where funk actually breathes.
Built for the Long Drive
The reference points are easy to reach for. There is Anderson .Paak in the pocket and the charisma, and Blue Lab Beats in the jazzy warmth of the chords. But “Driving Solo” doesn’t feel like homework about its influences. It feels like a summer record made by people who like each other, which is rarer than it should be. The song asks nothing of you except movement. Windows down, one hand on the wheel, nowhere in particular to be.
It also lands at a moment when this exact strain of live-feeling, transatlantic funk is quietly having a moment. The bridge between American soul vocalists and European groove producers, from the Jafunk and edbl school of UK funk to the French touch revivalists, has become one of the most reliable pipelines for feel-good music that still has musicianship at its core. “Driving Solo” is a strong new entry in that conversation, and a promising signal for whatever Ptelicans, Pastel, and Hanson do next, together or apart.
The single is out now on all streaming platforms. Play it loud, preferably in motion.
