Maya Jane Coles

Maya Jane Coles is a highly productive producer, songwriter, and DJ from London. Throughout her career, she has crafted intricate, personality-driven tech-house tracks in addition to dubstep and garage (primarily as Nocturnal Sunshine). First appearing with a series of well-received club EPs in 2008, her releases since 2010′s Humming Bird EP have increasingly focused on her vocals and songwriting skills. Comfort, her 2013 debut full-length, effortlessly blended downbeat house and pop, and her 2017 double album Take Flight contained one disc focusing on downtempo songs, and another on club tracks. 2019′s Full Circle (as Nocturnal Sunshine) branched out further, incorporating trap and drum’n’bass, and 2021′s Night Creature contained club tracks of varying tempos. Maya Jane Coles got into making music as a teenager while using software to make tracks inspired by rap and trip-hop. At some point, house won her over, and she debuted in 2008 on the Dogmatik label with the Sick Panda 12″. Her first remixes of tracks by other artists were also released in 2008, but it was around 2011 when she became particularly in demand, with work for the likes of Tom Middleton, Little Dragon, Florence + the Machine, and the xx over the next few years. Along with Lena Cullen, Coles executed additional remixes under the name She Is Danger. All the while, she continued to release her own productions on labels such as Mobilee, 20:20 Vision, and Hypercolour, as well as LMD SkunkWorks, home to a dubstep diversion credited to alias Nocturnal Sunshine. In 2013, Coles released her first proper album on her I/AM/ME label. Titled Comfort, the mostly low-key, predominantly song-oriented album featured collaborations with Tricky, Miss Kittin, Kim Ann Foxman, and Karin Park, among others. As a DJ, she has also made mixes for Mixmag and Resident Advisor, as well as commercially released sets for !K7′s DJ-Kicks (2012) and Fabric (2014) series. Following the 2015 release of the self-titled Nocturnal Sunshine album, Coles released an ambitious double album titled Take Flight in 2017, containing downtempo as well as house tracks. Coles’ EP Waves & Whirlwinds arrived near the end of 2018. Full Circle, her second album as Nocturnal Sunshine, arrived in 2019, with guests including Peaches, Gangsta Boo, and RY X. In 2020, Coles released the single “Run to You” (featuring Claudia Kane) and the EP Would You Kill (4 Me)?, as well as another EP titled Pleasure under her CAYAM alias. She subsequently remixed songs by Sylvan Esso, London Grammar, Emilee, and others. The club-focused Night Creature album arrived in 2021, with guest vocalists including Kane, Julia Stone, and Karin Park. ~ Andy Kellman & Paul Simpson