Anyone who experienced Daft Punk live this year may find themselves getting tingles on the neck watching this clip...
It's taken from the 'Alive' DVD, directed by Olivier Gondry & released at the end of November. Looks bloody good. Seems they dished out loads of cameras to the crowd & got them to do the work.
Co-incidentally my buddy Jools emailed today with a new mix he's done of the same track. As Jools points out, it's a little more refined than yer usual Blog House fare.
Slightly linked to Daft Punk is this new track from Christopher Just. It uses the 'Around The World Again' riff (by Nicky Van She) with the vocal taken from the Pet Shop Boys' 'Domino Dancing'. There's a splash of 'Rocker' in there too..... so with those high quality ingredients it's not a surprise that it's not rubbish. Behold: MEL MERIO - DOMINO DANCING (EXTENDED CLUB MIX 1)
Our Brave Kylie has a new album coming out, which is always worth at least some of your attention, since she (or her A&R at least) has a gift for working with the hottest producers & remixers of the day.
On remix duty for this are Studio, who are cut from the same Balearic cloth as A Moutain of One, and in fact remixed their last single.
As Kylie herself predicted, things these days are Slow. So we get Spanish Guitars and a chugging dubby sunshine groove. Pity it's brass monkeys out.
2 Hearts is apparently her 40th single! And comes from her 10th album, 'X'. I was sent a promo mix of the album, which when compressed into five minutes seems to turn into a deranged Girls Aloud track. There's too many choruses! The 'megamix' seems to be making a return these days, which brings back horrible memories of this strange Smiths 12" I had, with about 10 tracks mixed together on each side. It was scary bad.
Anyway 'hooked' (or maybe it's 'Like a Drug'), about half way through this, sounds quite promising.
A quality new Banksy in Bethnal Green.... hopefully he can stick 'em up as fast as Tower Hamlets rip 'em down. Twats.
It's seemingly influenced by 'the flower guy' Michael De Feo
So after a great many reminders and a few sharp pokes in the ribs, I finally got a mix recorded for Mdme Modyfier. It's 75 minutes of the finest Detroit sounds of the past 20-odd years (plus one from LA that slipped in by mistake!) and you can download it from here. Apart from a couple of tracks that didn't seem to fit in too well i'm pretty pleased with it, so let me know what you think.
I've been listening more than anything else lately to Chaz Jankel's new album on Tirk. Chaz was apparently one of Ian Dury's Blockheads, and it seems that since then he's been quietly releasing amazing records. Now i'm ashamed to admit i've never heard of the fella... but this album is pure gold. It's like a one-man 'Good Times' compilation, with tracks covering disco, electro, jazz & funk.
This track was apparently newly recorded for the compilation, and is my favourite. You wouldn't have thought from appearances (above) that Chaz was actually the twin of Prince. But so it seems. CHAZ JANKEL - GET MYSELF TOGETHER
Posting this next track probably doesn't show off the variety contained in the album all that well, as it's quite similar in sound to the last one. But it's probably my next favourite so sod it! CHAZ JANKEL - WITHOUT YOU
Pick up the album. It's great.
On a rather less cheerful note, but brilliant all the same, is the new album by iLiKETRAiNS. Some may grow weary of their need to portentously impart tales of historical events on us, but personally I love it. Where else would I find out about Donald Crowhurst, who attempted to cheat a round-the-world sailing race by writing a fictitious log of his exploits while sailing aimlessly round the doldrums. Although looking at the Wikipedia entry, this tale (ending in insanity & suicide) has inspired many artists & musicians. I don't think Girls Aloud are one of them though.
This album, 'Elegies to Lessons Learnt' suffers slightly by not having a real standout tracks like 'The Beeching Report', but it's consistently absorbing, interesting and powerful... especially when consumed with the accompanying booklet of essays.
Opening track 'We All Fall Down' sets the scene... a tale of the Derbyshire village of Eyam, stricken by Bubonic Plague, who volunteraly isolated themselves from their neighbours and thus prevented the spread of the disease further North.
The album's not perfect by any means. The tracks do sound a little samey once you take away the wildly different themes of each song... but they're still a band well worth investing some time into.
Ages ago at Bugged Out I heard Erol Alkan play a mash up of The Chemical Brothers & Primal Scream, which struck my chemically addled brain as being rather good. So when I noticed this week that Phonica had a copy in stock I thought i'd pick it up....
Well it possibly sounds now a little more dated than it did a couple of years ago. Those Chemical beats are just a bit too polished for today's dirty dancefloors. But i'd say anyone of a certain age who hears those Primal Scream samples will let out just a little groan of pleasure. It certainly bangs in a most pleasurable fashion.
At the time someone told me it was someone pretty famous who was responsible. Erol himself? I can't remember to be honest. If anyone knows please let us know in the comments!
I was a little surprised to see a re-release of 'La Musique' by Riot in Belgium. I remembered it as being a good track, and I think I posted it here. I can't imagine there's been a clamour of people wanting to buy it and not being able to though? Anyway re-released it is, and i'm glad because i've been digging this remix by Revlover. Which has reminded me that it has a damn good chorus.
It's a tragic day for music fans, with the pink palace falling victim to the shadowy BPI....
The hypothesis that each download = a lost sale is clearly flawed.... and I for one see MP3s as a sampler for the real thing. If the BPI are so worried about people listening to music the artist hasn't received payment for, shouldn't they be tackling the underground menace of second hand shops?
So the big release this week is probably the Soulwax remix album. Which contains all of their slamming remixes in one handy package.
Funnily enough I find the impact is a little diluted when you hear them all in one go, since it's only when a Soulwax jam follows some faceless techno bollocks or derivitive indie whining that it stands out as being the futuristic head rave that it really is.
Most of the remixes are pretty familiar.. The Gossip (of course); Justice; Robbie Williams; Gorillaz; LCD Soundsystem (although to be honest I can't stand the new version with the extra Daft Punk samples)... but there are plenty here that I hadn't heard before. My favourite of these is probably this track by Arthur Argent. I've no idea who he is, but it seems this was released in 2002 on Whacked Records. Being from 2002 it sounds very Electroclash. I think it's about time that we can reminisce on that now. This sounds great.
The second CD is a great mix (it's Soulwax innit!). So this gets voted a: BUY
Poni Hoax has thus far released two FANTASTIC singles on Tiger Sushi... 'Budapest' and 'Involutive Star'. Both however I feel were rather overshadowed by the even better Joakim remixes on the b-side.
Now Joakim has been put in the background on production duties, and this new single 'Antibodies' is the first output. It's described as 'Heroic Disco', and that seems an apt term. It's dramatic, uplifting, slightly dark... and yes, a little heroic. Like Depeche Mode crossed with Erasure. Again this is backed by two cracking remixes.. by To The Bone and Chateau Flight. But this time the Poni man wins out! And does a sexy dance just for you.
What next? Er.. how about a competition. It's not run by me, so as far as I know it's been on every blog in the planet. But anyway if you enter you can win some really cool shit so it's worth a jiggle.
Closing date is Thursday, since the party is on Saturday. Halloween & shit innit.
Finally here's something from the terrifying mass of emails that I should have read / responded to / listened to / deleted. These are probably from the genre described as Blog House.... and will give you Ableton DJs something to slamming to play while you wink at sexy dancing girls.
G.L.O.V.E.S. is from Melbourne and specialises in defeating his enemies using nothing but a well timed 'swoosh' of the synth emulators on his prosthetic arm. He's ruthless.
I got the new Black Ghosts single in the post the other day, and like all the others it's brilliant. I was all excited about posting the Plastician & Skream remix, only to remember just now that I posted it a few months ago. Gah! Well it's still amazing.
I've a lot of love for the Ghosts, and based on all the singles so far (all of which i've probably posted here... this skull has certainly made several appearances on the page!) I think the album is really something to look forward to.
The original of 'Some Way Through This' actually has a fairly similar dubstep flava to the aforementioned remix. Laid back with heavy sounds & dramatic strings. In essence however, it's just a great tune.
Tonto is the new single from the Battles album, and it's another belter almost soaring to the heights of 'Atlas'.
The accompanying video is incredible, even when viewed in the tiny confines of youtube.
So with a track & video as good as that, and Warp managing the goods, it's no surprise that the remixes are mighty fine. It's a real battle (ba-dum) to decide between the Four Tet & The Field for first prize, but i'll give it to The Field as i've not written about them before.
Well the reason i've not written about him before is because i've not heard anything by him before (this, to be clear is The Field and not Fields or Field Music). I have heard good things though from his technoid output on Kompakt Records, and perhaps on this evidence it's a guy worth investigating.
Conjuring up images of travelling at night, the mix builds slowly & repetitively, firing at new synapses of your brain as each new element is added. It becomes quite overwhelming after a while, and demands your attention. This isn't for background listening. BATTLES - TONTO (THE FIELD REMIX)
I'm still crazy about the Italians do it Better compilation, and even more so now my 12"s have arrived too. Farah, Glass Candy & Professor Genius in all their analog glory. Well I also had the good sense to order the Professor Genius CD. His tracks were some of the best on 'After Dark' (how good is 'Pegaso'?!), and there's only 300 copies of this bad boy (order it here).
You know what to expect from this.. glitzy Italo chords, heart pumping arpeggiators fuelled by pure crystalline cocaine. Dry Ice & glitterballs. Night Games is one of the tracks that's only on this CD. Across the Spree can also be found on the Italians do it Better 12". It's trendy cos it's hot.
After getting Talking Heads' 'Stop Making Sense' DVD free with the paper last week, it's great to hear this new re-edit from the genius of the genre Greg Wilson.
This sounds very much like it's the version taken from the film, where Byrne plays an acoustic guitar accompanying a boombox belching out staccato 808 noises.
With the drums moved to the beginning, and some fantastic crowd noise manipulation, an already spellbinding version of the track is improbably improved. I don't want to over use the words 'brilliant' and 'amazing' but this is both. TALKING HEADS - PSYCHO KILLER (DJ GREG WILSON RE-EDIT)
I've posted a few Bollywood disco type things up here... mainly by Usha Uthup. But i'm enjoying this most of all.
It's of course the original version of M.I.A.'s new single 'Jimmy', performed by Parvati Khan. It's from what looks to be a particularly demented Bollywood film.. 'Disco Dancer'. From this great review it looks like a classic piece of kitsch cinema, and i'm trying to order myself a DVD. There was one on ebay but I just missed it. Rats! I'd love to get the soundtrack on vinyl, but I can't seem to find it anywhere. Luckily this blog has the entire album to download, which is where I got these MP3s. The Parvati Khan track is utterly fantastic, but so is 'I Am a Disco Dancer'. After a slow start the madness increases as they break out the bongos. 'Auva Auva' meanwhile seems to be a cover of 'Video Killed the Radio Star' done in the usual Indian fashion... listen to the song once and then half remember various elements of it. The perfect way to do a cover version IMO. PARVATI KHAN - JIMMY JIMMY JIMMY VIJAY BENEDICT - I AM A DISCO DANCER BAPPI LAHIRI & USHA UTHUP - AUVA AUVA
At last some tracks from the Italians Do it Better 'After Dark' compilation are available on vinyl. It's probably my most listened to album this year, so i've been eagerly waiting for these. They're cheapest through the Troubleman Unlimited website - all three for £10 rather than £7.99 each. But postage is pricey. 'Miss Hollywood' by Glass Candy in particular is spinning my brain in all sorts of directions at the moment. I might post one of the mixes up when they arrive. The full bundle also contains the CD & a great Jacques Renault mix CD I got a while back. This time i've also gone for the Professor Genius album... his tracks on 'After Dark' are great & it's limited to 300 copies...
So whilst waiting for the postman to bring me my disco bundle, i've been chugging along to A Mountain of One.
They seem cut from the same balearic cloth as Map of Africa, and their three vinyl singles seem equally as elusive. Fortunately a CD compilation is out next week. To be honest i'm only completely mad about one track at the moment, but I think I may need to give the album a little more time.
This is the one that's really doing it for me. A slow disco chugger featuring Martina Topley Bird on vocals. It'll turn your eyes to glitterballs and put an inch on your heels.
I been getting down today to '12" 80's Grooves' a triple CD nostalgia filled cruise through the 80s, designed to bring back memories of Top of the Pops & white socks.
Of course you get people like Herbie Hancock, Chaka Khan, Public Enemy, Pointer Sisters blah blah blah. But it's the one hit wonders who bring the most joy.... Steve Arrington, Gwen Guthrie, Dennis Edwards. Joyce Sims. The half-remembered heroes of Thursday evenings.
Truth be told there's a fair few tracks here for which the 7" radio edit would be too long, let along the full 12" mixes.... however i've been rocking to these in particular today. LOOSE ENDS - HANGING ON A STRING ORAN JUICE JONES - THE RAIN
I suppose I should be talking about the Radiohead album. I don't know about the music, but it's pretty interesting how they're delivering it. In case you don't know, you can download the album from 10th October, and basically pay however much you want for it. Which may be nothing, if that's what you want. Alternatively there's a pretty lush looking vinyl & CD box set that'll set you back 40 smackers.
Personally, I have never paid for a download. I buy plenty of vinyl & CDs, but I can't get my head around paying £6.99 for an album in mp3 format when you can get the original CD for 8 quid. Chances are that MP3s will be obsolete in a couple of years, and I also don't fancy the financial consequences of a busted hard drive. Plus I like to hold the case or sleeve in my hands while listening to the music. So yes, despite the best efforts of the music industry I have not been sold one iota on this itunes lark. So it's rather ironic that an album that is potentially being given away for free is probably the first one I will pay for. I'm quite happy to pay 2 or 3 quid for an album's worth of MP3s, and that's what i'll do. I really don't see how mp3s cost so much when there are no manufacturing costs and very little cost of distribution. I think the industry may be surprised at how many people opt to pay what they consider a fair price despite being given the option to get it for free, so it wouldn't surprise me if this model is used far more often in the future.
But i'm sure you can read about that on roughly 100,000 other sites on the web. So I'll leave it at that.
It's been a while since i've posted up some dancefloor riddims. Well, if there's one thing that's been more ubiquitous in clubs the last couple of years than the Human League's 'Things That Dreams Are Made Of' it's Kissy Sell Out. So it makes sense that KSO has remixed the aforementioned synthpop classic. It's a little restrained by Kissy's standards, and lovingly produced. I suspect though that it may be augmented by the odd air horn when played out...
I've also just discovered this on my hard drive, and since it's caused me a momentary twinge of recollection & the onset of a dose of chair dancing i'll post it up as well...
Ah, so looking at hype machine it seems that as usual i've prevaricated before posting my tunes up, and therefore as usual i've been beaten to the punch when it comes to posting up the hottness. But as a wise man once said, 'it's not a race'.
(that's what used to greet me on the M4 into London)
So as you probably know by now, if you read other blogs, there is a retrospective of Trevor Jackson's Output label coming out on 12th November. It's a triple CD / DVD pack and will no doubt be quite lavishly packaged if it's in keeping with the rest of the label's...err... Output.
Accompanying it is a remix single called 'I Hate Remixes', and it features this bitching Optimo remix of Colder. 'To The Music' was a decent track from Colder's second album 'Heat', but Optimo have just perfected it for playing out. I'm not saying they're old, but they've been playing in discos long enough to know what works. A lolloping bassline; glacial chimes; emotionless vocals & a squelching ravetasm erupting half way through.
Trevor Jackson has also mixed one of the CDs in the forthcoming 'Kings of Electro' compilation. It sounds to me what a mix CD should be about... someone who knows their stuff delivering a perfect mix of the familiar & unfamiliar. It's a strange term though 'Electro'. Although in my eyes it can be interpreted many ways, i wouldn't have done what Alter Ego did on the other CD which is put together a Techno CD. Particularly since the last one in the series was 'Kings of Techno'. Get with the brief sunshine... Maurizio, Plastikman, Kenny Larkin, DBX & Underground Resistance = Techno.
Thankfully our Trevor got the right idea. These are electro.
I'd really love to talk about all the awesomeness that's been coming out on DFA, however they're not very keen on MP3 bloggers, and if I put a track up i'll just get shouted at by EMI within about 10 minutes. So instead i'll just have to tell you to go & seek out the new stuff. Carl Craig's mix of 'Sound of Silver', the Soulwax mix of 'Get Innocuous', Hercules & Love Affair, LCD Soundsystem's 45:33 and Still Going Theme by Still Going are all essential. In a way it's good that I don't have to decide which tracks to post as it'd be a tough decision. The new Death From Abroad sublabel is going to be worth keeping an eye or two on also...
One thing I can hopefully post is this new remix from Justus Kohncke... a man who always gives good mix. This time it's on a single by Half Cousin, that also contains very good versions of 'The Absentee' from Zero 7 & Fujiya & Miyagi. Justus' mix is the highlight though... one that spends half the track hitting you with some wonky techno before some lovely chords herald the arrival of the vocal, and the whole mood of the track changes.
It's only when I start writing these things that I realise how much stuff i'd like to talk about & post up. I won't overload y'all though. Soak these up & i'll be back with more sometime soon...
