BANANASPAM!

Broadcast and The Focus Group!

2009-10-05T14:03:00.000-07:00

Caribou Vibration Ensemble Live at ATP-NY on WFMU 9/13/09

2009-09-28T13:35:00.000-07:00

WFMU had much of this legendary lineup broadcast in real time. But we just discovered this great live set from Caribou's expanded super bonanza 14-piece live ensemble with Marshall Allen (Sun Ra), Kieran Hebden (Fourtet), Koushik and more including a choir, four drummers and a big fantastic mess of sound!

Shellac At Great American Music Hall June 18th

2009-06-24T08:46:00.000-07:00

Last week I stood in the same room as Steve Albini for the first time since July 24th 1987. That was at one of Big Black’s last shows, and it was tremendous, life changing even. You can read about it here and here. It’s hard not to think of that when you’re standing in a room eight thousand miles away from Hammersmith, London and twenty-two years on. The thought holds some gravity shall we say. Last night I walked into the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco to see Albini's current band Shellac as support act Arcwelder was finishing its second to last song. I wish now that I had arrived earlier, as this outfit was kicking some ass.

Shellac came onstage not long after that and booted a fair amount of posterior itself. The stage set-up was a no frills affair, as befits Albini’s view of, and approach to, music: there were no colored lights, and the drummer, Todd Trainer, had a sparse kit just slightly in front of Albini and bass player, Bob Weston. Just as an aside it’s pretty impressive to watch three guys who were all on Homestead’s Wailing Ultimate compilation, Albini was in Big Black, who contributed the electric “Il Duce,” Trainer was a member of Breaking Circus, whose excellent “Song Of The South” was featured and Weston was bass player with Volcano Suns, and their “White Elephant” features one of the catchiest choruses on the album as well as the most abrasive and exhilarating guitar line.

So you got some serious staff for a serious night. And a serious night it was, Albini with his guitar strapped around his waste — as it was on that night in ’87 — Trainer alternating between pummeling the drums in a primal way to holding down tricky and involving grooves that would befit a jazz drummer, and Weston playing sparse but thick and deep bass lines. Albini didn’t say a lot but Weston was a hoot, telling off color jokes (my favorite was “What’s the difference between a hard-on and a corvette?” “I don’t have a corvette.”) and fielding questions from the crowd between songs. But that’s not to say that the night was frivolous all round, hardly, not with Albini at the controls. Shellac are not a light option, their subject matter is heavy, as are their sounds and all this is set on top of awkward time signatures, which might have some saying, “oh that’s so Math rock,” but hey, let’s just stick to the way the band describes themselves, “a minimalist rock trio.”

Minimal indeed, and though minimalism in the electronic world has become so glaringly tedious, in the world of rock, with musicians who can play and have performed for decades it takes on a whole new meaning entirely. Shellac proved this in spades last Thursday night with songs like “Crow” from their debut At Action Park, and “The End Of Radio” from 2007’s Excellent Italian Greyhound. The crowd were there to see Shellac and to bask in the presence of legends, legends who still speak to them, and don’t patronize and who carry an angst that seems to be missing everywhere.

At the end of the night I approached the stage as Steve Albini was putting away his aluminum guitar (a Travis Bean guitar might I annoyingly add) and said “This is the first time I’ve seen you on a stage in 22 years.” He walked over and said “Oh yeah, where was that?” “At the Clarendon in London in ’87.” There was a look of genuine amazement on his face, he was gobsmacked as the English might say, and then he said, “That’s a long time ago,” and shook my hand. I’m not in the habit of talking to performers — let them perform and enjoy — but that night so long ago is pivotal in my life and it was important to mention it to the guy who drove a lot of the power in that room that night. And it was great to see that he hadn’t lost his edge — nor had his bandmates — merely honed it into a new and vital form. Great gig!

Orr

Shellac - Crow mp3

My New Favorite Band From SF = Girls

2009-06-19T20:11:00.000-07:00

Our peeps in London turned us on to this band a while ago. Why do the best bands from the states consistently fare better abroad than on their own turf? In this case, that may not be entirely fair to say since they haven't even released their official debut. Time will tell. This is definitely a band to watch.

Though this tune has been floating around the web since '08, the official debut single 'Hellhole Ratrace' will be released on July 13, 2009 via Turnstile Music/ Fantasytrashcan (UK) | True Panther Sounds (US). Lovely tune and lovely video. Happy Saturday!

-Simon Bananaspam
Watch video in HD!
Girls Hellhole Ratrace - MP3

Richie Panic and Eric Sharp present Green Velvet at Mezzanine, Saturday the 20th of June

2009-06-15T11:37:00.000-07:00

If you are into deep house, techno or banging electro then you will know who Green Velvet, aka Cajmere aka Curtis Jones, is. I’m not going to give you a detailed history, but since the early ‘90s this dude has put out some quality tunes and, like Felix Da Housecat (another Chicago feline), shows that all this electronic dance music, from Adonis to Justice, owes something to that mid-western city’s sense of effortless, musical cool.

This coming Saturday, the 20th, of June, Green Velvet is gracing the stage of Mezzanine in San Franbloodydisco. Two well spoken, polite and thoughtful young men by the names of Richie Panic and Eric Sharp are putting on the show, primarily for Richie’s birthday (Like he doesn’t get enough attention already. Where was my shagging birthday party? I had to take a reduced rate bus tour of SF. Excitement!). Anyways, these prolific gentlemen, who grace the turntables of every worthwhile partay in the city these days, have also roped in Designer Drugs from NY — East coast electro types who are well worth watching out for, and a fave with the kids, or so I’m told — and local producer and deck tech Andrew Phelan.

You’ll be feelin’ this show I would wager given the staggering aspect of the line up and after the show you might end up staggering around the End Up, with your ears ringings, head nodding and heart ablaze. Such is the effect that Eric Sharp and Richie Panic have on everyone who hears them, sees them, smells them or senses their auras. I would say the night will be a delightful amalgam of banging tunes, shweaty kids and joyous behaviours. In fact, I’d guarantee it, like that beardy fucker from the Men's Wearhouse commercials. Get yer ass down there on Saturday and none of your f@#!in guff. And I’m off to mix the original version of Dajae’s “You Got Me Up” into the Underground Goodies Mix, then flip a copy over, extend the percussion break, mix back in after the break, phase it out to the near the end before mixing into “The Percolator,” and “La La Land” on a third deck. You’re all like, “F@!% you Orr, you old bollocks.”

Orr

Green Velvet - Red Light

Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve Remix Package

2009-06-12T11:50:00.000-07:00

I’ve kinda slept on this one, but better late than never. Re-animations Vol. 1 is a collection of remixes by Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve, the collaborative project comprised of ex-Trash dj Erol Alkan — a remixer in his own right — and Richard Norris, psychedelic rock aficionado, ex-label manager of the now defunct, cult, psyche reissue label Bam Caruso label and a founding member of The Grid with ex-Soft Cell keyboard player Dave Ball. Norris was also a member of Jack The Tab with Genesis P Orridge, Ball and the Psychic TV crowd, and it is here that he may have honed his taste for fusing the mental with the transcendental.

Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve once again brings Norris to another point where psychedelia meets dance music, but unlike the acid house inflection of Jack The Tab or the prog house elevation of The Grid, Beyond The Wizard’s sleeve also features sly and subtle folk-psyche touches. In other hands the disparate elements of house, electro, space disco, psyche and folk might fall apart in a disastrous fashion but Norris is an old hand at eclecticism and Alkan is a newer but equally capable craftsman of this nebulous art-form.

And a blah blah blah, “but what is the music like?" I hear you feverishly intone. My humble opinion would opt for the words, top notch. I had already acquired wax discs (not brass disks mind you) of the BTWS remix of Tracy Thorn’s “Raise The Roof” — a little nugget that sits tight in and around Baldelli classics and ze like — and the monstrously wicked remix of Findlay Brown’s “Losing The Will To Survive,” as perfect a fusion of British folk-rock and NY style garage you’re ever likely to hear, think The Incredible String Band meets Mood II Swing – Mood II String? But nothing could prepare me for the excellentyness of their remixes of
Franz Ferdinand’s “Ulysses,” a track that will inspire a Joycean epiphany on the dancefloor and Late Of The Pier’s “The Bears Are Coming,” a chaotic, funky little disco percussion work out with chants of “acid rain” and a number of squidgy noises. Vary nice says moi.

And that is not all, at all, at all. There are eight more gorgeousful things to feast your shell like ears on, including a grand and trippy re-hauling of Peter, Bjorn and John’s “Young Folks,” the just grand re-tooling of Midlake’s “Roscoe,” which my friend Derek tells me reminds him of Journey’s “Who’s Crying Now,” a not unfounded assertion might I add, and an exquisite re-modelling of “Happiness” By Goldfrapp.There are more radical re-jigglings (I ran out of re words btw**) of the Chemical Brothers, Simian Mobile Disco and Badly Drawn Boy, and for twelve measely bucks you’re getting a damnable good deal and a half, so none of yer skinflinty whining. Get out of the house, office, garage, prison even, and get this awesomecore CD. Hokay!!

Orr

**Means "by the way" btw.

Franz Ferdinand - Ulysses (Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve Re-Animation)

The Field @ Mezzanine, SF - June 6, 2009

2009-06-09T10:48:00.001-07:00

Axel Willner likes to tamper with the fabric of time. This is precisely why he holds my interest over many of his peers in the crowded world of minimal techno. The Field have expanded their live band to a trio including bass guitar. Previous tours displayed a fairly accurate reproduction of his recorded work, likely due to the restrictions of performing heavily sequenced, loop based tracks solo. The two extra bodies on stage enable a more dynamic performance sonically and visually. Axel himself seemed more free to stretch and tweak his familiar chord sequences into shapes that stimulated the crowd's heads and bodies. The space that exists somewhere between head and body music is the place where The Field shine brightly.

The crowd seemed unsure whether to trip out and be enveloped or to dance, but that said, this may not be true for other stops on the tour where crowds are more naturally enthusiastic. I'd love to see this band evolve into a multi-media experience, strong visuals and quadrophonic big club sound could be the next step forward. The new tracks sounded amazing in Mezzanine, and showed more acoustic timbres to balance with his debut's synthetic sonic palette. It's always pure joy to spot his Cocteau Twins and Kate Bush samples tweaked far enough out of context to mysteriously suggest old tunes resurrected in bright and shiny new ways.

Simon Bananaspam

The Field - I Have The Moon, You Have The Internet

Bodycode's "What Did You Say" EP on Spectral Sound

2009-06-08T11:43:00.000-07:00

Here we have yet another kick ass single from Spectral Sound, Ghostly International’s leftfield house and techno label. This time the pressure comes from South African born, Berlin based, producer Alan Abrahams, aka Bodycode. There are three tracks on his “What Did You Say’ EP, the title track, an acidic paean to an estranged lover, complete with doomy Germanic femaile spoken vocal, that comes across like a minimalist Lidell Townsell colliding with Yazoo’s “Situation.” Next up is a dub mix of the track “Imitation Lover” from Abrahams’ second album, Immune. “Imitation Dub” sounds like early ‘90s Todd Terry mixed with Mood II Swing and Konrad Black, skippy, garage inflected tech with a dark soul.

Closing out the record is a wicked mix from Baby Ford, the UK acid house visionary and techno maven, who rolls out a mid-tempo thing that’s full of shimmering, dubby effects, and hefty bass. It just grooves along at about 112 bpms, and is great for building up or coming down. Check this rekkid out, it dropped on June 1 and it’s v. nice.

Orr

Bodycode - Imitation Dub

God Help The Girl

2009-06-04T10:00:00.000-07:00

Scotland has produced its fair share of what could be called twee music. From The Bluebells and Aztec Camera, to Altered Images and the uncrowned kings of twee, Orange Juice. Is there something in the Scottish psyche that makes the nation predisposed to creating dainty music? However, the likes of Glasvegas, Simple Minds, Big Country, The Skids or Sensational Alex Harvey Band certainly didn’t fall into that bracket, but over twenty years later it rears its head again.

This time around it’s in the shape of Belle and Sebastian (are they not quite twee themselves though? ) frontman Stuart Murdoch’s God Help The Girl, a 14-track opus featuring multiple singers, two of which Murdoch brought in by staging a competition on iMeem. The competition had four hundred entries and from these Murdoch brought Brittany Stallings and Dina Bankole to Glasgow in February of 2008. Other more established artists came on board too, including Neil Hannon from the Divine Comedy and Aysa of the Seattle teen trio Smoosh.

Murdoch also added Catherine Ireton, a friend of a friend who had just moved to Glasgow from Limerick, Ireland. In all nine singers joined the fold of the Belle and Sebastien core, and elements were also recorded in London with a 45 piece orchestra. An ambitious project indeed, but the end result is quite beautiful, if not a little twee. The songs will be used in a musical that’s due to be filmed in 2010.

The fourteen-track album seems to detail the trials of a young woman living in a city of today, while the music harks back to Burt Bacharach, Sandy Shaw, Petula Clark, ‘60s girl groups, ‘80s indie pop and classic pop records in general. This may seem like an unwieldy amalgam, but Murdoch and gang pull it off, crafting a delightful listening experience that will have you pulling out your 45s of “Anyone Who Had A Heart,” “Son Of A Preacher Man,” “William,” and “Simply Thrilled Honey.” Creative nostalgia and post modern musical devices never sounded so sumptuous and warm. It drops on the 23rd of this month, so have a wee listen when it does.

Orr

Click For mp3

Omar Souleyman and Group Doueh Need To Visit San Francisco!

2009-06-02T12:18:00.000-07:00

The always excellent Sublime Frequencies are teasing us americans with reports of a recent UK tour, featuring the incredible Group Doueh who spin saharan electric guitar based road music and a recent Bananaspam discovery, the unparalleled Omar Souleyman, who specializes in a bizarre and psychedelic brew of Syrian party music with hyper phased keyboard leads juxtaposed with more introspective emotional Arabic folk music. Here's to hoping the righteous Sublime Frequencies will bring the tour to the United States!!

Simon Bananaspam

Check out the video for "Leh Jani" by Omar Souleyman:

Click For mp3

Animal Collective @ The Fox Theater, Oakland - May 26, 2009

2009-05-27T09:25:00.000-07:00

The Fox Theater itself was a considerable star last night. Absolutely gorgeous venue which combines aspects of other grandiose bay area palaces like the Paramount Theater with an Islamic and Moorish inspired grandeur all it's own that doesn't stick to any architectural traditions, but otherworldly. Such an amazing space to experience music. However, the jury is still out regarding the sound. Was it AC's penchant for dsp caverns of mud and disorientation? Or perhaps the acoustics aren't fully optimized? The venue has only been reopened for a few months, stay tuned.

The buzz in the air for Animal Collective was considerable during the opener Grouper's set. She seems very early on in her musical journey. Her ambient, lo-fi with layers of looped vocals and guitar melodies is pleasant enough, but has light years to go before feeling right for a support slot like this one. For the time being, Grouper would be better suited to support slots for very small clubs or instore performances like the one we caught at Aquarius Records last month. Digital distortion is rarely if ever pleasant. Is it possible that a new generation of audio dilettantes may not hear the difference?

When a white orb was lowered above the stage, it was nearly show time for the veterans. Animal Collective's current stage setup is more spare than ever. Gone are the dual strummed guitars and acid howling through digitech processors punctuated by floor tom freakouts. Tonight the three current animals are manning samplers, mixers and keyboards on white draped tables with lights projected on them. Occasionally Panda Bear would remind us of what a fantastic drummer he is while Avey Tare's manic energy would keep the crowd focused on the massive sounds on offer. The whole visual scene with the venue's glowing eyed idols on either side of the stage and the Floyd'esque projections on the floating orb made for a stunning psychedelic environment.

Ghost rave pop is the main order of the evening. Eight albums and years of improvising on stage have fine tuned the AC vibrations to an acute window of ecstasy. There was an enormous sense of community amongst at least 1/4 of the audience. The remainder of the audience weren't sure exactly why they were there, but this speaks to the power of the media approval and recommendation matrix. Puzzled faces were preparing to "say they were there." Fair enough, we have all been enriched. Everyone wins in this musical village.

This band is now clearly in the major leagues, despite their devoted relationship to their more outre tendencies and refusal to engage on a direct pop star-to-fan level like others at their stage in the game. It's refreshing to see a band sticking to their roots and remaining true to their grain. The new songs are also sounding good and perhaps another progressive direction is in the works. The beauty of AC is in their live reinterpretation of their back catalog and the works in progress feel of new and developing tunes. Animal Collective perform tonight in Big Sur at the Henry Miller Library and we are tempted to go and do it all over again!

The "Summertime Clothes" single is due out on June 22 in the U.K. and July 7 in the U.S.
Domino is currently giving away the Dam Funk remix of "Summertime Clothes." Check it!

Simon Bananaspam

Click for mp3 - "Bleed" (Live)

Moderat album is very niiice!

2009-05-21T12:16:00.000-07:00

The nice people at BPitch Control sent me the Moderat record a week or so ago and given that Modeselektor is involved I noticed that it has been garnering significant love and column inches. I fired it on my i-pod and gave it a listen t’other day while trekking down to a shopping mall in Daly City to get my (late) taxes sorted out. This record, long stretches of freeway and multi lane thoroughfares like John Daly Boulevard are really suited to each other for reasons that become blatantly evident when you shove it in yer lug holes. Urban sprawl, exhaust fumes, low muggy skies, dank underpasses and an alienated (resident alienated) mindset provide the perfect backdrop to the glorious noise.

What can I say that hasn’t already been said? Not a lot to be honesht, but let me throw in my two cents worth by stating that this outfit’s fluid and seamless fusion of techno, dubstep, indie rock, ragamuffin, psychedelia and any number of other genres is pretty bloody inspiring. I would anticipate that some young and receptive ears (and some old ones too, perchance) will give this a listen and then young and receptive legs will walk out the door and go buy an old synth at a pawn shop, download some cracked software and go at it.

It’s also refreshing to listen to a record and not be able to pin down exactly what genre it is. Thank Christ for that, and I wish there were more records like this from which you could grab a banging tune or three and just fire them in the mix. Genres bore the knickers off me, and when you consider that styles of music like house, hip-hop and techno were borne out of eclectic dj cultures then it seems like a betrayal that they have been distilled down to these very recognizable and defined categories. Anyway, these German cats avoid that high school fixation by taking your head through variations of beat, tempo, mood and texture, before turfing you out on the other end of the record with your tail between your legs and your head up your arse (or further up if it was already lodged there).

There’s no need to tell half of you savvy fuckers to go and get this, as you already have it, but thanks for bearing with me (as opposed to baring with me, which even I wouldn’t advise you to do). By the way it was recorded at Hansa Studios in Berlin, where Bowie recorded Heroes and U2 crafted Achtung Baby. So there’s some analog recording bidness going on with this here record here, and Bay Area producer and tech maven Kit Clayton (that rhymes nicely huh?) provided the programming of a reverb algorithm designed especially for the recording of the album. So now all you SF (and environs) types can get all proud, self-congratulatory 'n' shit.

Furthermore Les Grandes Marches is ridiculous and the whole, entire record is a keeper and a way forward. Listen to it after The Field's new album and hate yourself for not being of Teutonic stock. I’m Scottish of Irish decent so there’s a fair chance of some Viking blood in my veins. That’s Teutonic enough for me to don a helmet with horns on it, fire on this rekkid and lep about the room like a mad thing, in a nice, sensible sorta way mind you. Get this record it’s fucking bang…ggging!

Orr

Click For mp3

Who wouldn't go to see Wooden Shjips?

2009-05-19T11:10:00.000-07:00

I went to see Wooden Shjips again on Friday night, this time at Thee Parkside, a killer venue in my humble opinion. There were two other bands playing, but I only checked out the Shjips, I arrived just before they played and bounced after they finished their last song. I’ve been a fan since about the fall of 2007 when I heard their self-title debut and after their sterling contribution to the Mojo magazine Syd Barret tribute, In Search of Syd: 15 Mind-Bending Freakouts. Their debut really made an impression with it’s measured, krautrock and psychedelia infused groovers. I covered the record in my nitewise column in October of 2007, but unfortunately didn’t get a chance to see them until they played at the Eagle Tavern in January of this year. I didn’t have my ear close enough to the underground of the live rock scene in the city, but thankfully now I do.

Friday’s performance at Thee Parkside was stand out as per usual with the bass player, Dusty, laying down hypnotic, minimal but super funky (am I the only one who wants to dance at Wooden Shjips shows?) grooves as the guitar player, Ripley, intones softly but menacingly while his guitar creates a tower of sound. They played a selection from the first album and the most recent one, Dos, and finished their all too short set with “We Ask You To Ride.” I want to see this band on a bill with one other band and on a savagely large sound system with retina blistering visuals. Wooden Shjips is easily one of the best outfits— if not the best — in San Francisco right about now. No contest. Keep eyes and ears peeled for more. And they're off to Europe this month to bless that continent with their tripped out grooviness. Those lucky European bastards would get so see them more than us, they would, wouldn't they?

Orr

Click For mp3

Jarvis Cocker's Rocker!

2009-05-15T10:10:00.000-07:00

What happens when you put Jarvis Cocker, his band and Steve Albini in a studio in Chicago? Simple, you get Jarvis’s upcoming album, Further Complications, which will be released stateside on May 18th, and then you get rather, somewhat and possibly, hella delira and excira (as they say in Dublin, or Baile A Cliath if you’re a Gaelic speaker). Whereas some of Cocker’s work has been quite slick sounding while still carrying his British working class view of life quite successfully, this one is a much rawer affair, in fact Jarvis is pretty much rocking out on this one.

The first single from the record, “Angela” is a kick ass affair about a young lady who might work in the sex industry that rolls in on a rippling vein of fuzzed out guitar, slapped out drums and lyrics like “and she’s nearly 23, making four fifty an hour, complimentary shower, they call her Angela,” “I feel the sap rising tonitie,” and other un-parental musings. “Caucasian Blues” is a frantic rocker about being a typical white dude, who is “hung like a white man,” and has “no sense of rhythm.” .” The title track absofuckinglutely rules and it contains the line, “I need an addiction, I need an affliction to cultivate a personality.” Nuff said.

These two tunes set the tone for the entire record, and of course you get a couple of slower numbers in which Jarvis gets to stretch out and flex his proletarian ennui in a more deliberate and paced manner. “Hold Still” is the first of these and it contains the kicker line, “we’re cosmic dust, but you’re everything to me,” which could be perhaps tongue in cheek. Cocker goes on to say that he feels “Like a single parent at the fair,” and once again he’s taking us back to the silent desperation of working class Britain, a realm that he is truly familiar with.

“Leftovers” is another slower number, a love song with an opening line “I met her in the museum of paleontology, and I’ll make no bones about it,” it’s hard not to laugh out loud, except that he goes on to detail his love for this person who shares his fascination for dinosaurs, and he tells her he will “fall upon your neck just like a vampire, just like a vampire who faints at the sight of blood.” Anyway, it’s Jarvis so you’re gonna get staggering lyrics that’ll make you laugh, think and maybe even cry. “Pilchard” is a fast, mostly instrumental Krautrock inflected work out which will just divine for frugging around the kitchen to after you’ve a had a chip butty or two.

Proceedings close with the raw disco of “You’re In My Eyes (Discosong)” which opens with what sounds like a looping Philly disco sample, low in the mix with Jarvis talking over it about lurve. Barry White, god rest him, would be proud, likewise Gamble and Huff, and Stan and Hilda. There’s no point in trying to wax cleverer than Jarvis, this is a top album and that’s that.

Orr

Click For mp3

Nah'feel's remix of "She's Electric" by Nightwaves

2009-05-12T11:02:00.000-07:00

Russell Gaskins, aka Nah'feel, is the true definition of a music industry worker: he works bloody hard and he works it. I met him at the peak of the SF house scene in ’96 and we immediately hit it off because of our passion for music and philosophical attitude towards its creation and propagation. And though he was working in the hip-hop field and was a rapper and beat maker, he had an appreciation for beats of any kind. An introduction to the deeper, abstract house of Omid Nourizadeh (16B), House of 909 and Don Carlos made him keen to craft his own beats in that vein, and his early experiments were pretty damned good. In fact, an airing of one his first tracks in the sadly missed bricks and mortar version of Primal Records in Berkeley got more than a few kids in there kinda weasely to figure out what this new toon was.

Russell headed down to LA in ’97 to work for the Vibe/Spin ad department and from there on to Arista’s A&R dept before settling at Chrysalis Music Publishing. He still makes beats, works on production for some big name hip-hop and r&b artists and in his spare time dons the guise of Nah’feel in order to bust out house inflected breakbeat numbers or add that flavor to tracks like “She’s Electric” by Los Angelean electro groovers Nightwaves (check out the original too, it’s a sexy doozy). Mr. Gaskins’ remake, though birthed in the image of Larry Heard and The 45 King, is a key contender for Balearic jam of the moment. And though the hot avenues of LA may be far from the balmy streets of Ibiza Town, the vibe sits just right.

Russell mellows the whole thing out, keeping the tempo at 110 bpm, adding a little rock guitar and just a pinch of jazziness. The outcome is languid but sensational, you can work the morning mood with this one, warm up with it, or shove it between the Stone Roses and Sheer Taft for optimum Balearia. You don’t need to have a beard, be from Norway or craft smooved out eurodisco to be Balearic, you can dwell down in LA, not care about that genre at all, and just make great music for listening and dancing to. Russell Gaskins does that. Nite Jewel, Nightwaves and Nah’feel, all the ‘Ns” add up to nice down in Los Angeles, and right now that city seems like a better bet than Promoterville, I mean San Francisco. There’s more where this little nugget came from, believe you me.

Orr

Click for mp3

The Field - Yesterday and Today.

2009-05-08T09:27:00.000-07:00

If you’re in need of a strong fix of floaty, ethereal techno that possesses nuances of shoegaze rock and Krautrock, you need look no further than the music of one Axel Willner, the Swedish producer more commonly known as The Field. His next album, “Yesterday and Today,” which will be released on May 19th by German label Kompakt, is an extended exercise in atmospheric electrolove, punctuated with rushing strings, live bass, all manner of electronic whooshing and clicking, and dizzying heights of lush, repetitive groove and melody.

There are only six tracks on the record, and clocking in at just over an hour, each track takes you on a long, cerebral run that combines the minimalist template of German techno and fuses it with an otherworldly sense of texture and melody derived from a respect for bands like Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine. But this is just not another motorik work out by, or for, bespectacled bedroom dwellers. Willner throws elements of rock and funk into the heady mix, their corners sticking out through the slick veneer that covers his beautiful machine music, conspiring with clicks and whirrs to tumble the carefully balanced, fragile, yet muscular creation into a primordial ooze of messy glitch.

Each track is a marathon session of electronic finesse, which will sound excellent in the head and triumphant on select dance floors. For proof of this check out the title track and the one which follows it, “The More That I Do.” At around eight minutes and ten minutes respectively each track suspends you, and time, in a drifting and driving state of ethereal emergency (if such a thing exists). The latter track will really work the dancefloor too, taking it, and the dancers, to new heights, carrying both on a carefully wrought sonic platform where My Bloody Valentine collides head on with DJ Pierre at his Wild Pitch finest and Wolfgang Voigt’s all absorbing micro-worlds.

To crown all this afferent glory Willner includes a cover version of “Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime,” the 1980 hit by British synth pop group, The Korgis. However, he doesn’t feature vocals in the chorus and only intones the first verse, the chorus being an instrumental section which kinda leaves you hanging. However, given that the song has been rendered by Glasvegas, Erasure, The Dream Academy and Army Of Lovers amongst others, this is not such a band thing and Willner’s take on it is beautiful, as is the entire album. Yesterday and Today, a magnificent listening companion and an extra-terrestrial dance partner.

Orr

Click For mp3

The Lost World/Dengue Fever @ The Castro Theatre - 5/5/09

2009-05-06T17:39:00.000-07:00

For this year's San Francisco International Film Festival, the annual silent film accompanied by live music pairs The Lost World with LA's Dengue Fever. This tradition is reminiscent of the Barbican Centre London's excellent silent film and live music series that has featured Lambchop, The Delgados and others in the past.

Harry Hoyt directed The Lost World, aided by the pioneering stop motion animation work by Willis O'Brien, only better known for his work on King Kong. This is Hoyt's journey back to a jurassic wonderland, aiming to satisfy man's fixation with the ancient prehistoric creatures that roamed our planet. This particular print has had vivid color tinting to bring the monochromatic masterpiece into a modernized otherworldly space.

This otherworldy visual accompaniment suits the evolved 2009 version of Dengue Fever. Dengue Fever have always been an entertaining party band that brings the 60's psych, garage and surf vibes. This ambitious pairing has inspired them to instrumental and vocal heights that shows a band with tremendous scope and understanding of textural nuance. Instead of visually fixating on the beauty of Cambodian queen, Chhom Nimol we are watching sequences of humorous human trivialities juxtaposed with dinosaurs roaming the earth and culminating with an amazing climax of a Brontosaurus invading London!

The band is squarely in the ethnofuturepast sound world with colors that remind one of Jon Hassell's treated flute and trumpet melodies from "Dream Theory in Malaya", only to crash back down to a late 60's Cambodian space lounge with garagey Farfisa and snaky guitar lines. Dengue Fever could be aiming for the next chapter of ethnoforgery, or ethnofuturism, pioneered by one of our favorite labels, Sublime Frequencies. We'll definitely keep an eye on this band and see if this challenging live score will influence their future works. Props to SFIFF for this inspired program that won't leave the memory for some time.

Simon Bananaspam

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The Emperor Mack Sheen Rekkid Is Not Half Bad, Squire.

2009-05-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

I know it’s been a whole bloody week since I set finger to keyboard in order to craft another captivating shlice of opinionated bollocks. Sorry for keeping you hanging bananafans. Sometimes the problem is inspiration and other times it’s superfluous matters like money, work, stress and cagey building owners. No need to elaborate, believe me.

Luckily Space Beyond The Egg, the upcoming LP by The Emperor Machine, which drops on June 1st, arrived in my email and I’m getting my shell like ears around it right about now. Two tracks in and I’m already hooked. Future single, “Kananana” is really doing the bidness if you ask my humbly opinionated ass. Tough drums are linked up to clicky guitar work, a simple but effective bass groove and some very lushly lovely analog synths, which convey the all important Cosmic -— or Kosmiche even — transcendence that one should expect from all E Mack Sheen tunes.

Needless to say they deliver it in track after track, including the "What’s In The Box” single, which dropped in the fall of last year and is included on this here record here for your listening and undulating plaisir, mais oui! “Snatch Shot” is a chewy slice of bumpy, whooshy electro funk that will have you bouncing your body to the box in the wee hours of the morning timez, and though most of the record is instrumental, allowing you drift off on a cloud of pleasantly and gorgeousfully wonderful melodic reveries (ooh er, shouldn’t be allowed), the song “What You Want” has vocals that advise one to do what one wants. A splendid thought indeed! Proceedings close with “Not None,” a chunky basslined little item with soft percussion, dramatic stings and echoing synths. It finishes things up nicely

Do I be liking this here record? I sure does, and that does be all from me.

Orr

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The Ruts.

2009-04-29T10:51:00.000-07:00

In 1979 things were starting to get a little tense in the UK. In May of that year Margaret Thatcher was elected Prime Minister, heralding the start of a conservative era that lead to the mess we’re in right now. Were there other factors? Of course, but when you deregulate and privatize everything and leave the functioning of society at its most important points to private interests, the financial being one of those, then you end up with a big, greedy balls up, which is where we’re at currently.

In 1979 the punk era was winding down, segueing into what followed it, new wave. However, one British band, which kept the flag flying for punk, was The Ruts. Most of us on that side of the pond became aware of them when their rousing single “Babylon’s Burning” crashed into the UK charts in the summer of ’79, eventually settling at number 7 in June of that year. It was raw and fast, but melodic, the sound built from a fascination with reggae, metal, straight up ‘70s rock and the music of their punk and new wave peers.

The band was comprised of Malcolm Owen on vocals, Paul Fox on guitar, John "Segs" Jennings on bass and Dave Ruffy on drums. Owen was a magnificent front man, kinetic and full of righteous rage, as reflected in the fact that The Ruts started out as part of an anti-racist collective in West London called People Unite. They had a deep respect for the West Indian community and featured a prominent reggae sound in their music.

The next single that really made me sit up and take notice was “Staring At The Rudeboys,” a frantic ditty about an altercation with some racist skinheads, which was released in the spring of 1980. Then in July Owen died of a heroin overdose, a surprise to some given the anti-heroin stance of the song “H-Eyes,” the b-side of their first single “In A Rut.” The band became Ruts D.C., from the Italian Da Capo, meaning from the beginning and explored reggae and dub more.

However, in their first two years with Owen at the helm they crafted incredible, rousing singles, and the classic album The Crack (cover featured above), with its memorable cover. The single “West One (Shine On Me)” was released in August 1980, an obvious tribute to Owens. I heard it on a compilation album called Cash Cows, a Virgin Records release that featured some of their best artists. However the record was pulled due to a legal wrangle over a track by The Professionals, a band that featured Paul Cook and Steve Jones of The Sex Pistols. A store in Derry called Quaver — where The Undertones began their careet — was handing them out for free over Christmas 1980, and my mom got one for me. There are some top tunes on that record, including “Dirty Blue Gene” by Captain Beefheart, but “West One” was my favorite.

In 2007 Henry Rollins, standing in for Owens, at a London benefit gig for Paul Fox, who was battling lung cancer, announced to the crowd that “West One (Shine On Me)” was easily one of the best songs ever written about being lonely in the big city. Some will arguer otherwise, but it is definitely the most rousing, Enjoy it and check out The Ruts a little deeper if you haven’t already.

Orr

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Higamos Hogamos, Infinty Plus One

2009-04-28T08:00:00.000-07:00

I am becoming ever such a little bit fatigued by the current glut of Kraut rock inflected material that is being released from the indie rock and dance music world. It’s not that Kraut rock is bad music, far from it, it just seems a bit too trendy at the moment to channel the likes of Faust, Neu!, La Dusseldorf et al. However, when it is done well does this really matter? To be honest: probably not.

So with that in mind I am listening to a new offering from the reputed UK dance music label, DC Recordings, which is home to Padded Cell, The Emperor Machine and Kelpe among others. The British imprint’s latest release is from an outfit called Higamos Hogamos, which is comprised of Toby Jenkins and Steve Webster, a duo also known as Fort Lauderdale.

Their new EP is a four-track vinyl item and a six track download release. The record features the tune “Infinity Plus One,” which appears in its original form and in remixed form by The Emperor Machine, who provide two mixes on the wax plus an extra redoodle that appears on the digital version only. “The Creeper” is given a remodeling by Muscleheads while Higamos Hogamos's previous single “Major Blitzkrieg” is bent out of shape by 22 Inch Wife.

All in all, if you like spacey, Cosmic or Kosmische accented material, which can emotionally resonate with you while motionless and horizontal or while in motion and vertical, then you will probably like this. Hokay! The tracks are cool, with the Emperor Machine mixes getting me most interested while the original mix of “Infinity Plus One,” with its opening line, which states “Across my sky blue heart your indelible jet trail,” gets my other vote. It’s a nice record, go and do be getting’ it.

Orr

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It's Grand But Not Douchey.

2009-04-22T09:49:00.000-07:00

Black Francis, Frank Black or Charles Michael Kitteridge Thompson IV, and his missus , Violet Clark, or Violet Clark Thompson, have just done a new LP. The collabo is called Grand Duchy, and that doesn’t sound kinda like douchey, nor does the album itself. In fact, it’s a rather subtle likkle surprise if the truth be known, and the truth should always be known, should it not? What do you get when you take classic Pixies inclinations and fuse them with just a smidgen of synth pop and new wavey gorgeousfulness, and then have yer old lady channel a bit of Kim Deal while remaining thoroughly individual and vocally involving?

You don’t know! Jeepers! You get Grand Duchy for cryin’ out loud. The album is called Petits Fours and it’s on the Cookin' Vinyl label. The first single, “Lovesick,”sounds like the Pixies colliding with “Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” then it doesn’t, and it forces you to wrap your flakey head around some bloody chewy lyrics and the cutely menacing (how that?) vocal delivery of the not so shrinking Violet. The chuckly bit with him asking “What are you wearing?” and Violet girlishly answering “I Don’t Know” is so bloody addictive and funny that it just sets the tune out as a stone hard classic. The stonesy guitar riff is bloody excellent too!

Plus we need more rock albums with synthy bits and women shpeakin in shexy French accentsh (Or Sean Connery accentsh even). Check the song “Fort Wayne” for that: top tune, great lyrics, completely fun and hooky, hooky hooky. Do I really need to dissect every track, ‘cos I hate to, but let’s just say “Black Suit” rules on high, from the dense drums and bass intro (nice bassline) to the overall spooky but energetic feel of it. Black Francis channels some weird, grating anger and it’s ever so welcome.

Am I blowing too much smoke up this album's ass, or maybe I’m just blowing too much smoke, or just blowing too much. Take it to the gutter, sher why not as they say in the old country. Francis you do look divine btw. And I forgot about “Seeing Stars,” a special, little slow number that comes over all coy and folksy/rocky before the bass slinks down and the pair ‘o’ them throw in some glacial synth work while Violet intones “I’m guess I’m seeing stars again,” in a way that you want to hear over and over, except that they only do it for a short while and you want it to never end and you'll remember it and cherish it forever and a day. Yer knowurramean?

This album is fucking great, just go and get it and stop reading this shite. All right?

Orr

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Van der Graaf Generator - Darkness (1970)

2009-04-21T11:18:00.000-07:00

Here's your daily dose of prog. (thanks G.M.) Taken from 1970 German Television footage. See also two mp3's from a 1967/1968 demo tape from the more elementary and slightly more straight forward earlier incarnation of VDGG. Folky melodies hinting at the darkness to come. Happy Tuesday!

Van der Graaf Generator - Firebrand (the master tape is audibly shrampled but gives way after the intro)
Van der Graaf Generator - Sunshine

-Simon Bananaspam

J Dilla, Slum Village and Fantastic Stuff.

2009-04-20T13:38:00.000-07:00

I can’t really add anything to what has already been written about the sadly missed hip-hop producer Jay Dee (aka J Dilla), but it’s hard to forget the first time you ever heard a Jay Dee track. I remember hearing Slum Village back in late ’99 or early 2000. Their material had already been circulating since ’96 or ’97, when their Fantastic Vol 1 record dropped on indie label Donut Boy Records. It soon became extremely hard to find and was finally given a re-release in 2005. In late '99 there was much excitement about the upcoming US release of their follow-up album, Fantastic Vol. 2, on the Good Vibe Recordings label out of Los Angeles. It had already dropped on the British imprint Wordplay Records in 1998, creating a serious buzz.

By this time Jay Dee’s impact on hip-hop was fully realized, due to his work with some of the genre's finest, including A Tribe Called Quest, The Pharcyde and Busta Rhymes. In early 2000 the hype surrounding the imminent release of the second installment of Fantastic was palpable and bootlegs were already circulating. I scooped two of them and they both contained a track called “Players,” which just blew me away with its languid groove and atmospheric feel. All the spacey funk of Dilla’s grooves was coupled with some very distinctive flow from rappers Baatin, and T3.

The bootlegs were merely a warm up to the killer package that Good Vibe put together for the release of Fantastic Vol.2. I bought it on triple vinyl and CD and gave both a good old twirl. Tunes like “Players,” “Climax (Girl Shit),” “Back and Forth” and “What It’s All About” were in heavy rotation at my apartment, work and on the decks when I would play hip-hop out. Around the same time Detroit rapper Phat Kat released his “Dedication To The Suckers” EP on the House Shoes Recordings label, featuring the track "Don't Nobody Care About Us," which had another devastating beat by Jay Dee, and featured the prolific Detroit music impresario Brian Gillespie in the executive producer’s chair — a man who we can thank also for bringing us Detroit Grand Pubahs.

So the point is that Slum Village’s Fantastic Vol. 2 made a really big impression on me and still does when I pull it out for a re-twirl. If you see it around on CD, or if you are so lucky to find on wax, scoop it on sight. It’s proof of how good hip-hop can be when it’s not a corporate controlled monster, and a valuable testament to the sonic genius of Jay Dee. It sounds good in the heat as well, and it’s hot as bejaysus today.

Orr

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Keith - La Ritournelle

2009-04-19T06:20:00.000-07:00

Another Lucky Number Music artist, Keith from Manchester tackles Sebastien Tellier's classic, "La Ritournelle" for Record Store Day - April 18th 2009.

Sebastien Tellier - La Ritournelle - mp3

Sebastient Tellier - La Ritournelle (Mr. Dan's Magic Wand Mix and various remixes) - playlist

Sébastien Tellier live in San Francisco

2009-04-18T13:40:00.000-07:00

Sébastien Tellier came to San Francisco in the last couple of days and he played The Independent last night. I actually ran into him on the street on Thursday afternoon on the way to gym, he was walking up around Polk and Post with his friend Francois, so I had to stop them on the street and confirm that it was he. Indeed it was and it was only then that I remembered what my buddy Dax had been telling me for over a month, “Sebastien Tellier” coming to town in April and we need to get tickets ‘cos it will be awesome!”

And awesome it was. Tellier’s set was inspiring, uplifting, hilarious and accomplished all at once. It was an organic experience, with the singer coming on stage with two keyboard players and a drummer, seeming a little stiff and unprepared before launching into “Kilometer.” The organic aspect was that, of course, as the show went on Tellier and the band became looser, more daring and more musically involving.

By the time he had seated himself at an electric piano and started hammering out “La Ritournelle,” some five or six songs later, he was drenched in sweat, had polished off a bottle of wine or two, and was in fine form. Leading up to this he had knocked out a selection from his most recent long player, Sexuality, carried out a guitar solo in the crowd and pulled some seriously understated but highly effective poses.

The show culminated with him lying on the piano crooning to the crowd, which was by this time in the palm of his Gallic hand, before finishing with an encore of “Roche,” the first track on Sexuality. It was very captivating performance by an extremely unique artist, Long may he perform, put microphones against his crotch, wear very hot pleather jackets and write excellent music.

Orr

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Junior Boys at Bimbo's.

2009-04-17T09:49:00.000-07:00

Went to see Junior Boys at Bimbo’s last night. I love that venue and it was a great show. Max Tundra opened in fine, funny and quirky style, and included a hilarious nod to ‘90s rave toons in his set — killed me. Junior Boys took the stage soon after and rocked a very groovy, electric, and atmospheric collection of songs, all topped off with Jeremy Greenspan’s soulful white guy delivery. The crowd was young and really enthusiastic, and they stomped the floor hard for an encore when the boys finished. They opened their two-song encore with “FM” and it was all over way too soon. Now I have to attend Sebastien Tellier tonight in order to recapture the fervor…hopefully.

Orr

Lil' Louis - "French Kiss" Version 1

2009-04-14T19:47:00.000-07:00

The first time I heard this track was on a friend's Walkman, cassette fresh dubbed from a KDVS (Davis, CA.) late night house radio program. This felt like a forbidden jam. X-rated for sure and the exhilarating vibe of this naughty groove and decelerating tempo did a number on the teenage psyche. DJ Louis Burns, a Chicago based house producer hit it right with this classic track. The first version of the video, which was rejected by the label was a recent youtube discovery and worth sharing. Check it!

-Simon Bananaspam

King Roc's Chapters

2009-04-13T14:50:00.000-07:00

I have to confess, I’ve been on a Steely Dan kick for the best part of a week and other music has faded into the background. It’s hard to beat “Glamour Profession” as you walk through the quiet streets of North Beach in the wee hours of the morning. I love walking through quiet cities in the dark, mainly because the music in your headphones becomes a real soundtrack and you can thread all your own triumphs and losses through the lyrics, with Becker and Fagen’s tales of sordid trysts, chemical dependency and lost dreams creating a backdrop your imagination can work with.

However, I’m not here to write about Steely Dan, because what could I tell you about them that hasn’t already been written. So I want to tell you about another record entirely, which is equally usable for nocturnal excursions, from another time, place and style. King Roc is a British musician and dj, who deals in deep house and minimal techno. About two years ago when he became fatigued by the 4/4 beat of those genres (who doesn’t) he luckily ran into Australian graphic designer and illustrator Seb Godfrey, aka Drunkpark.

They conspired to craft a concept album that didn't need to explain itself, and would all start with a set of four collectable 12"s, each with poster by Seb. The first one, which dropped in the winter of 2007, had chance as a theme. Three more themed 12 inchers followed and now there is a CD of these tracks, which have not only been compiled but taken apart and restructured in different genres to what they were originally created in.

The album takes in ambient, trip hop, house, techno and rock. It’s a damn good listen, mainly because there are so many atmospheric, involving tracks on it. The record sounds brand new but somehow takes your mind back to the glory days of the early ‘90s when the likes of Orbital, BBG, and Jam and Spoon were ruling the dance-floors. Hypnotone also come to mind on more than one occasion during the course of the record. No need for a track by track dissection, just scoop it and prepare to immerse yourself — or be immersed — in a drifting, throbbing and elevating musical experience. Hokay?

Orr

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Super Furries With New Album.

2009-04-09T09:30:00.000-07:00

The new Super Furry Animals record, Dark Days-Light Years, is almost upon us, it will be released digitally on the 14th of April and vinylally on the 21st. It’s a bouncy, twelve track opus with the lads returning to earlier psychedelic and kraut rock tinged territory. It also has some grand song titles, such as the opening track, “Crazy Naked Girls,” and the humdinging, “The Very Best of Neil Diamond.” I’m not a huge Animals fan, so I’m hearing this record with fresh ears, and a little stroll around 25th Street and Harrison, near the park, in San Francisco this morning was vastly improved by these toons and others like “White Socks/Flip Flops,” "Mt" and “Moped Eyes."

The Super Furries take ‘60s inflected rock, 'n' roll it around in tripped out German inflections and hints of funk and electronic dance music. The arrangements are addictive, the lyrics compelling and wry, and the overall feeling of the record is that of a certain world-weariness that’s fortunately bolstered by an unvanquished capacity for optimism and joy. Nick McCarthy from Franz Ferdinand provides the German spoken word guest vocals on “Inaugural Trams,” and does a wunderbar job btw.

It’s a great record for walking around, driving around, getting around, arsing around and fucking around to. “Inconvenience” is a hot jam too, and “Cardiff In The Sun” is a kicky slice of dreamy, modern fuzzydelia. A well scoopable rekkid I have to say. Niceness!

Orr
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Lemonade - Big Weekend (Roman Stange Mix)

2009-04-08T06:11:00.000-07:00

At the moment I am inundated with rock stuff that I need to listen to, ponder and then wax poetic about. However, in the meantime before tackling this sysiphean task I am dragged back into abstract electronic territory by a gentleman by the name of Roman Stange. Stange is a Michigan native who arrived in San Francisco via Kurdistan and Boston. Being from that mid-western state he has that magical touch for techno inflected strangeness, or is it Stangeness? You decide.

Anyways, he gave me a dvd with some toons on it, and quite a few of them were well good, but one kinda jumped out at me in a big way. I gave him a call to enquire about the name of it and it is his remix of Lemonade’s “Big Weekend.” It’s a loping, rolling technoid thing with touches of the original vocals and bass-line and some drifting dislocated synth sounds that bring it into an outer orbit. This coupled with incessant, tough, stripped down drums that evolve effortlessly into elements of the original’s more staccato rolls make this track perfect for arranging the dance floor into some semblance of order before shaking it up again with a stirring a bass break culled, once again, in whole from the band’s own version.

A dirty, grungey sound coupled with some crisp textures and percussion elements make this track a winner for the AM come down, or for pushing the floor forward while not being too pushy about it, but effectual enough to maintain movement. That’s a feat in itself and Stange seems to be able to achieve it fluidly. That his beats are way funky is a welcome addition to his capacity for brain tickling oddness.

Keep an eye on this guy, and his Auralism imprint, which is also home to the likes of Alland Byallo, Clint Stewart and Jason Short. To top all this off Stange's down-tempo tracks are equally involving and mesmerizing, making you sway gently while projecting a lush yet quietly unsettling sense of empyrean elevation. Stange is one element, one voice, in San Francisco, that is pointing the way forward to the post-minimal, post electro, post-post-post punk event horizon which we are silently but relentlessly approaching. I think we’re going to hear more about this guy, in fact I hope so.

Orr

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Welcome! From Orr

2009-04-05T14:10:00.000-07:00

To those of you who might be new to reading Bananaspam — I’ve noticed a few new folks from near and far — welcome to the blog and let me give you a brief run down on what I do. I write about records that I like, plain and simple, be it an indie album from yesterday, a rock album from 1981, a house record from 1989, a disco tune from 1978, an Italo thing from 1982 or some new electronic thing that’s not out yet. I’ve been djing since 1986 and I’ve been a vinyl junkie since 1980. I have a lot of tunes, so please don’t expect a format or a genre or a marketing niche, those are corporate bidness concerns, my concern is music.

I’m also a classic Detroit techno nut, I love top 40 r&b from the ‘70s til today (if there is any of that anymore), classic hip-hop takes me back, I’m partial to the Undertones, and Thin Lizzy rocks me too. I’ll listen to Mary J one minute, a Baldelli classic the next and I’ll fire on Motorhead for a rush. I love music and I adore vinyl, but music in any format is fine as long as it makes a glorious noise! Genres are for mainstream radio; music is for life!

Orr

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Dark Entrails - The Horrors' upcoming second album.

2009-04-04T11:04:00.000-07:00

Sometimes an album speaks to you, and you can think about it in terms of era, politics, a change of the guard, a draw of the cards. And sometimes an album just grabs you because it’s really fucking good. The Horrors’ new opus, Primary Colors could be slagged by the uninitiated as the work of a group of Cure copyists. Is it not, it is an album produced by a group of young Englishmen who grasp the future as passionately as they do the past. But the future is rarely grasped, it unfolds in a leisurely fashion, it tugs at your eyes and head like the arching, blurred streetlights on Mission Street that punctuate every unarriving bus and every thought lost on a Bay Area gust of air or abruptly found again in a seismic shudder.

“Mirror’s Image,” track one on Primary Colors doesn’t let you indulge all that fog drenched paranoia and self indulgence, it lunges out at you the way you’d expect a product of the isles to do, it comes on like the intro to a mellow German minimal house track before it slowly, methodically and slyly grabs your head and fucks it into a distant, never imagined tomorrow, full of shreds of Bauhaus, Ride, The Cramps, The Doors, The Sonics, Neu!, and the Horrors. Anglo-Saxons, Celts and Normans, the earth cooling and people traveling over water and then you forget about all this in dark, loud rooms, filled with dark, loud people, their eyes and smiles and glances flooding into your delicate head

By track five, “New Ice Age” your battered and delighted psyche gets a chance to realize that is has just been pummeled by an excellence that rains down blow after blow. “New Ice Age” wheels around, grabs you by your collar and swings your drunken ass around the room and loses your dollars…holler! We could continue with this poetic tail chase, but let’s put it in simple terms (or not). This is a really good album by a group of artists who have grasped the music with gobsmacking clarity and who have so subtly and deftly cultivated a look and a style that they can subvert the intended effect of this image, turning it in on itself, and blowing your preconceptions out of the water, as you ponder all the other skinny white boys with accents and tight pants, who might look just a tad on the gothic side. Is it a way of saying, hate us, assholes, ‘cos of the way we look. We rock nonetheless? Who says you can’t be excellent and dress excellent? The Horrors beg to differ.

The group is used to adverse reactions as evidenced in their jaunt around the UK with the Arctic Monkeys last year, which produced what best could be called a mixed reception, with the Monkeys’ fans hurling a fair amount of projectiles at them. That’s a good sign though? Right? The Horrors’ sophomore piece is top music from a top band, obviously staffed by some smart, thoughtful types. Only thoughtful individuals would crash their Birthday Party and garage inclinations into uncharted stretches of kraut rock, electronics and lush, layered shoe gaze territory. More horror please.

The Horrors will be in the US in April and May, including appearances at Coachella, Webster Hall in NY and The Fillmore in San Francisco. Check ‘em.

Orr

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Less Is More In The Here And Now

2009-04-03T13:22:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the swirl of thoughts in my head becomes too much, and I am left in stasis by their movement. Isn’t that a conundrum, a contradiction? The doctors say I’m really low in serotonin, chemically low in joy, chemically high in stress, prone to days of darkness, weeks even. Not much fun, huh? Leaves you prone to things and wrongful accusations of being a curmudgeon. But maybe we’re all guilty of being blessed but still selfishly feeling we’re being oppressed. By ourselves? But we could be worse, or we could be rubberneckin?’ Not really my style to be honest but sometimes you have to count your blessings.

In the calm eye of the swirl of my thoughts is where I count them, and on that islet, that eyelet, all is well. All is well simply because the music comes through in waves, through a narrow opening, it becomes joy like that in Kavanagh’s “Advent;” “We have tested and tasted too much, lover. Through a chink too wide there comes in no wonder.” From a wallet too full, comes no hunger, and my music was always a music of hunger. When there’s unlimited supply — like EMI — then there’s a dearth of anything that even approaches soulful, whatever soulful means. Is it an energy, like anger? Then the same plastic paddy from North London had something to say on that too, an energy derived from an abundance of cortisol, and a hunger for joy. Take the medicine and feel the calmness. It’s underwhelming is it not?

Land of hunger indeed, but I’ll spare you Bonoesque meanderings on the Famine etc. You can rubberneck about it later on wiki. Back to that compressed joy ready to unfold. It rolls out in sound always. It floats, sways, grinds and halts in fluid motion or in stacatto rhythms. It shunts back and then lurches forward, one step back and two steps into the future. The music never hints at anything or anyone that produced it, it just is. It never needs to come from an unlimited supply, it can come from nothing, from a dollar out of fifteen cents, or no sense at all. Maybe that’s it, nonsense, this nonsense.

Maybe the music I hear is dwarfed by a goliath with an unlimited supply, it may stand meek surrounded by lawyers, guns and money, but when it elevates, when it lifts off, when it soars into the future, it bursts out through that narrow opening where wonder is kept, and it blooms, it balloons, it explodes its colors in my head and the storm clears and the eye of it becomes all of it, the aye of it even. The music never stops, it never can and never will. Like Weller said, “see the tyrants panic, see their crumbling empires fall, then tell ‘em we don’t fight for fools, ‘cos love is in our hearts,” and in the swirl of our heads, and in the hunger and in the narrow channel where joy comes in slowly and leaves fast and where the future sleeps like Shelley’s lions in slumber, only to rise “in unvanquishable number.” The future is here, it’s time to wake up.

Orr

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Bullion - "Young Heartache" EP

2009-03-31T12:33:00.000-07:00

I keep harping on about the looming post electro era and how it will manifest. It seems it will do so in a number of ways through a number of artists. From Nite Jewel to the diverse and artful onslaught of Exploited Records to this, one of my newest discoveries, Bullion. I can’t say I know much about this artist except for the “Young Heartache” EP, which I just purchased a few days ago and a few things I’ve listened to online, including the rather wicked “Rude Effort” off the “Get Familiar” 7” EP, mastered by MJ Cole no less, but I have to say that I've like what I've heard.

The “Young Heartache” EP is a sly amalgam of hip-hop, Balearic vibes — or a feel that can be easily placed in a Balearic context. Isn’t that the essence of Balearic? — and that abstract capacity for wide-eyed, Beach Boys type arrangements that make Animal Collective compelling. But this is British beat music; the raw, crooked edges of electro colliding with the enveloping warmth of the post-Bush, coke comedown. It’s infinitely less defeatist than Burial and though the music stargazes and sun worships it won’t turn into cocktail fare for yuppies.

Fire on “Time For Us All To Love” and “Are You The One?” for a brief glimpse of what is to come, and what has always been; tuneful forward, looking beat music that lifts a foot, a mood or a movement. This one creeps up on you, and that's always a good sign. A keeper, so keep harping on about it.

Orr

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Blank Dogs, Brilliant Colours and Nodzzz @ The Knockout, SF 3/29

2009-03-30T19:53:00.000-07:00

Thanks to its staff and resident DJs, who have paid their dues through enough of the indie scene's ups and downs to know something good when they hear it, The Knockout has been able to host a number of up-and-coming Brooklyn bands all out of proportion with its size and location. Shows like The Vivian Girls last year (just before their album--the original pressing, that is--went to the top of the eBay watch lists of bloggers everywhere) and Blank Dogs last night are must-see events if you live in SF and care about what goes on in that far away land where indie bands move to "make it," whatever that means in this day and age. Blank Dogs definitely fit that NY mold, teetering precariously between punk and post-punk with hints of the Ramones and Television as well as early Cure and, most interestingly, with a rickety home-built synth lurking off in the corner, Pere Ubu. As you might expect from a relatively new band with a toweringly large discography (Mr. Blank Dog is an avid home recorder, apparently), some songs hit the mark more than others. The untapped potential of that synth, though, looking so weird and cool yet not making much of a sound, was the real disappointment of their set.

Despite the occasional heavy-hitting touring band, however, some of the most exciting stuff going on at The Knockout is decidedly home-grown. The only San Francisco band on much-hyped NY label What's Your Rupture?, Nodzzz humbly took the opening slot, starting the party off right with a different set of late '70s influences, this time closer to the nerdy Athens, GA college rock of the DBs, recalling the B-52's, even, in the time before they hooked up with a producer ("I'm from Planet Z!", shouted one guitarist). Nodzzz have gotten a lot of attention already, but it is nice to have them here as a local band and playing around frequently. They really do put on a fun show. Sandwiched between them and Blank Dogs were Brilliant Colours, a relatively new local band who have the honor of opening both this show and the aforementioned Vivian Girls gig last year, and who are quickly finding their sound, putting their own mark on the '80s indie anglophilia that their name evokes. Like a poppier Wedding Present or a less distorted Black Tambourine, they've been looking for the sweet spot between energy and melody, and they're getting pretty close to finding it; their debut 7" has just been released and is definitely worth picking up. All in all, it was one of those all-too-rare nights: come for the out-of-town band you keep hearing about, leave amazed instead by everything that's going on in your own backyard.

-DJ In the Manner of a Leprechaun

Lene Lovich.

2009-03-26T13:56:00.000-07:00

While the ongoing ‘80s throwback, which has been gaining momentum since the ‘90s, gives us all the opportunity to relive adolescent glory, or imagine it if that era is a little before your time, it seems kinda sad that you pretty much get subjected to the standard hits that were ubiquitous at the time. Billy Idol, Madonna and Michael Jackson, that’s the ‘80s, hmmm, not the ‘80s I remember, but then I grew up on the other side of the pond and we had some stuff that wasn’t popular stateside and vice versa. I know that super obscure items from that decade have been exhumed via the newly found passion for Italo, Cosmic music etc., but the cool thing about the UK top 40 charts at that time was that some of that stuff was in there.

“Big Man Restless” by Kissing The Pink was a big Baldelli record, and thus an arcane delight, but the band also had a UK top twenty hit in 1983 with their song, “The Last Film.” Let’s just say that the UK charts back then seemed a little more exciting and a lot less prefabricated and ruined by quasi-payola. One UK artist who deserves more than just the cult adulation she has received is Lene Lovich. Born in Detroit to an English mother and a Serbian father, she moved back to the north of England with her mother when she was thirteen. The first time most of us heard of her was when her single “Lucky Number” got into the UK top ten in 1978.

It was a striking piece of new wave rock, with Lovich’s unusual vocals and noises, and a fast, funky and exhilarating backing track. It really stood out at the time, and 1978 was the first year when you could see new wave really taking shape. Lovich was a standard bearer for it, along with the likes of Elvis Costello, Ian Dury and The Pretenders. The single was followed by her debut album, Stateless, on the infamous Stiff Records label. Her career continued on into the ‘80s with songs like “New Toy,” "It's You, Only You (Mein Schmerz)" and “Blue Hotel,” though she never regained the profile that she achieved with that ground breaking single in '78.

However, she didn’t go away and down the years Lovich has also written lyrics, guested and performed with artists as diverse as Nina Hagen, Cerrone, The Residents, Thomas Dolby and George Clinton. Recently she has crafted lyrics for French house producer Bob Sinclar, including “The Beat Goes On,” and “Kiss My Eyes.” A cult artist she may be but her influence is still felt and tunes like “New Toy” and “Lucky Number” will never go away. Also if you have the “Lucky Number” single, flip it over and listen to the brilliant “Home,” an excellent track that I always played more than the a-side.

Orr

Sebastien Tellier's Kilometer Single Is A Doozy!

2009-03-25T10:30:00.000-07:00

I have to say that I really like this new Sebastien Tellier rekkid. Four mixes in all, including the original, and they’re all banging in my opinion. The original is a mid tempo euro disco tinged thing with kitschy, sexy vocals, the Aeroplane mix is a vocoderized Italo flavored work out at 112 bpm, Arpanet get all weird, austere and Detroity at a slower tempo and the dancefloor crown goes to A-Trak’s mix, which fuses disco, Daft Punk and Todd Terry, keeps the vocal, really playing on the “right over the top refrain,” and will secure this record in your crate for daze.

It will be in your crate for days ‘cos the house folks will like it, the electro kids will get a kick out of it and even the mainstream crowd, who bug out on anything Kanye or Kid Cudi, will feel the kindred spirit in A-Trak’s kicking mix. It’s a mix for all seasons, a renaissance mix, and the record in general is a little gem, if you’re a multi-tempo, multi-genre dj like myself. It’s pressed on gorgeousful red wax, so it appeals to the vinyl junkies too. Total keeper! Get it and work it!

Orr

Babe, Terror

2009-03-24T15:31:00.000-07:00

San Francisco is feeling like summer at the height of this economic winter. At least for the time being. What better time to dig into this Brazilian artist: Babe, Terror.

For starters, his tunes pack the disembodied ghosts of Tropicalia past with woozy harmonic ideas constructed from looping voices and stuttering drones. Track 7, entitled "Julebord" from his new album, "Weekend" feels like the spiritual offspring of Caetano Veloso's amazing "Araçá Azul." This revolutionary Brazilian psychedelic influence with a few hints of Brian Wilson and additional spookiness may draw comparisons to Panda Bear/AC and El Guincho, but he's obviously inhabiting his own cosmic primordial ooze.

We know a few things about him. He's from São Paulo, he likes Super Nintendo and he gets "it." His music to date has all been self-released and free. Download his latest, "Weekend" here, UNTIL FRIDAY (march 27). Not sure where the record will evaporate to on March 27, but it will certainly be swimming the internet seas of availability. This is a concept that Babe, Terror understands and exploits to great success, because he gets "it."

We are at the dawn of a new era for artists who understand how technology is a great ally and that content need not be policed. The labels and artists who embrace this will not only survive, but flourish. As for the others, their future is in the balance and the lawsuits will continue to fly.

For us in the bananaspam-o-sphere, enjoy the false summer if you're experiencing what we are in SF. If it's cold where you are, enjoy the future tropicalia on offer here.
His EP is also available free for download.

Meho Plaza - I Sold My Organs

2009-03-23T15:12:00.000-07:00

Blackbelt Andersen Takes Balearic To The Motor City

2009-03-19T12:05:00.000-07:00

Though the whole Balearic scenario has left me in a state of advanced disinterest, especially in relation to its current manifestation, — Why isn’t Chris Rea revered, or Mister Mister for that matter?— schmooveness of a Shcandinavian ilk, or so many beards, so little time, I do have a little ting for Danny Blackbelt Andersen’s self-titled debut rekkid. He most definitely deals in the same kind of breezy electro fare that has become a staple sound for the likes of Prins Thomas — on whose label he records — and Lindstrøm, but adds a little techno flair to it.

And when I say techno I mean Detroit techno, not the current glut of funkless, melody free, software demo music that we have been inundated with for too long, in fact I’m always amazed by the tendency to intellectualize about music that doesn’t really do anything that interesting or musical, call it the emperor’s new clothes of music. That said, local minimal techno maven Roman Stange needs to get his stuff out to a larger audience. It’s nasty, funky and heady stuff and I want to hear it very, very loud!!

Back to Blackbelt Andersen already. His album is a melodic sojourn in a Balearic place that is smitten with early phase Detroit techno. So what you get are nice chunky, chewy bass lines, pitch bendy strings, à la classic Derrick May, and the kind of warm, alien textures that Carl Craig used to trade in before he became the “very long remix that does the same thing forever and then changes a bit near the end and then goes back to doing the same thing” purveyor.

We know Carl’s from Detroit and a certain amount of adulation is warranted (god knows I’ve done my fair share) but please take us back to the mystery and funk injected abstraction of BFC and Psyche. Sorry, but even though The Juan MacLean and the DFA posse will wax endlessly about Carl’s mix of “Falling Up,” it was good but it was no “Elements” or “Galaxy” or "Domina" remix. I’m not trying to be a purist, but I love Detroit techno, obsessed on it and collected it forever and then edited XLR8R’s techno section when the genre wasn’t cool in SF. My techno standards are high and I hate being minimally lulled into herd-like acceptance.

Mr. Andersen takes that sense of motor city mystery, the sound ringing in Johnny Gambit’s ears as he policed Cabaret 7, and rivets it onto his Nordic/Cosmic vehicle. The results are very pleasant and the whole album listens very nicely, has a few decent dance floor cuts but sounds better in headphones while on the sofa or on the beach (with Chris Rea per’aps). If you like pretty electronic music it’s a must and if you want to romanticize and remember the old techno or scheme the next wave of galactic robot music it will come in handy for that too.

Orr

Remembering Phil on Paddy's Day.

2009-03-17T14:50:00.000-07:00

Smash Hits did a piece on Phil Lynott in the early ‘80s, which began by positing the question, “What’s Black, Irish and has a big head?” The answer is Guinness, of course, cos Philo was a rocker par excellence but he didn’t have a big head, no sirree. In the early ‘80s in Ireland, where I grew up, Thin Lizzy were revered, usually by young fellas with AC/DC patches on their denim jackets, but those of us who were bugging out on Joy Division, The Buzzcocks and PIL revered Phil Lynott too, for many reasons. Firstly, we recognized that Thin Lizzy was a seriously good band, secondly we saw from interviews with Phil that he had a lot of love for new music; punk, new wave and even synth pop.

Ultravox member Midge Ure was Lizzy’s stand in tour guitarist in ’79 and I’m sure his friendship with Lynott opened up the Irish rocker to Kraftwerk, Moroder and Yellow Magic Orchestra. Listen to “Yellow Pearl” (the Top of the Pops opening theme for a good chunk of the '80s) from his first solo album for ample proof of that. The third reason we respected him was because he was black and Irish, the real “black Irish,” and we understood, as members of a culture that had been down-trodden, decimated and finally wrenched apart by infighting, how his race made him more vulnerable to xenophobia, stereotypes and racism. All that made us really proud of him.

We felt this because we knew how we were stereotyped as alcoholics (the Irish can and do drink a great deal though), barbaric and stupid, even though we produced thinkers and writers like Jonathon Swift, W.B. Yeats, Oscar Wilde, Lady Gregory, Samuel Beckett and James Joyce. Phil Lynott was an icon for us because he could rock out with the best of them and then he could turn around and work with the likes of Steve Jones and Paul Cook from the Sex Pistols and Midge Ure from Ultravox. You could hear blues, soul, funk and Kraftwerkian electro in his solo records. Simply put, Philo was a man for all seasons, a renaissance man, the man.

It’s been twenty three years since he passed away and I can think of no better way to tip my hat to Saint Patrick — the Christian, Roman British slave who began the Christianizing process that civilized all of western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire and the barbaric slide into the Dark Ages. This is why we honor him. — than to do likewise to Phillip Parris Lynott. So drop the green beer, the corned beef and cabbage (we don’t do any of that in the old country) and slap on a tune like “Old Town,” “Girls” or “Don’t Believe A Word” and revel in one of the best Irish exports ever, black as Guinness and Irish as all get out. Go dtuga Dia suaimhneas da anam.

Orr

Gilberto Gil, Quilombo

2009-03-13T14:26:00.000-07:00

In the ‘90s I never really spent much time listening to Latin music, not that I didn’t like it or was dismissive of it (how could you be?) but the way Afro Latin music was turned into ersatz yuppie jingles for chintzy cocktail bars and earnest nights of “serious” club music just put me off being curious about it at all. I had flirted with it briefly in the ‘80s — in a more innocent age that wasn’t replete with corn ball acid jazz casualties (please god don’t bring that back in a ‘90s revivalist manner) in dodgy hats — but somehow that didn’t resonate with me in the latter half of the next decade.

However, having gone back to Brazilian music again, only to be stunned by its beauty and sense of transcendence, and picking up Caetano Veloso’s book about the Tropicalia movement, Tropical Truth, I am newly refreshed by it. Especially when you listen to it and think about Velosos’s extremely literate, thoughtful and intellectual detailing of that turbulent period in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. One of Veloso’s many, but probably his closest, compatriots was Gilberto Gil, a legendary Brazilian musician who, like Veloso, was exiled to Britain by the military dictatorship.

On the Brazil Classics One record, which was compiled by David Byrne, Gil has a track called “Quilombo, O El Dorado Negro,” taken from the soundtrack of a 1984 Brazilian movie called Quilombo. The movie is based on the history of an independent republic set up by escaped black slaves in seventeenth century Brazil, and Gil wrote the music. I was very familiar with the title track from Byrne’s compilation but recently found a French copy of the soundtrack in great condition and discovered another beautiful track called “Chegada Em Palmares,” which is a slower and deeper reprise of “Quilombo, O El Dorado Negro.” Overall I find the album much more polished than Gil’s earlier work and thus not as interesting to me, but the two tracks mentioned above make it a worthwhile find. I think it’s still in print on CD too, so keep an eye peeled for it.

Orr

Humungoid Ghostly Party in SF Tanite!!

2009-03-06T14:50:00.001-08:00

Ghostly International is ten years old and is having banging parties across the country to celebrate the fact. Tonight they’re throwing a shindig at Mezzanine in San Francisco. There’s no need to introduce this wicked label, it covers a vast array of exciting music from rock to heady, techy downtempo and minimal bidness, and consistently puts out quality music. Matthew Dear is on the imprint and local techno outfit Broker/Dealer is on one of Ghostly’s subsidiaries. Tonight’s line up should be a winner; it’s varied — as you would anticipate — and will undoubtedly rock from start to finish. If yer goin’ I’ll see yuz there.

Orr

DJ Hell does the Devil's work!

2009-03-05T11:44:00.000-08:00

The guy who kicked off the whole electro deal — well I-F and Stuart Price deserve some serious props too — DJ Hell, is back with a new album, which will be released in late April. I’ll be honest I was ready to dismiss it, not because I dislike what Hell does and has done, but because that cold electronic shudder that he trades in is beginning to wear on me. However, that would be a disservice to the man’s talent, taste and reputation. Teufelswerk (Devil’s Handiwork in English) is the name of the record and it’s no tha bad (as they might say on a sunny day in Glasgow).

It’s comprised of two discs, one is devoted to day, one to night and the album features collaborations with Bryan Ferry, Peter Kruder, Billy Ray Martin, P. Diddy, Stefan Robbers and Christian Prommer. The first disc opens with “U Can Dance,” a track that features Roxy Music’s Bryan Ferry and displays Hell’s tougher more techno oriented side. Legendary rap producer P. Diddy adds some vocals to “The DJ,” a bumping, techy house track with the bassline from Sandee’s “Notice Me” and the rest of this disk features six more tough work outs drawing on Hell’s Detroit techno and Chicago acid house influences.

The second CD gets a little more interesting with Hell moving back to some of his earliest influences, German Kosmiche Musik, space rock or Kraut Rock as it is more commonly known. Here he takes a more ambient and downbeat approach, with some subtle rock touches and melodic synth textures. Overall it sounds like Hell colliding with Lindstrøm, except it’s better than Lindstrøm, has more of a raw edge and retains the inherent psychedelic quality of the music. “The Angst/Angst Pt. 2” is a prime example of this, as is the masterful cover version of Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine” which closes the record and sounds like the British space rockers co-opted into a Daniele Baldelli set. Maybe Lemmy should have been asked to guest on this track.

Perhaps this will the last interesting record of the entire electro era, and who better than its innovator and originator to close it out. You have to excuse my recent prophecies of impending electro denouement, but it has to come to an end at some point or at least take a lesser role as newer (albeit probably retro leaning) music forms take centre stage for a new decade and a new generation. The thing is Hell has been around for so long and has such an encyclopedic grasp of dance music that he may fire the opening shot of that too. In the mean time Teufelswerk is well worth checking out. It drops on April 27th, so keep ears peeled.

Orr

The Coming Post-Electro Era, Exploited Records Points The Way Forward

2009-02-24T12:05:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the delay fans, — “What fans,” I hear two random people in a phone booth in Concord ask — I’ve been suffering a block once again. But not a total block, more of a temporary impasse, the type of impasse I have when I deal with rock music — especially classic stuff — for a minute and then I feel the gravitational pull of electronic music again. I have the capacity to deal with both as there are no musical borders in my mind, but finding new electronic stuff that compares with my rock of ages is a tricky thing to do.

“So why not write about classic electronic music,” I hear you caringly ask. Well there are enough sites already doing that and though I enjoy reading them a great deal I don’t need to do what they’re doing, and furthermore I like being random with music. I’ve liked so many different genres in my life so far that I don’t want to dedicate myself to one or two types to be honest.

So to pull myself out of the hole of not being able to write about electronic music again I picked up on a German imprint called Exploited. The first record I bought on the label was the Allthegirls EP by Siriusmo back in early 2008, and I got use out of three or four tracks on there, especially the tunes “Femuscle” and Mode Selektor’s edit of “Wow,” a glitchy, dirty downtempo number that I’m sure found favor with the burner crew in SF, and on other scenes too.

The captivating thing about Exploited is that it is definitely pointing itself in the direction of the electro scene, a la Ed Banger, Crookers et al., but it also has an eye on other electronic styles and is in some ways directing us towards the post-electro era, when the genre gets over its youthful, exclusive phase and starts to fuse with other genres. Exploited’s newest release, “Motor Cortex” EP by Lorenz Rhode, is an indication that this is a likely outcome. It’s a six track affair in its vinyl version and a nine tracker in digital form.

There’s no doubt that it’s a little gem in either format simply because it touches on so many genres; from italo and electro to minimal techno, house and downtempo, glitchy bidness. Minimow & Solo’s remix is a minimal techno at its best in that it still retains a sense of fun and isn’t just another chin strokers’ delight. Ben Mono’s house mix of the same tune is another keeper and a sure way to keep the floor heavin and the hands in the air — nice fun use of a Gwen Guthrie sample too.

Add to this the original and its instrumental, a blinding fusion of electro, italo and boogie, with enough balls to get the party jumpin;’ the searing neo-Italo of “Tronic Matic,” the short but very sweet downtempo electro-funk of “A Little Something” and the chunky Italo of “Antidote — with it’s naggingly familiar bass line, and a keyboard melody that slyly hints at Kraftwerk’s “Hall Of Mirrors.” Clump all this noise together and you have a record that will never leave your box, or files that will never be deleted from your hard drive.

Scoop it on sight, it’s a doozy, and keep an eye on Exploited, as it moves electro out of its infancy and brings the fun back to all the other genres it touches on. It's much needed breath of fresh air and melody in a dance music scene numbed by banging electro, polite house and discordant minimal tech.

Orr

La Folie, The Stranglers' Love album. Part 2

2009-02-16T14:44:00.000-08:00

The fact that La Folie contains the timeless “Golden Brown,” and absolutely no filler content also lends to the album’s reputation. What I find funny is that in the endless, beardy search for post punk classics The Stranglers invariably get left out. Perhaps this is because they weren’t on a label like Cherry Red or Rough Trade nor did they indulge in the kind of shrill politicizing that defined groups like the Au Pairs or Delta 5. The Stranglers weren’t shrill at all and perhaps that’s the reason why the group isn’t revered by hirsute white boys in bands that sound like they’re fronted by a neutered cat.

However, you can’t deny the power and groove of tunes like “Bear Cage” —a non-album single which proceeded La Folie — “Let Me Introduce You To The Family,” and “Dead Loss Angeles” from The Raven album. And their politics weren’t the then relevant wedge issues of the ’70s and ‘80s, — now becoming irrelevant as we edge towards an economic melt down and the “haves and have nots” event horizon — perhaps they didn’t have politics at all, but during their career they sang about Iran, and nuclear power in France and Australia, and touched on the Mafia (“Let Me Introduce You To The Family”), cannibalism (La Folie’s title track is about Japanese student Issei Sagawa who killed a Dutch teacher named Renée Hartevelt and then ate parts of her) and drugs (“Golden Brown” is about heroin or toast maybe, who knows?).

La Folie, translated from the French as “madness” was The Stranglers album that dealt with love in all its myriad forms, but also love as a kind of madness. Perhaps the reason this records is so damned good is because EMI, the Stranglers’ record, dispatched them to the studio with ace producer Tony Visconti, who had the express orders to treat every track like a hit single, thus all killer, no filler. Eighteen years later it still sounds wicked and is a good guide on how to craft a varied and involving rock album. It’s worth tracking down and giving a damned good listening to, so please do.

Orr

La Folie, The Stranglers' Love album. Part 1

2009-02-14T10:14:00.000-08:00

When it comes to the subject of disco there are none who do it as well as my buddy James Glass. He has the tunes, does the edits and can school your ass at length about this music. It’s pity he doesn’t play out more, but in SF right now twenty years of spinning just isn’t enough hours spent at the craft I suppose, and he shaved his beard a few years ago. I did too, we both thought we were contracting balearia and would end up becoming Norwegian, so we took the only measure that will reverse the affliction, follicular annihilation of the facial area. And it worked, and now our names aren’t Bjorn, Sven or Gunnar even, whew!

The Stranglers thought that another Scandinavian country, Sweden, was the only country where the clouds were interesting, implying that nothing else was. I can’t say, I haven’t been there, but maybe Hugh Cornwell felt differently in regard to his university tenure in that country. James and I will argue at length about disco dancing related matters; he feels that the lush, symphonic and soulful ‘70s gear (get the de-S-er) is the pinnacle of all dance music. Though I think that sound and era is beautiful I always counter that stuff like Todd Terry’s early ‘90s gear, a filtering of disco and house through hip-hop and freestyle is really the zenith, glorious in it’s minimalist approach and tough resonant grooves.

We have to agree to differ on that, but there a few things that we do agree on, first is that you can get completely fatigued by disco and might want some nasty, dirty rock music that displaces a little anger. You see disco is cool but it can drift (as house did) towards bourgeois tastes — not that this could ever happen in edgy, informed and radical San Francisco, yeah. We also agree on the Stranglers, one of my favorite bands of all time, and one of his too. They pissed off journalists, bated conservatives and liberals alike, behaved very badly and sold an ass load of records. What is there not to like about that scenario?

I’ve already gushed about them in my posts Meninblack parts 1 and 2, but I just want to scribble about their La Folie album from 1981. I remember when it dropped and was highly excited to hear it after blazing through Rattus Norvegicus, Black and White, The Raven and The Gospel According To The Meninblack. An old high school buddy picked it up shortly after its release and we delved into it right away. In some ways it is the watershed album for the band, the one that led to them pursuing a more pop approach, and in other ways it is their most perfect album. It’s perfect in that it takes the energy of their early records, fuses it with the diverse subject matter of albums like The Raven and Meninblack (a weird one, but I love it all the same) and then smoothes off the corners just a bit to create a pop masterpiece.

Orr

The Undertones, Derry's Finest.

2009-02-11T11:11:00.000-08:00

Some of us can look back and take pride in a local band that did it, that put out a killer album or two, or dropped an unforgettable single. You used to see them live, you might have even seen them in the street or your mate was pals with their roadie’s cousin. You know the score. Whether you’re from Alberta, Albania, Albuquerque or Alameda I’m sure some of you loved a band that was the pride and joy all your buddies and you. For me that band was The Undertones, Derry’s finest, the band whose lyrics are inscribed on John Peel’s gravestone, an outfit that came out of working class defeat at the start of the Thatcher years but produced music that embodied the mythical endless summer.

The Undertones; Feargal Sharkey, Billy Doherty, Mickey Bradley and the O’Neill brothers, Sean and Damian were from Derry, Northern Ireland, a city about 15 miles from where I grew up in the north of Ireland (the Republic, or the Free State as the old timers used to call it), they made fast, happy melodic music that bordered on punk but had enough power pop in it to steer it away from the anger that was a pre-requisite of those late ‘70s times. My cousin Gerry lived in Derry and he introduced them to me. He had a fair stash of now rare stuff by them because his father’s cousin was married to a guy called Paddy Rice who ran a store on Derry’s Carlisle road called Quaver Records (one of the first record shops that would bug out in over the years).

Anyway, Feargal and the lads were broke but trying to get a band together, get shows and hopefully get a record out. Paddy helped by letting Feargal use the store as an office, to send faxes, make important calls etc. Gerry was always hanging around and when the ‘tones’ finally got a record deal and starting putting stuff out, he was there with an open hand. And into this open hand would go green vinyl versions of “Jimmy Jimmy,” the original Sire pressing of the first album with the black and white sleeve, 45s of “You Got My Number (Why Don’t You Use It)” though I don’t believe he ever snagged a 45 of the famous “Teenage Kicks” EP on Terri Hooley’s legendary Belfast label, Good Vibrations. On a side note, when Nirvana played in Belfast, Kurt Cobain ended up in hospital and reportedly said that he didn’t mind dying in Belfast, the home of Good Vibrations records.

Anyways, back to Derry. I would spend a few weeks in the summer with my cousin, heading downtown, where there were British army check points, armored personnel carriers, troopers in camo and all those other signs that God had given this part of Ireland to the British elite — they didn’t have an invoice from God but they had the hardware. Being young you ignore that kind of stuff, even though a few years later Gerry’s mother — my aunt — and sister were pinned down on a cross walk while an IRA sniper and British soldiers exchanged fire. Heady times indeed, but the best of times in some ways, and the craic was 90. And despite all this violence and darkness The Undertones music refused to succumb to it, refused to be seen as part of the cliched and stereotypical view of Northern Ireland. They offered hope and a respite from it all, even while it was beamed into your living room morning, day and night.

Gerry played me all these great records, and at the time, the summer of 1980, the Undertones’ second album, Hypnotised, had just come out on Sire Records, the American label that was home to The Ramones (who were adored by all my buddies who liked rock) and Talking Heads, who were equally revered. Hypnotized was and is a great record, a classic moment in that shift from punk rock to new wave. That album still brings me back to that summer, it was a hot one if I remember correctly, and songs like “Tearproof,” with its killer bass intro, “More Songs About Chocolate And Girls” and “My Perfect Cousin” hinted at a bigger idea of eternal summer in the youthful mind, ever shimmering, just out of reach, more of a feeling than a thought but with sounds to harness its floating vision to the ground.

And a line from the lyrics from “Teenage Kicks” is carved on John Peel’s gravestone, an eternal message from the grave of the quintessential taste maker, who loved the song the first time he heard it, and played it twice on the same show, around the time that Terri Hooley was hawking it to cloth eared record execs in London, only to be told that it was awful. John Peel knew otherwise and so did me and Gerry.

Orr

It's Poptasticness at its bestness!

2009-02-09T12:16:00.000-08:00

If you haven’t seen the latest Negativland DVD, Our Favorite Things, I suggest that you rush to their online store or to your nearest discerning movie rental joint, grab it and give it a watch. It’s spellbinding, informative, irreverent and subversive all in one fell swoop. The editing is incredible, the images will be burnt on your frontal lobe and you’ll laugh out loud at some of the segments in it. In the meantime before you rush out the door you should stop and think for a second about getting the latest release on Negativland’s Seeland label. It’s called “The Teen-Pop-Noise Virus” by Poptastic and it’s as mind warping and riotous as anything released on this imprint.

Experimental producers Chris Fitzpatrick, Thomas Dimuzio and random friends wrote and produced an entire album of sappy, top 40 style pop, then completely deconstructed it with more plug ins than you can wave a stick at. The concept of the record is that a computer virus has infected a studio and this album has been corrupted by it. The CD was also designed to only play the “hits” in CD shuffle mode but when played in a continuous way it is a single interwoven piece of work. And though the album sounds like a mess — albeit a good mess — it is comprised of a dense weave of editing, remixing, arranging and de-arranging.

This is exactly what you’d like to do to that annoying Britney track or Beyonce’s recent irritating oeuvres, but then to have the chance to release it too, what joy! As producer Dimuzio says, “Poptastic is just plain wrong.” Indeed it is, thank god!

Orr

Memories of Brazil Classics 1

2009-02-06T13:06:00.000-08:00

In early 1989 I was obsessed with two things, Detroit techno and a girl called Máiréad— who hated Detroit techno and liked Leonard Cohen. I was obsessed with both separately and then after much lurking and a fair bit of charm on my part (I have my moments) we started dating in the spring of ’89 in the Irish west coast city of Galway. Those were halcyon and innocent days and the west coast of Ireland was a beautiful place to be young and in love. It was also a beautiful place be completely bonkers about acid house, techno, EPMD and De La Soul.

And though endlessly I spun Juan's “Techno Music, “Spark” by Mia Hesterley and “Big Fun” by Inner City from the Techno, The New Dance Sound of Detroit comp on 10 Records, there was no swaying her, she wasn’t hearing it. But there was one record that we agreed on — and I did like Leonard Cohen and had spend some time listening to him years before — the first Brazil Classics album, which was compiled by David Byrne of Talking Heads. We would lie around in her little place in the Shantalla (Gaelic for old ground) district of Galway and listen to Caetano Veloso, Jorge Ben, Maria Bethania and Gilberto Gil. We’d dream about what Brazil was like, and how beautiful the people must be and how warm it was, knowing nothing of the turbulence that went on while this music was being produced.

And I often go back to this wonderful album and it always makes me smile, remembering a much simpler time with people who I’ve drifted away from, or who passed away. And though there is a certain amount of sadness attached to these thoughts there is no denying the life affirming force of this gorgeous music. And today you hear the influence of Tropicalia, as it is popularly known, in artists like The Bird and The Bee, Beck and Devendra Barnhart. When I hear it in my mind it's competing for air time with Juan Atkins, Ralphi Rosario and Liz Torres in a small terraced house while the rain comes down in sheets and dreams and laughing cut through the cold air. And in a weird twist of fate, twenty years later, Gort, a small town outside Galway, is thriving due to a recent influx of Brazilian immigrants. So now hurling (the Gaelic game not throwing up, smart asses) and samba live side by side in the wesht.

Orr

Nite Jewel takes us down from the electro high.

2009-02-03T11:20:00.000-08:00

When I first heard Nite Jewel, a duo comprising Ramona Gonzalez and Emily Jane, a few months ago — the youtube video of “Artificial Intelligence” above — I wasn’t convinced. Perhaps I was in disco curmudgeon mode (yes with me it’s a fine line between Bah Samba and bah humbug), but everything I was hearing at that time was prostrating itself at the alter of cosmic; a shrine where gentile young men with beards intone the names of records they researched on discogs and 'bought now' for 150 bucks on ebay, and anyway I was in search of other sonic pastures.

However, on the sage advice of two of my fellow conspirators, Disco Dave down in Indio, a man with a keener set of ears than a two year old cocker spaniel, and the disco don himself, James Glass, I checked out their “What Did He Say single” on Mike Simonetti’s “Italians Do It Better” imprint. I hadn’t heard that track before and let’s just say that I was tremendously convinced.

I loved the lush slo mo electro clunk of it and how Ramona Gonzalez's voice hung over the music like a hovering angel. This was new cosmic, filtered through a lo-fi indie rock ethos. bathed in Los Angeles heat and imbued with the spirit of Suicide at their most wide-eyed and romantic. Beautiful is the only word that even comes near describing the feeling of this record. The stripped down freestyle of the flipside, “Let’s Go (The Two Of Us Together)” is equally impressive.

Then Disco Dave informed me that he had shelled out for her album on vinyl and that he was well elated with it. So a few days later I was sojourning at a large music emporium here in San Francisco looking for said record and being the vinyl junkie that I am shelled out for it myself. Good Evening is the name of the album and it’s a gorgeous piece of work from start to finish. All ten tracks from “Bottom Rung” to the Roxy Music cover which closes it are little universes of intimate sound replete with delicate synth textures, pretty melodies and chunky analog basslines all topped off with Gonzalez’s plaintive voice.

This is not just a good come down record, this is thee come down record for the whole electro re-run; from the halcyon dark days of electroclash and the posturing, dystopian euphoria it promised to the cold twitch and pneumatic glitch of the Ed Bangeresque variants. Nite Jewel’s Good Evening injects some warmth into proceedings, bringing us back to when Miss Kittin, Felix, Ladytron and the gang re-introduced us to Italo, freestyle, new wave and acid house, and hopefully pointing us forward to a new era of electronic music that rocks even as it dreams and that leaves behind the icey shudder in favor of the galactic glide. One can only hope. This is an important little record.

Orr

Beppe Loda EP on People In The Sky

2009-02-02T15:14:00.000-08:00

Beppe Loda is another pioneering Italian dj from the same school and era as Daniele Baldelli, and, like Baldelli, his legacy has been been overlooked until recently. In the last five years both of them have been recognized as the innovators they truly were and are. Without them, the genre known as Italo disco might never have happened or at least wouldn’t have spawned as many forward looking records before the bidness men got hold of it and turned it into a Stock, Aitken, Waterman bubblegum Frankenstein.

Loda is currently enjoying a renaissance of his sound and is djing all over Europe to celebrate it. The UK label, People The Sky have tracked down some of his old productions from the mid ‘80s under the Egotrya monicker and released them with two remixes. The tracks, “Wind” and “Volcano,” appear in their original form and are augmented with remixes by the cosmic Irishman John Daly (who lives in Salthill, Galway and hangs with my old friends back in the wesht) and Belgian electro discoers, The Revolving Eyes.

The record drops today and it’s killer, all four tracks are lush, wide screen Italo monsters capable of turning the club into a madhouse. The original version of “Wind” and Daly’s mix of “Volcano” really do it for me as they’re full of cinematic drama, electronic textures and uplifting melodies. Scoop it if you see it.

Orr

Mr. White's Aeroplane EP

2009-01-29T10:04:00.000-08:00

Mr. White, the Memphis, Tennessee based geezer whose vocals graced Larry Heard’s “The Sun Can’t Compare,” has a new record out as a joint release between Black Market in the UK and Heard’s Alleviated imprint. This is Mr. White’s first solo production, with Larry Heard providing mixing duties. It’s a three tracker with a nice acidic house edge on all the tracks. It’s hard to pick out a favorite as all three are strong, but you can't deny the charm of the title track, "Aeroplane." It's cute and lysergic all at once as White sings about flying around in a plane because the person he fancies remains indecisive about his amorous advances, while a metallic acid groove undulates underneath. And I love the little acid surges that robotically mimic “Jingo” by Candido.

“Inside Your Mind (This House Is Home)” will have you reaching for that old E-Smoove EP on Future Sound as it displays the same kind of driving, dark acid vibe that works so well deep into the AM. And finally “You Don't Answer (When I Call)” comes in like Murk colliding with Italo disco, before taking a trip down the same organ paved route as Jaydee’s “Plastic Dreams.” And lest I forget, Mr. White’s vocals on all these tracks are stellar and are evocative and soulful. Hercules and Love Affair should have a listen because this is house without the retro pomp, it’s understated like all the best house was. It’s out now on vinyl and in digital form. Keep yer ears peeled. And you can scoop the wax here, and the digital version here.

Orr

Loud E's Loudefied Collection

2009-01-25T23:17:00.000-08:00

Even though I’ve been a bit of a disco evangelist for a long while — since the early ‘90s and I remember hearing some of the genre first time around when I was knee high to a grass hopper, in fact I recall “I Feel Love” had an almost addictive effect on my childish psyche at the end of the ‘70s (as did “The Lone Ranger” by Quantum Jump) — and I will never pass up a disco nugget should it present itself to me, all the retro is beginning to wear on me significantly. It’s a combination of really wanting to hear some new dance music that’s not house, minimal techno, Italo, disco, boogie, dubstep or any other pasture that has been well and truly strayed over multiple times.

Basically the rule of thumb with this situation is, if you feel that way perhaps it is time to make your own music. Far be it from me to disparage or criticize the young team from going doolally about music that I have been going nutty about for years myself, I don’t have four enormous ceiling high shelving units devoted to disco, house and italo for nothing, and so if you’re all about the stuff more power to ya. I’m delighted that there are really good blogs devoted to uncovering the gems in all these genres and then some. I read them, I enjoy them thoroughly and I enjoy hearing tunes from way back when that I missed, or simply have never heard or heard of.

Going out and hearing a killer set of tunes you’ve never heard before is the perfect antidote to the unending wave of clubs where it’s top 40 dross all night. It baffles me why people who listen to this dung all day on their I-pods, in their cars, on the telly; every fucking where, have to hear it when they go out to a bar or club too. All that said I am waiting to hear some new stuff that just blows my socks off, but I might be waiting a while.

In the mean time one of the kings of truly obscure disco, Holland’s Loud E just released a full CD of his special edits. It’s being released on the ever collectible Ambassador’s Reception label, and so far it seems that it’s a CD only item. It’s eleven tracks of rocking good stuff injected with that devilish Dutch sense of humor and containing more than a coupla two or three reworked tunes culled from the glut of material that Loud E deems to be below his standard. So he chops em up and makes them more usable for the dance floor.

Who am I to complain? And who are you to complain too, especially if you’re a disco, italo, cosmic or boogie nut? If you fall into any — or all — of these categories then get out and grab this little gem when it drops. It’ll work the party in your Saturday evening living room as it will the club or after hours spot. A keeper.

Orr

Wooden Shjips, Ezeetiger, Hank IV at Eagle Tavern.

2009-01-23T15:04:00.000-08:00

Last night I went to the Eagle Tavern on 12th street, mainly to check out Wooden Shjips — and another beautiful, tall, but not so wooden form, which was sadly absent from the horizon. It was a grand night, I ran into some friends, an old friend whom I hadn’t seen since 2001 and good sorts all round. I’m embarrassed to admit it but this is the first time I’ve been to the Eagle, but it won’t be the last after last night’s events.

Let me try to be brief. The opening act was Ezee Tiger, which is one guy, a set of drums, a mic, a geetar, a bass and a multi-tracking device. The music constructed by this collection of gear, and the person with it, is at times noisey, abrasive, driving, percussive, unruly, hypnotic and rousing and that was just the first song. Enjoyed this, it woke my ass up and was wildly entertaining, all from one dude who bears more than a striking resemblance to Dave Grohl. Has anyone noticed this?

Next up was Hank IV, another SF based act and a motley crew to boot, some youngsters and some more seasoned dudes knocking out rock n roll that stylistically swerved between The Fall, early Talking Heads, Television, Volcano Suns and the Stones. Lead singer Bob McDonald comes across animated and salty and looks not unlike Jello Biafra in a grueling collision with Pere Ubu’s David Thomas and Mark E Smith. Good front guy, tight band, zippy little bass player.

Last up were SF’s own psychedelic rangers, Wooden Shjips, who I want to see every time they play in the city. I loved their self-titled five track mini LP from 2007, and gave it a very positive review around its time of release and after seeing them live last night for the first time I love them even more. If you like Spacemen 3, Kraut Rock, early Floyd, Suicide and The Doors, then you’ll like these guys. And though they look like imposing and serious musos, which they are, their drummer and bass player lay down a mean groove that makes you wanna get up and dance. The guitar player and vocalist looks and sounds great — his voice and instrument — and the keyboardist adds some great textures, sounds and licks.

I’d love hear someone like Weatherall, Padded Cell or Tensnake doing kicky remixes of a few of their tunes so that Euro types can get acquainted with their name and sound and buy their records. I’d also love to hear them at a face meltingly loud volume with a gang of heads frugging out to their menacingly groovy sound. An SF band to watch, I’d watch out for all three of these acts in fact.

Orr

Nothing in particular.

2009-01-22T12:21:00.000-08:00

To quote the Beastie Boys, “The Hiatus Is Back Off Again.” I was suffering from a little bit of a block, and I was wading through new promos (some of which I haven’t downloaded yet) and dealing with labels and publicists etc. to make sure that I have cool gear to write about, And sometimes that admin stuff and having a mountain of music that you want to write about — and don’t know where to begin — can have a muddling effect on the scribe’s psyche that dwells deep in the recesses of my cranial area.

And there is plenty to write about, from new stuff that’s about to drop, like the upcoming solo album from The Knife’s Karin Dreijer Andersson and Mr. White’s cheeky Aeroplane EP to the stupendous first volume of Brazil Classics, which David Bryrne so deftly compiled back in 1989. And let's not forget the upcoming compilation of tracks that Massive Attack have sampled and covered.

Elvis Costello once said that “writing about music is like dancing about architecture,” but when he said that I don’t think he ever took into consideration that if it wasn’t for writers informing people about his music that he may not have sold as many records or become as popular as he did. The words of rock stars, like those of politicians, should never be construed as a key to living successfully, or living period. Keep plenty of salt handy, my skeptical Scots Irish heritage is replete with salt and saltiness, thank god.

And though writing about music may be second best to playing it, someone has to do it, so I might as well. And anyway when you spend so much time scrambling around with music, new and old, sometimes you get kinda lost in it, like Sister Sledge. Let’s say I’ve been lost in the music for the past week; my head has been swamped by Tropicalia classics, The Bird And The Bee, Burt Bacarach and more new and classic dance music than you can wave a stick at. Disoriented? Maybe just a little, but fueled up with more material to write about. Be prepared!

Orr

Rex The Dog's hecka cute vid and other thoughts.

2009-01-14T11:03:00.000-08:00

Though I get pulled in the direction of indie rock, infectious pop, classical music, jazz and punk (in its halcyon late 70s British form and the intense and beautiful American interpretation of the ‘80s) I am always pulled back to the orbit of dance music. Currently there aren't enough good toons out there, and though my ears and feet flirt with ‘70s soul and disco, Italo, and the 2 Step garage of the early noughties (2000s) my heart will always have a big place for late ‘80s and early 90s NY garage and for Detroit techno.

To me tech house in its perfect form — this is something I wrote about while I was techno editor at XLR8R in ’96 — would be a fusion of the best Detroit techno and the best, funkiest and most abstract NY dubs, with the odd vocal thrown in to ease the tension and prepare for the next wave of electronic confusion. Bliss!!

However, at the moment I’m finding the music of Rex the Dog quite blissful too, and the video above is too cute and clever for words, as is the tune with it’s blatant Yazoo sample — doesn’t Alison Moyet have a banging voice? Anyways, I thought I would share this with you and the video too. Keep movin’ on, keep pressin’ on.

Orr

The Bird and the Bee - Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future

2009-01-12T14:07:00.001-08:00

The Bird and the Bee, the Los Angeles based duo of Inara George and Greg Kurstin, has a new album coming. It’s called "Ray Guns Are Not Just the Future" and it’s due on January 27th. I’ve already listened to it quite a few times, and though the commonly held belief is that a band’s sophomore release is usually a lesser effort than their first I believe this album breaks the mould and shows a significant improvement in lyric writing and arrangement.

Like the first album, Ray Guns is a perfect record, full of sugary pop that has been drizzled with ‘60s Brazilian nuances, and little touches of Bacharach, Gainsbourg, The Beach Boys and Dusty Springfield. Then this heady and infectious concoction is melded into modern electronic genres like house and hip-hop. If you’re a fan of AIR, Pizzicato Five or Thievery Corporation, then this record will really grab you.

In fact, if you were charmed by Gwen Stefani’s dalliances with Japanese youth culture on her Love.Angel.Music.Baby. album, or the aforementioned AIR’s “Cherry Blossom Girl”or “Mer Du Japon” then “Love Letter To Japan” will resonate with you positively. If all that wasn’t enough, the sterling craftsmanship of multi-instrumentalist Kurstin fills the whole record with beautiful and uplifting choruses that whirl around the stereo field, and your head…for days.

Stand out tracks? Wow, the record is full of them; “Polite Dance Song,” has the most life affirming hook and message about music (and in the music) and its groove effortlessly glides over rolling funk drums and oscillating, glassy keys. While “You’re A Cold,” reflects on a bad boyfriend who is still indispensable while honkey tonk tinged piano conspires with playful electronics and sassy, girlish and clever lyrics.

There are eleven more tracks of similar quality, which display moods that swing between elation, melancholic regret and wide-eyed amazement. If you have given up on pop music then "Ray Guns Are Not Just the Future" might put your faith back in the idiom again. Why? Because Greg Kurstin’s arrangements are so solid and infectious and Inara George’s vocals are velvety, varied, soulful, playful and timeless. Simply put this album is awesome. Keep an ear cocked and an eye peeled.

Orr

True love, disco and herpes.

2009-01-11T14:44:00.000-08:00

Just in case you can't read the quote under the heading 'Disdain' on this jpg, it says "I Feel the same way about disco as I do about herpes." Fightin’ words indeed from Hunter S. Thompson, and though I would definitely agree with the man on many points, especially his attitude towards Nixon, I have to disagree with him on this one. There are a lot of music forms that generate a similar feeling in me, but disco is not one of them. And though there is a serious glut of disco revival goin’ on at the moment, which essentially follows on from the attention paid to the genre all through the ‘90s, it’s influence on contemporary dance music cannot be diminished. And as much as the British music press has attempted to stamp a genre every single strain of beat driven music that emerges, in some ways all modern dance music is really just a continuation of disco.

There’s a famous quote by legendary New Jersey dj, Tony Humphries — whose residency at the Zanzibar club in Newark is as important to the formation of house. garage etc. as those of Larry Levan at Paradise Garage, Ron Hardy at Music Box or Frankie Knuckles at The Warehouse or Powerplant — in which he states that he didn’t spin house, he played uptempo r&b. And really what is disco other than uptempo r&b, though not all great disco tracks are uptempo.

The thing that galls me the most about people bad mouthing disco is that the genre was killed off at the height of its popularity, when it was kicking rock n roll’s ass in sales and was popular in demographics where rock got a lukewarm reception at best. If disco got the chance to really flourish it may have become a monstrosity but it never got the opportunity as it had its life cut short by a cabal of paranoid, racist, homophobic and greedy radio djs, label execs and other misanthropes who couldn’t deal with the fact that it was more fun than Emerson, Lake and Palmer and had a strong appeal with women and gay men.

It’s these artificial ways of directing the music market that really annoy me, these ways of — to quote Chomsky out of context — manufacturing consent. I see the same thing with modern rap, and especially r&b. If you have the most recent copy of the SF Weekly, read Ben Westhoff’s scathing, yet accurate, overview of modern r&b on page 39.

The question is, how did black music get narrowed down to such specific and easily recognized genres, by musical evolution or by the stifling direction of the major labels? I’d opt for the second option. Isn’t Detroit techno a black music form? But it doesn’t get any attention as it’s too cerebral and hard to market, perhaps. Get it simple and keep it dumb (and crass, sexist, misogynistic and ultra materialistic).

Yeah, I know I’m missing the fun, irony and fantasy of the music and its message, but the whole gangster, pimp thing is getting very, very, very, very old. Like Outkast said, …”spittin all that bourgeoise, my watch, my car, I'm a star — I'd rather be a comet by far…” And perhaps disco offers what has been forgotten, the star gazing sci-fi element in black music that was espoused by Parliament and Funkadelic, Sun Ra, Model 500, Lonnie Liston Smith and X-Clan.

So even though we’re knee deep in disco revivalism, it ain’t such a bad thing at all, for sometimes you have to take a step back in order to take two steps forward at a later date. And you don’t have to be R. Kelly to take those two steps.

Orr

Outlaw tonight!!!

2009-01-09T12:35:00.000-08:00

If you’re going out tonight in San Francisco and you want to hear good dancing music across a range of genres played by people who know what’s up, look no further than the little shindig detailed on the flyer above. Lawrence “Foxee” Petty is throwing the do, and if you don’t know who he is darling then you need to put down that Crookers mp3 (???!!!) and read up a little. Lawrence has been around for a minute — he claims that 2009 is like 1988 (shite but on the cusp of excellentyness againz) — and used to be a staple on KMEL with local garage mainstay David Harness.

David plays US garage not fucking “gay house,” (Christ I hate it when people call vocal, NY type house that). Given that house music pretty much grew out of gay club culture in NY and Chicago, calling it “gay house” is like calling Heavy Metal “heterosexually inflected rock.” Stop calling it “gay house,” you sound like a pro Prop 8 Mormon, or moron, or merman even.

Anywayz where was I? Lawrence is joined by another veteran, Mike Bee, a man who has spun IDM, Jungle, 2 Step, Broken Beat, house and much more, run his own label, has written for XLR8R and stocked Amoeba’s electronic sections on the regular. And rounding out the line up is Chris Brennan, a talented and polite young man who is given to spinning classic hip-hop, taking kicking photygraphs, dating very attractive young ladies and falling off his skateboard with disastrous results. He’s also fond of mucking around with that Jamie Jams geezer, whose monthly Debaser party gives the young team the chance to crowd surf over each other's heads all fucking night to “Freak Scene,” while sweating profusely and indulging in all manner of joyous behaviourz.

Thank you Lawrence for booking a line up that reflects thinking outside the box of “I’ll just book my friends and people that other people book duh.” It's the same mind set that will marvel at the fact that a deep house track is sitting next to Dinosaur Jr. on the gorgeousful playlist under this here blog post here. It's also the same frame of mind that makes me want to go back to the deepest Irish countryside so I can be around people who are more open minded (no shit), it's also called being a myopic suburbanite who proclaims loudly on how liberal they are but still acts and thinks like a hick. We know SF is a small city, stop turning it into a fucking village with your narrow, cliquey ways.

Go and dance at this party you fuckers, it’ll be fun, I guarantee it (yeah like that beardy guy on the Mens Wearhouse ads. And I’ll keep using this analogy until I grow fatigued with it).

Orr

Interview: Lucky Dragons

2009-01-08T13:58:00.000-08:00

Luke Fischbeck and Sarah Rara have been creating art and performing together under the name Lucky Dragons since the late 1990's and have produced some twenty recordings since 2000. Their work centers around mixed media collaborations. Having been to one of their shows in late 2007, I was entralled by the sights and sounds. It was unlike anything I've ever seen before, so I remembered this when writing my thesis in art history. In an attempt to understand visual art's role in the music world, I investigated their multi-media concert experience. Luke and Sarah were kind enough to indulge me with the following interview.

Bananaspam: How would you describe the aesthetic of your visual installations? How long have you been creating them?

Lucky Dragons: We work in many forms, but we often exhibit videos and musical instruments/interactive sculptures together. the videos I would describe as Californian, fast, colorful, and hypnotic--with some very basic special effects like greenscreen. The videos are non-narrative, cyclical, and often center around the performance of a specific human action like spitting, falling, or embracing or a use of landscape as a repeating pattern of interwoven images. The instruments are made from bits and pieces of homemade materials linked with electronics--cardboard, yarn, and braided aluminum. We've been working in this vein for 5-8 years, though sometimes we do shows/installations that are entirely drawing based. We organize a collaborative drawing group called sumi ink club, that is the drawing equivalent of lucky dragons.

Bananaspam: What is your process for creating visual art? What programs do you use?

LD: The programs we have used in the past are pretty standard commercial software: Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, MaxMSP/Jitter, Pro Tools... though we're trying to move towards using programs that are open source such as audacity (sound editing) and pure data (multimedia).

Bananaspam: What is the difference between a Lucky Dragons show with visuals and one show without visuals? In other words, what do they add to the performance? Do they change the performance? How essential is the visual aesthetic to the perception of your music?

LD: There is always something to look at as well as to listen to or touch during the performance.
Many of our instruments have a sculptural quality to them--and in preparation for the show I often lay everything out in a very specific and often bi-symmetric way. The coils of the touching wires are knitted into colorful stripes and spirals and we often incorporate a pile of stones from the area surrounding the site of the performance. These repeated visual motifs are either part of a ritual or a game depending how you look at it.

There is always a balance to the aural and visual information that we present--rather than the music or art component becoming dominant, ideally what arises is a unifiying social interaction, a connection formed between members of the audience, that becomes the most prominent aspect of the performance. The social component is the thing that remains in my mind long after the music is shut down and our bags are packed.

Bananaspam: In your opinion, why is there a disconnect between the study of music and art history?

LD: there is a separate discipline devoted to the study of music history, with its own specific methods and language... i think it is similar to the study of art history in some ways (as a technological history, perhaps, or as a cultural history). The main reason i can think of that music is left out of most art-historical discourse is that it is looked at as a craft, or a tradition, or a social economy, not an end into itself (a "fine" art...). perhaps there is a confluence of craft / tradition / economy / technology that is taking place in contemporary art, that widens the discussion a little bit to include music as a fine art... hopefully so!

Bananaspam: Why do you suppose concert visuals have never been analyzed historically?

LD: I suppose it is difficult to pin them down as something discrete, with their own identity outside of the performances... do you look at ballet or opera stuff? it seems like there are some roots in the collaborations that have taken place in those fields... with historical analysis to boot...

Bananaspam: What filmmakers or visual artists inspire you?

LD: Niki de St. Phalle, CoBrA group, Bruce Conner, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Paper Rad, Harrell Fletcher, YAYOI KUSAMA, cory archangel, frances stark, dexter sinister, chris marker, rose lowder, jack smith, peter kubelka, nick relph + oliver payne, amanda ross-ho, joan jonas, bruce nauman, allan kaprow, lygia clark, helio oticia, and on and on!

Bananaspam: Do you ever find visual accompaniment to be a distraction from a music performance?

LD: Definitely, this often occurs for me when violent images or images that create a gender divide are projected during a performance.
I remember playing at a festival in which I was the only female musician performing, and noticing that all the other bands had visuals that included bad things happening to women. Perhaps that's more than a distraction--but a reminder that the visual image creates a context for the music, and molds it's meaning, The music and visuals together create a public space that either creates an open community or has the power to alienate.

Bananaspam: What are your favorite marriages of live performance with visual accompaniment?

LD: Extreme Animals and Hecuba are two groups that always pair sound and image in a very astounding way. Extreme Animals incorporates animations into the live show and Hecuba works with costuming, dance, and gesture--almost like Kabuki theater.

Bananaspam: Could you accomplish visual accompaniments to your music without the use of computers or projection technology?

LD: If you can imagine anything you can make it happen. In many ways the computer approximates things that have an analog partner like reverb springs or certain film techniques. We use a computer to move swiftly and cheaply from one idea to the next.

** Lucky Dragons' other projects include a weekly collaborative drawing group called "Sumi Ink Club," and a small internet press community called "Glaciers of Nice."

Animal Collective's new album

2009-01-07T17:35:00.000-08:00

The new Animal Collective album came out yesterday in digital formats and on vinyl. It’s called Merriweather Post Pavilion and is released on the ever reliable Domino imprint. I’m fairly new to this band I’ll admit, I got introduced to them last year when a friend of mine hipped me to Panda Bear’s solo album, Person Pitch. There were several things I loved about it; the Beach Boys feel, the deep ambience, its cut and paste aspect and liner notes that give props to Cat Stevens, Moodymann and Biggie, amongst many others Furthermore it seemed dense and difficult to pin down in terms of production, I mean to say I couldn’t quite fathom what he was doing, but it sounded good.

Ditto with the new Animal Collective, I can’t put my finger on what they are doing and I don’t want to wax metaphorical about it just to seem clever and knowledgeable. Perhaps ignorance is really bliss, or perhaps mystery lives inside ignorance too, like back in the days when you would read about some obscure record in a magazine and there was no internet to hear it or buy it immediately. The lack of access created a mythology around it and if and when you found it was momentous.

I’ve had this experience with many of the seminal house and techno records that I read about in British magazines back in the ‘80s and ‘90s, but I could never find them or I missed the boat on them when I tried to mail order them from stores in the UK. But when I immigrated to America I suddenly started finding those records, even the ones on mix tapes that I didn’t know the name of, suddenly one day you’re in a record store and you pick up this unknown record to listen to it and there it is, it’s that tune on that tape that you used to listen to it in 1988. Perhaps when you have to struggle hard for something it becomes all the more precious.

Consumer pontification aside, the new Animal Collective is another towering mass of noise, hefty bass, angelic vocals and beautiful arrangement, which doesn’t follow the tried and tested song structures that we have come to expect. Psychedelic rock conspires with drifting ambience and tough techno style beats — check “Summertime Clothes” for this heady amalgam — yet the mélange still manages to retain a strangely pastoral feel that is imbued with a pop inflected naivete; technologically augmented music for luddites?

Merriweather Post Pavilion is a musically open ended sojourn though forests and cities built of pure imagination and glistening sound. A record to get lost in, so let’s get lost.

Orr

Grace Jones - Williams Blood (Aeroplane Mix)

2009-01-02T16:13:00.000-08:00

There’s been quite a bit of fuss about this one since it started doing the rounds as a promo. And after much anticipation it was released in the UK, December 8th, on Wall of Sound, and in mainland Europe on Play It Again Sam. As Grace Jones’s performance on Later With Jools Holland proves, she still has the chops and the gusto. However, Aeroplane, the Belgian electronic act, take the track into a new dimension.

Some will, of course, tag this Nu Disco — everything must be put in a sub-genre in order to allow consumers to make the right consumer choices, and we are all consumers aren’t we? But let’s just say that it is forward looking, electronic dance music that contains the right amount of melody and arrangement in order to generate movement and emotional content on the dance floor. It is the perfect antidote to minimal techno tyranny and linear house tedium and is a band wagon that will jumped on when both of those genres have been effectively flogged to death — like now.

Not that any genre needs to be flogged to death, in fact if it’s mixed with other styles of music it can retain its freshness. Look at how djs like Ron Hardy and Larry Levan played classic Salsoul disco cuts ten years after their release and mixed them up with the newer, more electronic dance music that was being released in the ‘80s. I can’t quite deduce the difference between Balearic (in its new generic context) and Nu Disco, but I’m sure that arcane mystery will be unfolded to me at some point in the near future.

In the meantime, before that undoubtedly startling revelation, enjoy this transcendent little groover. And let’s hope there’s more to come from Aeroplane. I’m sure there will. And thanks to Kevin McKay at Prestel Records in London for sending me this banging little number at such short notice.

Orr

The Black Dog's still here!

2008-12-31T13:13:00.000-08:00

On this, the last day of the year, it is customary to look over the year and evaluate what great musical things have come our way in the last 12 months. However, since every website, blog, publication, and their granny is doing this I’m just gonna write about something that I’m totally crestfallen that I missed. The most recent album by British techno/IDM stalwarts The Black Dog came out at the end of March of this Year and I didn’t get the memo. The fact that it was released on a label from the city of my birth, Glasgow, Scotland, adds even more insult to injury, the insult that comes from not paying enough BLOODY ATTENTION to what’s going on in the world of proper techno, as I like to call it.

Radio Scarecrow came out on Soma Quality Recordings on March 31st as a CD and a very limited — 230 copies — triple vinyl pack. Would I like to possess the aforementioned three vinyl set? Yesh, I soytenly would, but alas and alack ‘tis undoubtedly sold out. There’s still the CD or digital files from the Soma store, and those may suffice. However, regardless of format this album absolutely rocks from start to finish, over the course of its seventeen tracks. On it, The Black Dog, Ken Downie, Martin Dust, and Richard Dust (of Dust Science Recordings) return to that lush, tricky sound that has been their trademark on IDM classics like “Virtual,” Spanners and Temple Of Transparent Balls.

The group has never really gone away, the line up has just changed — estranged members Handley and Turner went on to trade as Plaid — and their profile has lessened somewhat since the ‘90s when IDM was a hot genre. Intelligent electronic music, that you can dance to sometimes, is always a welcome thing in my book, but the lowbrow turn that dance music has taken in this low brow decade has kinda left it in the shadows. Radio Scarecrow shows that though it may not be in the limelight there is always a place for it. This album rolls, twitches, glitches, turns and hovers excellently from start to finish and the boys even fire in a couple of dance floor burners just in case you might think that they’re a trio of glum, Northern English chinstrokers. In fact, “UV Sine,” an abstract fusion of Detroit techno and New Jersey garage shows why djs like Tony Humphries used to drop “Virtual” back in the day.

Radio Scarecrow is a real keeper, extremely listenable and a solid exercise in melodic abstraction. Scoop on sight!

Orr

Ghostly Round Up

2008-12-30T12:50:00.000-08:00

I often feel guilty when I give props to an artist or a label over and over again but sometimes you just can’t help it. This is the case with Ghostly International I believe. In the last week or so I have a covered School Of Seven Bells and Broker/Dealer, two outfits which record for the Ann Arbor, Michigan, based imprint. The debut album by the former is sterling piece of work, while Broker/Dealer’s “Soft Sell EP” contains one of the best dance tracks of the year, the title track.

However, it doesn’t stop there as Ghostly just continue to knock out the quality entertainment across a range of genres. This is what makes Ghostly truly admirable, a dismissal of the need to willingly pigeon hole yourself. Hats off to that in an era that has seen underground music cave to the myopic and narrow focus on sub-genres and the manufactured notion that club music — and black music in general — can only have rap, r&b and syrupy dance pop. Not that all of that is bad either as the commercial producers continue to dumbfound us with increasingly abstract and enthralling beats.

However, thank god there’s a world of music to choose from besides what the corporates prescribe for us. Ghostly’s existence is proof enough that good music will always find some way out of a tight, corporate controlled bind. And serving that purpose this year were albums by British odd rockers, The Chap, and their Mega Breakfast long player, Michna and his Magic Monday opus and singles by Kate Simko, Lawrence, and Matthew Dear with the excellent "Pom Pom."

I could wax about this label for days, but why bother, it's to better to root through what Ghostly has and see how it suits ya. That way you can surprise yourself with just how kick ass this label is.

Orr

Roy Davis and Todd Edwards

2008-12-24T11:22:00.000-08:00

What do you write about on Christmas Eve, when you have a gang of music to deal with but you’ve spent so much time downloading it, sending feedback and making sure that it’s somewhere you can find it easily when you do need to listen to it? Simple, you pick out a five-track remix EP by Chicago house music guy Roy Davis Jr. and you gush endlessly about the Todd Edwards remix dub. If only all writing conundrums could be solved this easily.

Scion, those purveyors of boxy, little cars, also have an Audio Visual arm, with which occasionally like to put out digital releases, and the odd rekkid too. So far their releases have centred in and around the accepted modes of club music, i.e. electro and hip-hop, or a combo of both. As I am completely over both of these genres — in their more mainstream leaning forms anyway — I was glad to see that the car people had decided to go into a more groovy direction with Roy Davis Jr. and a host of credible remix talent.

The song is called “I Have A Vision,” a title which smacks of late ‘80s and early ‘90s starry eyed idealism — we could all do with a bit of that right now I think — and makes you want to run and grab your super deep house records and uplifting New York and New Jersey garage toons. Luckily I have an ample supply of all of these types of music, which means I’m always on the hunt for something new and fresh sounding. As the decade winds out and the whole edit/disco retro scenario starts to get long in the tooth (or is it the beard?), we’ll hopefully see and hear some new new sounding gear.

Todd Edwards’s remix dub has a certain freshness to it; it’s fast, slick, groovy and has the producer’s signature chopped up vocal style. It reminds me of his wicked mix of “If I Ever Feel Better” by Phoenix, coupled with the power of Justice (with all their jagged corners smoothed down) and a bit of Speed Garage, which Edwards influenced heavily anyway. I’ve been into his sound since the mid-90s after hearing killer cuts like “Saved My Life” and “Winter Behaviour.” This dub on Roy Davis Jr.’s record is another Edwards classic, not that the other mixes by Fred Falke, The Juan MacLean and Davis himself are sloppy, not at all, but Todd Edwards’s dub contains an effortless funk futurism that used to be dance music’s MO. We’ve taken the step back to re-evaluate the ‘70s and ‘80s, might be time for that step forward. Hopefully.

Orr

Les Filles on Le Pop Musik

2008-12-19T10:23:00.000-08:00

In the ‘70s and ‘80s you could always rely on the British media, especially the music media, to point out that the French had no real pop music of their own, that their interpretation of youth culture was heavily slanted by a dated reverence for Americana. This was based on the fact that in the English speaking world the only artists of note at that time were crooners like Charles Aznavour. There was a certain amount of xenophobia in these opinions, which bolstered the eminent position of the British as the first, finest and most current interpreters of American musical culture.

This was before the French fairly beat the British around the head with Daft Punk, Motorbass, Julien Jabre, Pepe Braddock et al. and their visionary versions of house music, executed before they handed the baton to Justice so that duo could shred the music through a refractive lens of irony, hair metal and good fun. However, the French always had their own, traditional popular music and song called Chanson, the origins of which dated back to the twelfth century and epic poem songs like The Song of Roland. This tradition has lasted up to this day, and is undergoing a renaissance as it looks to modern artists like Edith Piaf and Jacques Brel for inspiration.

Now there are a host of new French artists creating music in this vein and thankfully there is a German label that is championing it with individual artist releases and reliable compilations. The label is called Le Pop Musik and it is based in Cologne and one of its latest offerings is a compilation called Les Filles. It drops in Europe on January 26th and in the US on February 1oth. It is an excellent sixteen-track collection containing music by female artists. These include Barbara Carlotti, whose stirring “Mademoiselle Opossum” opens the record. Other stirring offerings include Fredda’s “Barry White,” the beautiful “Clash Dans La Tempo” by Constance Amiot and the girlish and irresistible “Cupide Et Stupide” by Austine. The risqué, joyful and hilarious video above is by Marianne Dissard, a French woman living in Tucson, Arizona, who has collaborated with both Calexico and Giant Sand, and whose husband, Naim Amor, has done likewise.

I was introduced to this label via Le Pop Musik’s Le Pop 4 collection in the sping of last year. I do like what I hear as it is perfect listening music and isn’t it nice to hear pop music sung in a different language (I get guilty pleasure from some J Pop too). Plus Jeanne Cherhal’s closer “Si Tu Reviens J'annule Tout” is magic and the album just gets better and better with each listen. Check this, it came out and if you're keen on fragile girls singing in French and making you sigh, then you might want to check this blog on the regular, fillessourires.com.

Orr

Toob - Dervish Angel

2008-12-18T14:31:00.000-08:00

This one came out on Monday and I think it’s kinda nice. The record is called “Dervish Angel” and it’s by a British act called Toob. The music is house inflected with dreamy, narcotic nuances and a dark little edge that catches you off guard. The Clouded Vision Remix will probably do the most damage on the dance floor and it sounds quite pleasant in your ear holes too, when yer away from the dance floor. The duo appeared on Bomb The Bass’s last album, Future Chaos, and have been putting out material on labels Process Recordings and Lo Recordings for a minute. Keep an eye and an ear peeled for them. Pretty boys they may not be, but they make a pretty noise, and that’s what counts. Or did.

Orr

Broker/Dealer in exquisite techno manoeuvres.

2008-12-16T23:56:00.000-08:00

I’m kinda up to my naddlies in new records but pushed this one to the front of the priority pile as it rocks in a grand style. It’s a four track EP (on wax, five on the digital release) by San Francisco based duo Broker/Dealer on Ann Arbor’s Spectrum Sound label, a Ghostly International side imprint. The Ryans, Bishop and Fitzgerald, comprise the outfit and produce what is, in my humble opinion, some of the best dance music coming out of SF right now, along with releases by folks like Claude Von Stroke, the Martin Brothers and Nick Chacona.

Von Stroke and the Martins deal in techno with a bounce happy sound that is as abstract as it is playful, while Fitzgerald and Bishop opt for a galactic glide that hints at hours listening to Basic Channel, Il Discotto, Underground Resistance and Logic System. The title track of this record exhibits that tendency in all its glory and is hooky and majestic all at once

Thomas Fehlmann, a collaborator with The Orb and a former member of Palais Schaumburg, provides two mixes (only one appears on the wax, two on the digital release) which take a more minimal route with a gritty and funky groove. And there is an extra track called “Save It For Later,” which also works quite nicely on the ears and arse. The title track is the one for me though, deep techno from some sound heads. Check it, and wreck it.

Orr

Christmas in Discoland

2008-12-15T15:15:00.000-08:00

Here we see two completely different approaches to Christmas carol/song covers. The first, by Italo disco legend Alexander Robotnick, aka Maurizio Dami, is the completely barking mad, ravey, burn yer fake beard while lighting your fag approach. The second one is a much more Scandinavian and polite take on the idiom by Norwegian artist Lindstrøm, and friends. Both are equally valid, with Lindstrøm's Paul McCartney cover being a delightful accompaniment to the early and civilized part of the day, while Robotnick's will do just fine when all the food's been scoffed, quite a bit of hard liquor has been imbibed and the kids — rushing on a savage amount of sugar — are on top of the tree chucking baubles at you and screaming total gibberish in your general direction.

Thanks to Sir Anthony of the Mansfields for posting a link to the Lindstrøm vid on myshpace. Anthony makes rekkids with Nick Chacona, djs...a lot and runs the Hector Works label (I'm not sure if Hector works there, but call his mum too find out, if you're curious, or bi, curious even, snicker). He's based in Shan Francishco, and if you don't concur that his rekkids and remixes are fab –check his TJ Gorton remix and Greg Wilson's rework of "Oh Snap" — he will come to your town and point at you and then bear hug you until you relent. So relent now, as relenting laterz could lead to unrelenting embarrassment, and that's the tired and not so funny relenting usage put to rest.

I just love the Paul McCartney original and Lindstrøm's version is pretty damned faithful and you could have a bit of dance to it while pulling a cracker with granny, the Robotnick version is good whilst listening to the sleigh bells, and galloping reindeer in your mind...in your mind...in your mind. Can also did a version of "Silent Night" and it's on the b side of the 12 inch of "I Want More," and came to my attention in the winter of 1989 when I successfully blagged one off a friend back in ze old country. He wanted Sonic Youth's Sister on wax, which I had, and I wanted the Can 12" which he had.

We reached a harmonious accord in relation to the transaction and I haven't looked back since, except when I'm walking through the Tenderloin in the wee hours and behind me I hear feet shuffling, blades being pulled or someone screaming "wurrarrghaaah" (which is always, but coincidentally, the name of someone who lives on the third floor of a building and has a copious amount of serious narcotics). Enjoy the yuletide machinations that are laid out before us like a cornucopia of gorgeousfulness, dear readers, and I will take my leave. Hokay!

Orr

School Of Seven Bells' Alpinisms Album

2008-12-09T14:36:00.000-08:00

I was going to write a super long-winded treatise on this album using words and phrases like post-modern, musique concrète, neo-psychedelic and post ambient dub trip rock, but decided strongly against that and just vouched for a simple message instead. School of Seven Bells’ Alpinisms album fucking rocks — albeit in a gentle way that creeps over you in a wave of controlled euphoria — and I would advise everyone and their granny to go out and buy it immediately and without further delay, hesitation, pause or procrastination on anyone’s (or their granny’s) parts — not that this blog (or anywhere else) is a forum for discussing your granny’s parts or your parts either. There are other places to do that and this not one of them. Hokay!

Seriously though, this record is a damned good one, and Ghostly deliver ze goods once again. The Chap aren’t three bad eever.

Orr

Ghostape - Many Stars EP.

2008-12-07T10:29:00.000-08:00

Out of a lot of the new stuff I’ve heard recently in the electronic side of things a cheeky little five tracker from a Swiss artist named Ghostape was a breath of fresh air to say the least. It’s coming out tomorrow on UK label People in the Sky. It’s cute, quirky, danceable, unself-conscious and contains a coupla two or three tight remixes, especially the one by Danish artist Screen Tests. I’ve already reviewed it here, so have a listen and a read and enjoy yer Sunday. Hokay!

Orr

Meninblack Part 2

2008-12-07T10:05:00.000-08:00

All this twee rock and dance music just pushes me to listen to edgier, harder music that truly exhibits angst, anger and hunger. The first three Stranglers albums do this with bells on and the fact they were lambasted as misogynists, racists etc. etc. was ample proof that they riled the British music press with their talent, lack of interest in punk pigeon-holing and general lack of respect for the journalists themselves.

Bass player JJ Burnel got into some fisticuffs with NME journalists and fellow musicians, but a lot of British rockers of that era — Siouxsie and Paul Weller included — made violent overtures about music hacks. The Stranglers just delivered on the threats and then wound things up more by pushing all the taboos they could in the press’s face. NME regarded the band as not punk enough because they were older, had members with long hair and featured a keyboard player. But the band weren't trying to be punk, they just happened to be around at the same time as the budding genre and had a dark, aggressive sound that resonated with punk rockers.

Regardless, the first three Stranglers records are a great exercise in gifted musicianship, a non guitar hero approach to rock — Burnel and Cornwell shared lead vocals — and a musical style that couldn’t be put in a neat, punk box. The Raven, their fourth, is a pretty neat affair too, although showing more of a pop leaning. Some of the tracks from all these albums are timeless, and sound as forward looking and modern as much of the rock coming out now.

The combination of JJ Burnel’s bass and Dave Greenfield’s unbelievable, baroque tinged keyboard playing and synth work made their music intricate, aggressive and otherworldly all at one. They sounded like the Doors colliding with Kraftwerk and The Flamin’ Groovies. I grew up on those albums and I go back to them often for ideas and inspiration, now, more than ever. Their music proves that you can be angry, pissed off and intelligent all at once and that you don’t have to cave at the feet of an elite world view that’s fascist at one extreme and overly politically correct at the other, because there are no parameters in self-politics or good music. There are in dogma and crap music.

Orr

Meninblack Part 1

2008-12-06T10:00:00.000-08:00

Thanks to the man like James Glass for hipping me to the absofuckinglutely killer youtube video above featuring the stellar talents of both The Stranglers and Peter Cook. James is a bit of a stellar talent himself, on the wheels of steel, and on the edit and like myself is an old school Stranglers fanatic. Check his selections of the Golden Goose label and keep an eye peeled for when he is behind the ones and twos.

We are both currently lamenting the fact that everything musical we love — dance music and rock — has become so damned wimpy that we might be forced to go metal. Even techno has wimped out as it becomes more of an ultra-generic software workout for jet setters with great programming skills and not a note in their head. Anyway as the cities become more and more expensive to live in, and you get less and less for your buck, the task of creating music has fallen hard on the delicate shoulders of the progeny of the wealthy.

Oh, they should show us the extent of their struggle and hunger while creating twee offerings replete with shrill vocals and music that has “always had an Arthur Russell and Liquid Liquid” quality to it.” This will be an antedote to our drab proletarian lives. However, I would rather just pull out Black And White by The Stranglers and wallow in its dark and caustic post apocalyptic vision to be honest.

Orr

Meninblack intro

2008-12-05T11:34:00.000-08:00

In the last month or so I have been writing about new dance music and older rock music. And it’s only today that I’ve really thought about why that is so, because at this point I’m kinda a little bored with both and with some of the newer rock I’m hearing too. Perhaps, I got up on the wrong side of the bed today. Well, my bed’s against a wall so maybe I’m getting up on the wrong side of it every day (a chorus of chimpmunk voices chimes in saying, “Yeah you do, you fucking asshole!”). Hanx for that.

New dancey stuff is getting all quiet, cosmic and contemplative, kinda like trip hop without the minor jazz chords, dodgy compilations and start up parties with an ice sculpture (San Fran circa 1999). While some of the new rock I’m hearing sounds like “we made this album with the trust fund of the singer, drummer and bass player and we’re going to do our godsdarnests to exercise our bourgeois ennui if it kills us — or gives us a nasty blister on our pinkies. Twee to say the least, and then on the electronic front there’s been a serious outbreak of balearia.

Balearia is a disease that’s contracted when you mix the eclectic dj sets of ‘80s and early ‘90s Ibiza classics with yacht rock, Italo disco and Baldelli classics, It causes you to grow a beard and speak in a quiet voice like the whispering guy out of the Old Grey Whistle Test. Advanced forms of it reportedly make you Norwegian, but you’d have to check in with the World Health Organization for more info on that.

I think it’s hilarious that Balearic has become a genre, given that it’s a style of djing where eclecticism was a prerequisite. Welcome to corporate style marketing for underground music. Which leads to me to pull out one of my old favorites and write about it, basically because I want to hear something that’s keyboardy and weird but has balls. You could always rely on The Stranglers for balls and their music is a beautiful fusion of testosterone, an excess of good drugs, Devo, Kraftwerk, The Doors, acid rock and dark sarcasm.

More on this is a bit.

Orr

Killing Joke Part One

2008-12-01T12:20:00.000-08:00

My friend Raf who writes the absolutely banging blog, Gold Code, just posted about Killing Joke’s phenomenal “Almost Red” EP and it got me thinking about the band, one of my favorites, along with The Stranglers. I love Raf’s blog ‘cos it sidetracks away from all the dance music obscurer than thou dick swinging and occasionally focuses on stuff that’s under your nose and that’s not dance music while also keeping tabs on killer classics in the boogie, Cosmic, hip-hop, house and Italo realms. And he posts mp3s. It’s a good read, no doubt.

And Killing Joke was/is a good listen, a brutal, yet complex, fusion of punk, Moroderesque electronics, disco, funk, Kraut rock and dub reggae. However, this potent concoction of sounds didn’t detract from a rage that was palpable, an anger that was moulded from coming of age in Thatcher’s no hope, no future, class war plagued Britain. Listen to tunes like “War Dance,” “Psyche,” “Requiem” and “Change” for evidence of that, and a dark edge that set them apart, putting them somewhere in the same realm as the equally dark horse group The Stranglers.

Like the Meninblack they had a kick ass bass player, in the shape of Youth, the man who brought the disco and reggae quotients for sure. Legend has it that in the ‘80s he would sneak off to New York for a month every year to check out the music and clubs etc. He would tape every mix show on WBLS that he could and then bring the tapes back to the UK to share with friends like NME writer Kris Needs. This was the age of Shep Pettibone playing dubbed out, three deck clusterfucks of avant funk. Youth took that inspiration and applied it to the production he provided on cuts like Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill. He also dated Bush, the jammy fucker, as did Stranglers bass player Jean Jacques Burnel. Shoulda taken up the bass sooner, huh?

Legend also has it that the entire band ran off to Iceland in 1982 because their occultist beliefs led them to the conclusion that the world was about to end, and Iceland was the best place to avoid the fire and brimstone. It seems the opposite is the case in the current financial maelstrom. Despite numerous line up changes they always operated as a quartet with Jaz Coleman on vocals and synths. Coleman also managed to collaborate with Anne Dudley from Art of Noise on a project that combined electronic, middle eastern and classical musics, and produced an album of Māori inflected music using master Māori players. Thus he didn’t resort to samples like the new agey twiddlings of Enigma et al.

To be continued….

Orr

Thank Ya, Thank Ya!!

2008-11-27T16:27:00.000-08:00

It’s a day for giving thanks so let’s give thanks for two absolutely slammin’ jams that display gratitude in a very excellent fashion. First up is Sweet D’s absolutely banging Chicago house classic from ’86. This was the work of the legendary Chip E. — a man responsible for some early and innovative jackin’ moments — and Danny Wilson, who worked with the likes of Farley Jackmaster Funk, Victor Romeo and DJ International head Rocky Jones. For an early house jam it’s pretty well put together and has a real uplifting feel with this is not a moody, deep or acidic number, this one is brimming with bright, joyful keys and a driving bass line that could still rock a dance floor.

This one smacks of what Chicago house was all about, synthetic disco, and you need disco to synthesize in order to have the ersatz version. The disco tune that begat or inspired “Thank Ya” was Cheryl Lynn’s blinding 1978 number “You Saved My Day” from her eponymous debut album (the one which contains that Marina chick perennial “Got To Be Real”). No doubt this one was a favorite at the Music Box, The Warehouse and on the WBMX radio station. Sweet D’s imitation of Miss Lynn’s flawless soul nugget is a reminder that the soul needs to be put back in the mix. It’s good to remember r&b and soul in all its incarnations, but who’s gonna bring it back for the next phase? Hopefully one day we’ll be thanking some people for that.

Orr

New EP by Larry Heard.

2008-11-25T15:01:00.001-08:00

Larry Heard - 25 Years From Alpha [Buy It Here]

Larry Heard has a new one out on his own Alleviated label in conjunction with Black Market in the UK. It’s a three track EP called “25 Years From Alpha” and as you can expect it’s a bit of a keeper. It was released yesterday so it should be showing up in the specialist stores pretty damned soon. On it Heard covers a range of moods, with the title track, a fifteen minute plus pulsathon and excellent dj tool, sounding like his take on Italo disco – not that his track “Stars” under the Mr, Fingers monicker didn’t do the same thing back in ’87. Track two, “Mercurian Funk,” is a kicky fusion of sleek electro, deep house and Fela sounding keyboards. And the final track, “Feathers Floating” is delicate like its title and displays the kind of subtlety that made his Sceneries Not Songs, Genesis and Alien albums so essential.

If you’ve been a fan of Larry Heard for many years then this one solidifies his reputation for creating beautiful electronic soundscapes that you can dance or chill to. Keep an eye peeled for this one as it’s a worthy addition to his already legendary canon of work.

Orr

Another New Bear Funk Rekkid That's Rather Pleasant And Other Thoughts Of That Ilk!

2008-11-22T02:37:00.000-08:00

It hasn’t been that long since I wrote about the last Bear Funk release by Italian producer Arturo Capone (and Capone has an album coming at the beginning of December). This time around the pressure comes from British musician Alex Cordiner aka Lusty Zanzibar. I imagine when his EP, For My Friends, (4 tracks on the wax, 6 tracks digital) drops on December 1st it should create quite a stir with the djs and dancers who have been getting kicks out of the stuff that the likes of Aeroplane have been putting out recently.

Once again this music is being thrust into ready made genres like Nu disco and Balearic (yeah Chris Rea and Mister Mister would sound dope next to “Pacific Air Race”) but the truth is that it is just great, well produced dance music, which happens to be melodic and nicely arranged. Melody is for airheads as minimal techno’s dearth of music and abundance of whooshy noises has sagely proven. Why bounce around to a tricky bass line with lush strings when you can stroke your chin to a two note bass line and no strings? And don't get me wrong there's a fair bit of minimal that I like, Konrad Black is the man, Heartthrob has done some nasty tracks, Dan Bell rules from on high, Kompakt can do no wrong and Will Saul is on point. It's just that there is a lot of it that's plain boring. Sorry.

I think you can almost map the direction that electronic dance music is taking: the melody of Italo, disco and Cosmic gear is being deftly absorbed into modern productions by artists like Reverso 68, Phreek Plus One and Aeroplane, and that is all set to crash into a just bubbling fixation with a diverse amount of late ‘80s and early ‘90s gear, ranging from Weatherall remixes and Balearic bombs from the likes of Sheer Taft and BBG to the NY garage nuggets which are being given the twice over.

Lusty Zanzibar’s killer EP from Steve Kotey’s Bear Funk label is another step in the right direction. It’s driving, yet extremely musical and uplifting. No pianos. but I’m sure those are just around the corner, when someone in NY gives the Baldelli chinstroking a miss for a second, puts down that Steel Mind record and picks up an FPI Project 12 inch it’ll be on like Donkey Kong. Now a prayer,

Dear Father who carts in obscene
amounts of obscure rekkids, hallowed
be thy slightly worn copy of LB Bad’s EP
on Nu Groove. Will thou send us a party
thrown by people who aren’t proprietary
and who aren’t generic with their music, and
give us rekkids with melodic synthy bits,
strings and girls singing about life affirming
stuff. You can also ditch the banging electro,
irony and no name djs from LA who can’t mix
but are real handy with traktor. You can send
some that can mix and that might be handy with
a tractor (like a John Deere peut être ).
Amen!

Nice one Steve Kotey. Keep em coming, and keep on keepin’ on and on (Fears Keep On).

Orr

New stuff, old stuff and Sideshow

2008-11-20T13:10:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it takes me a minute to get inspired and it’s hard to be all perky when the economy is going down the drain and you’ve spent the entire decade having your self-esteem downsized, struggling under the imbecile prince. Also the very tiring fixation with the ‘80s is beginning to seriously wear thin and that includes the slavish hunting for rare boogie, Italo etc. When you’ve gone through some music like three times in your lifetime — when it was released, when it was exhumed in the ‘90s and when the carcass is finally flogged in this decade — then you know it’s time to move on.

However if you're a younger vinyl junkie then you are where we old, jaded vinyl whores have been and we enjoyed every second of it and so should you, whether you're reading blogs, checking discogs or chancing on the tunes at used stores and thrift outlets. There's worse things to be doing than scooping old toons and may all the Mid Airs, Samson & Delilahs and Assos fall into your sweaty mits like manna from heaven. Plus you'll have the joy of turning up all the tunes we missed!

Time for some new shit perhaps, or time to shift up a gear to fixate on the records that came out after the boogie, Italo and raw house. And lo and behold there are some dope new records coming out, and though they may tip their hat to the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s so what. The great thing about slavishly hunting down old records is that their ideas and the joy you feel at scooping them can be projected into making new music yourself.

If you haven’t checked the Control EP by Ecce, which I wrote about on Sunday, please do so. The more I listen to both the original and the Justus Köhncke remix, the more excited I get about this kick ass record. The same can be said of the forthcoming Sideshow record, which will be dropping in January 2009 on the impressive British label Aus Music. A full length will follow in February, and this, first, single is a wicked piece of work. It features remixes from both Chateau Flight and Appleblim & Komonazmuk, with the digital release giving you two more mixes than the wax; a dub of the original mix and an Appleblim & Komonazmuk dub.

What more can I say about this frigging fantastic record? Well the Chateau Flight dub is outstanding, it’s a minimal techno thing that isn’t boring (a rare thing indeed), is very dubby and rather dancey. Also Paul St. Hillaire aka Tikiman — who sang on all those dope Rhythm & Sound and Round records — sings on this here record, I thought I’d leave the best to last. The A & K mixes are no miss either, fast, dubby and uplifting, they’ll sound good pitched back a tad too. Keep an eye out for this, it’s definitely a keeper.

Orr

The Rapture come correct with a kick ass mix!

2008-11-17T13:17:00.001-08:00

I’m always on the look out for a good mix cd, and to be honest they don’t come around too often. Howeverz, !K7 have just dropped a doozy in the shape of The Rapture’s Tapes mix. OK, it’s been out for a minute, well since the end of October — that explanation is for people who regard a record old if it has been out for more than four months. I think a record is old if it’s been out for more than four decades. It’s obvious that The Rapture feel the same way as the playlist touches on a number of decades, and a number of genres…thank god!

There’s a lot to be said for the non-generic mix, but a lot can be condensed down into one tried and tested truism, variety is the spice of life. It works for food, and so “If music be the food of love, play on,” to quote the great scribe. As I keep saying, generic stuff bores the knickers off me: house all night — unless it’s played by the likes of Tony Humphries —is tiring, minimal techno mind numbing and so on. And a surplus of generic retro leaves me similarly fatigued, be it boogie, disco or Italo.

Dance music is a continuum, and Djs like Humphries, Levan and Hardy knew that in the mid ‘70s. Now we have three more decades of it to cherish, program and rock. On The Rapture’s Tapes mix this passion for dance music down the ages is displayed in spades, with tracks from the ‘70s sharing space with tunes that dropped a month ago. Plus dance is viewed in a broad sense, in that genres like hip-hop and Go Go make an appearance too, showing that the essence of this mix is completely in tune with the spirit of eclecticism that gave rise to music forms like house, techno and hip-hop.

The current uber-penchant for pigeon holing yet still referring to the music as underground has to be taken with a pinch of salt. Pigeon holing, in reality, is deference to corporate label niche marketing and that is at once irritating and treacherous to the underground. Wanna keep the underground alive? Mix it up. Scoop this CD a listen to how it’s done properly. That a rock band should be showing the dj community the correct use of dance music is definitely food for thought… and deed, indeed. It’s a kick ass mix and will hopefully inspire a new wave of djs to drop the top 40 mash up shit, and mash up the club classics of the past and the present. So come and join the future!

Orr

Ecce - Control EP

2008-11-16T13:07:00.001-08:00

Sorry for the delay in posting some new material. I’ll admit it, I’ve had a block and so I spent the time compiling a humungoid mailing list from the seven years of emails that I have saved. I’ve only gotten as far as the ‘Js’ so there’s a lot more to do. However, what’s the point in having a mailing list for yer blog when there’s nothing new written? So true!

To that end let me tell ya about a new rekkid that crossed my path. It’s called the Control EP by an artist named Ecce. It’s on a label called August Day Recordings, which is a sister label of Tirk, a UK label that has given some some gorgeousful music in the past and evidently continues to do so. Ecce is a pseudonym used by Nicholas Lisher, whose music was discovered by ex-Cure keyboardist Roger O'Donnell. O’Donnell released a couple of Lisher’s tunes on his “Nothing Concrete” 99x/10 label sampler.

Lisher has been producing more material, and his music is a subtle fusion of shoegaze rock, krautrock and electronics. This new EP, out on November 24th is just that and more. Plus German minimal star Justus Köhncke provides a kicky and melodic mix of the title track. The other three tracks are lush, layered with crisp and ever so English vocals. Great stuff actually, and lyrically engaging. Can’t wait for a full length!

Orr

Spirit Catcher at Mighty this Friday, November 14th.

2008-11-11T15:37:00.000-08:00

The more I listen to these Belgian electro types the more I like 'em, and their performances — of which there are quite a few on youtube — seem really passionate. I'm looking forward to throwing down some tunes with these guys. Once again more quality entertainment from Mighty, arguably the best club in San Fran thus far!

Orr

Pavement - Brighten The Corners Reissued/Remastered

2008-11-10T14:19:00.000-08:00

When I’ve spent a week up to my nadulettes in dance music and dance records and thoughts about dance records etc. etc. etc., what I want to do is settle down with a nice rock record and then try to formulate some coherent thoughts about it. Incoherent thoughts can work too, but hopefully my disjointed brainwork will somehow appear in an organized fashion. It’s all I can hope for.

I also hope for promo rekkids, and today I got a nice one. On December 9th Matador Records will release a remastered and amended version of indie rock heroes Pavement’s classic 1997 album, Brighten The Corners. The two disc set is called Brighten The Corners: Nicene Creedence Ed. and it contains the original album in a remastered form plus out takes of the original recording sessions, Peel Session material, KCRW sessions, single b sides, unreleased tracks, songs from various compilations and tribute collections and cover versions of The Fall, Faust and Echo and the Bunnymen toons

Altogether it is a faboolas paskage and I will be listening to it until the cows, ducks, hens and a small number of disenchanted ponies come home. Keep ears and eyes peeled fo it. Also keep an ear and eye peeled for a new solo LP on Stones Throw from Omar Rodriguez Lopez of The Mars Volta. There will be more on that later.

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 4

2008-11-09T12:08:00.000-08:00

The New York producers took the deep, abstract, Chicago vibe, melded it with the garage classics of their beloved hometown djs and created a utopian robot disco that sprung forth from imprints like Strictly Rhythm, Nu Groove, E-Legal, Nervous, Quark and Bottom Line Records, amongst many, many others. A new era awaited, a new era awaits, and obviously some of the new players have done their homework. Let’s wait and see what comes, if the spirit and optimism of 89/90 is recreated and advanced. And don't laugh at the youtube movie at the top, this was one of the raw, early '90s tracks that really defined the sound and pointed it in the direction that house/garage took, from the sparse MAW dubs that followed to Pierre's Wild Pitch sound and the stripped down and bassy vibe of Kerri Chandler's tracks. If you're tripping on Italo and boogie, you're in no position to laugh believe me, even if you are getting messages from the stars. Ha ha!

And I know what you’re thinking, how can I be doubtful about the retro fixation around boogie yet champion the retro sounds of the early ‘90s? Well, the early ‘90s were a watershed for club music. All the innovation that had been going on since the mid-70s, through the ‘80s with the post-disco and electro –funk/modern soul/boogie sounds and out into the raw sounds of Chicago house and the robo-funk of Detroit techno somehow seemed to come to fruition in the slick sounds emanating from house producers in NY, NJ, and Miami (let’s not forget about Murk).

Another aspect of the ‘90s that separates it from the ‘80s and its raw, analog dance music was that the Europeans jumped wholesale on house and techno. The British really excelled, and the Italians, well the Italians kind of invented house music and so their take on it was as forward looking, inspirational, under publicized, and as hard to find as its Italo disco predecessor. In fact the Italian producers just kept going, and the shift from Italo disco to Italo house was almost seamless like one of Alex Neri’s or Andrea Gemolotto’s transitions on the decks. Smooth was not the word for the early ‘90s, — the late ‘90s yes — slick was the word. Watch it all roll around again!

Orr

Arturo Capone's New EP On Bear Funk

2008-11-07T11:49:00.000-08:00

Amid all the reminiscing there is still time for some new tunes across a whole range of styles. Those gorgeousful types over at Bear Funk in the UK sent me this little doozy a coupla days ago and I have to admit it’s a keeper. This three track EP is a is a sampler for Italian producer Arturo Capone’s forthcoming album, Miocuore, and is firmly in the neo-Balearic — that’s a new sub-genre I just invented ‘cos we really need another one, no doubt — Cosmic disco ballpark. “Curcuma” and Max Essa’s mix of “Waves” really do it for me and will be receiving repeated spins. It drops on Monday the 10th of November so rush out and scoop it himmediately. Hokay?

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 3

2008-11-07T11:25:00.000-08:00

Months went by and the Virgo LP didn’t show up in my local vinyl emporiums. I was living in Galway on the west coast of Ireland and though some good US, UK and Italian imports would come through, the Virgo Four album didn’t materialize and I wasn’t flush enough with cash to do mail order from the UK. I figured if I waited it out, it would show up, being the tightwad Scotsman men that I am. The Techno 1 album I’d heard from my buddy Damian who made a timely trip to London in late summer of 89 and came back with some gems, including Model 500’s Interfearance EP on Metroplex. I liked Techno 1 a lot and I needed one for myself. Now I have a few, que shouts of "Sad bastard." Thank you!

Then one day months later — probably a wet, cold Saturday evening in January or February of 1990 while scurrying around Derry, Northern Ireland during a trip back home to the north — I stepped into Woolworth’s and while looking through their vinyl section and its sale items I found a mint Virgo Four LP for one pound sterling. Nice! I was delighted, and I still am. This is a great record, it continues with the cerebral house music that Larry Heard blueprinted with Mr. Fingers and the Amnesia album.

While the phrase deep house has been misappropriated and misunderstood — mostly by showboating new jacks who near sightedly associate all house with yuppies and jazziness — the Virgo Four and Amnesia records are the true essence of deep house, as is Baby Ford’s first LP. The sounds are still electronic and abstract however, the rough, yet endearing, corners of the early jack trax have been smoothed off, leaving a machine music that is at once robotic and utopian. This is the music that would lay the foundation for the visionary dance music that was beginning to come out of New York and New Jersey, garage as it was known. That music form fused the lush creations of the Chicago innovators with the canon of club classics that had been played by Tee Scott, Larry Levan and Bruce Forest.

To be continued

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 2

2008-11-06T09:15:00.000-08:00

It seems that we are indeed on the cusp of a new era, but will that mean a new era of music also? There are definitely rumblings in the underground — an underground that can’t stay underground for too long these days — Balearic signals, promises of future party euphoria, and perhaps a move away from the raucous irony that has befallen us, and the bling that won’t stop.

If a wave of the type of music on the record pictured above fell on us I wouldn’t be complaining at all. Virgo Four’s album from 1989 is essentially a UK compilation of two separate EPs on the infamous Trax Records label out of Chicago. One of the EPs is credited to Virgo Four, the other to M.E., but both are by Eric Lewis and Merwyn Sanders, who moonlighted as Ace & The Sandman. Virgo Four was often confused with the Chicago project that featured Adonis, Marshall Jefferson and Vince Lawrence, and which gave us the magic EP that featured the stellar, abstract house/boogie creation "R U Hot Enough." Wrongly naming the Virgo Four album Virgo by Virgo didn't help matters either.

I read a review of this record in the fall of 1989 in an electronic keyboard magazine that also featured an interview with Derrick May and a review of the Techno 1 compilation on KMS. I was intrigued by the description of the music and also by the fact that the reviewer used the word 'electronica' to describe tracks on the Virgo Four record and Techno 1 as well, R-Tyme’s “Illusion” in particular. Electronica wasn’t a word that was in general use in 1989, 1999 maybe but not ten years prior, and even if wikipedia says it wasn't used until the early 90s in the US, it is incorrect because it is used in that review in a British magazine from 1989 and I'll wager the term was floating around in the pre house/non-dance electronic music scene from the '70s onwards.

It’s use in this article was in relation to the fact that both records featured tracks that had a dreamy mood, an ambience much like that of the heady German music of the mid to late ‘70s. To me this is the real meaning of electronica, not the bastardized version of the word that popped up in post rave America as the perfect tool to sell dodgy compilations to dotcom yuppies. Ashra, Cluster and Kraftwerk; this was the electronica that the review referred to and to place the lusher and more abstract Detroit techno and Chicago house tracks in that realm was interesting to me at the time — though everyone around me was too busy having a good time to indulge my earnest chinstrokery, and a typical reaction to any poignant thoughts by me on the subject was a salty, Irish wave of "shut up Orr, quit the pontificating and put on another record, ya bollix." Nice, huh?

To be continued

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 1

2008-11-05T12:12:00.000-08:00

Maybe it’s just me, maybe it’s some kind of collective end of decade psychosis or it might just be all the economic panic that’s been happening of late, but I’m a bit out of sorts. I’ve been shaken from my work-a-day routine and pushed in the direction of some unknown future. I’ve been through some unknown futures before and faced them bravely, but perhaps I was younger then and not as bedeviled by self-doubt. I admire those who are rarely plagued by this frame of mind, but when those who show no self-doubt hit some snag or encounter some disaster I rarely want to be around for the ensuing egoist melt down. It’s just not my bag!

I’m also encountering other things that are not my bag as the decade — thankfully — fades out. One of these things is the slavish adherence to retro music styles, especially within the realm of dance music. I’ve done my fair share of frantic digging, believe you me, but the current uber fixation on disco, Italo, and in particular boogie, seems not only a little late but also a reflection of a past time, surprise, surprise!

In 1987 in London there was a similar retro fixation. It was called Rare Groove. It centered around obscure ‘70s 45s and LPs. DJs and collectors would spend silly money on the tunes, and a faithful would show up, often decked out in the then trendy '70s look (often referred to as 'radical chic'), and a lot of posing and semi dancing would ensue. Sound familiar? Even though I am up to my armpits in obscure records I have always viewed dance music as a continuum, from which you could pull some appropriate classics and mix them with stuff that was newer or brand new.

Focusing on one retro era or genre just seems redundant to me and, like London in the late ‘80s, a harbinger of the shock of the new about to hit, and what a timely day to think about this. In 1987 rare funk and hip-hop ruled the London cool dancefloors and hi energy and Euro-disco ruled clubs in general. In 2008, we have rare groove boogie and we have the high energy sound of electro, in its crunchy, glitchy, ultra white, Ed Banger derived form. In 1987 house music culture swooped down from Manchester, Sheffield, Leeds and Nottingham cleared all the posing, standing about, cocaine yuppie fests and bad music out of the way. And of course there was the London crew of Oakenfold, Holloway, Weatherall and Boys Own whose frequent trips to Ibiza had also shaped the musical outlook of that city's dancefloors.

Who needed to pay three hundred pounds for a funk 45 that was sampled by EPMD when you could buy a new Rhythim is Rhythim 12 inch for six quid? The new is not always good, but a glut of anything is just that, and when you’ve just lived through a decade that has been a re-run of the ‘80s do we need a last hurrah of idolatory for that decade, and for the next one to be a re-run of the ‘90s? Maybe not, but there are some late ‘80s/early ‘90s musical attributes that might be welcome.

To be continued.

Orr

Oíche Shamhna Shona Daoibh

2008-10-31T12:53:00.000-07:00

You wot, come again. All the post title means is Happy Hallowe’en To Everyone, but in Irish Gaelic. Hey, the Celts started all this spooky stuff hella way back in the day, as they say. Hallowe’en is a Christianized version of the ancient Celtic Festival of the Dead and the Celtic New Year, or Samhain in Gaelic, but I won’t bore you with tedious details just check out the links for some more info.

Hallowe’en in San Francisco is a whole other kettle of bananas altogether, or is it? Dressing up, getting down, painting the town red, or a nice shade of pink, preferably with some No On Prop 8 stickers festooned throughout — bigotry ain’t big and it’s not clever. Anyway, Hallowe’en is always a blast in this here town. And although there is an arse load of stuff going on tonight I think I will be pointing myself in the direction of the newly re-opened Paradise Lounge, where the man like TK Disco and Conor of Red Dot have teamed up with Maly and Ryan of Gun Club to bring in UK electro-funk DJ legend Greg Wilson. It should be a blast, the tunes will be exceptional and I will be on the dancefloor.

Wherever you will be, have a happy, happy Hallowe’en folks. We’re living in ever toughening times, so whoop it up tanite, aiight?

Orr

Spirit Catcher in San Francisco, Friday November 14th

2008-10-30T11:25:00.000-07:00

Belgian outfit Spirit Catcher will be playing live at Mighty on Friday, November 14th. The duo is comprised of Jean Vanesse and Thomas Sohet, a pair of synth nuts who imbue their chunky house sound with ample helpings of squelched out electro funk that tips its hat to Earth Wind and Fire and Mr. Flagio. They have recorded material for prolific labels like Silver Network, Freerange, Winding Road, Missive and Moodmusic, and played at clubs and festivals the world over Mighty is the perfect setting for these guys, with its warehouse like feel and sterling reputation for kick ass shows.

I’ll be donning my dj hat and laying out a set that will touch down in Detroit, Ghent, Riccione, Chicago and SF. Come through, it’s gonna be a rocker, no two ways about it.

Orr

Shoegazer Disco

2008-10-29T09:00:00.000-07:00

Richard Morel, aka Morel, and Pink Noise, is an extremely prolific musician based in Washington DC. He has worked with Deep Dish on many occasions, co-producing, co-writing and singing on tracks from the house music duo’s Junk Science and George Is On albums. He also co-produced and co-wrote songs on Cyndi Lauper’s last album, Bring Ya To The Brink, and has remixed Depeche Mode, New Order and the Killers amongst many others. And if all that wasn’t enough, he promotes, and djs at, the montly Blow Off parties in DC, a collaboration with Bob Mould, of Hüsker Dü and Sugar fame, in whose touring band Morel also plays. Expect Blow Off shindigs around the country soon, including San Frandisco.

His new album, The Death Of The Paperboy, which will be released November 4th on his own Outsider Music label, is a refreshing amalgam of sounds and influences that range from shoe gaze rock (Richard Morel calls the sound of this project ‘shoegazer disco’), to house, electro, indie rock and disco. On top of this, it is a two disc set, with the first disc being more or less straight ahead rock, albeit with the lushness that is a prerequisite of shoe gaze, and some subtle electronic touches.

The second disc opens out into house and electronic vistas, with remixes of tracks from the first disc and extra tracks like “Sweet Thing” and Shoegazer Disco.” The whole package is a surprisingly adventurous, yet listenable and accessible album, which will appeal to people who like Brit pop, shoe gaze, alternative rock, house music and downtempo gear. As this decade wears on, or out, it is obvious that there are more ways than one to skin the cat of dance/rock fusion. Here’s another very worthy addition to the canon.

Orr

Feel This: Deerhunter - Microcastle

2008-10-29T00:03:00.000-07:00

Highly recommended! Bigger and brighter things are on the way for these BS favorites who are continuing to push the beautiful--noisy axis to it's ends. Pre-order here! Released early December.

Dick Around!

2008-10-28T16:10:00.000-07:00

"All I do now is dick around, All I do now is dick around, dick around" - these are words from the profound and mighty Sparks. This song taken from their 20th album, "Hello Young Lovers."

Please take some time to "Dick Around" with Sparks, one of our favorite things at Bananaspam headquarters. Happy recession Tuesday!

Bend an ear to The Morning Benders!

2008-10-22T14:54:00.000-07:00

If you haven’t heard Talking Through Tin Cans, the last album by the East Bay’s finest, The Morning Benders, then you need to grab it asap. It’s on the Plus One Music label, was released in May and contains a coupla two or three kicky tunes, including the notoriously infectious opener “Damnit Anna.” Also the Oakland/Berkeley, Caleeforniaaaay four piece have an i-tunes session coming on the 11th of November and they are playing their final show of the year at Rickshaw Stop on December 5th.

And go here for some rather inspired cover versions that these young men have crafted. The set is called the Bedroom Covers and they’re not half bad or fully shabby at all. You have been warned, aiight?

Orr

New School of Seven Bells Album On The Way!

2008-10-20T13:52:00.000-07:00

School of Seven Bells, the new band comprised of former Secret Machines member Benjamin Curtis, and sisters Alejandra and Claudia Deheza once of On!Air!Library!, has a new album dropping next Tuesday, the 28th of October. It’s called Alpinisms and it will be released on the fine and very awesome Ghostly International label.

Orr

James Lavelle at Mighty Tonight!!

2008-10-17T10:59:00.000-07:00

Mo Wax founder, trip hop innovator and legendary dj James Lavelle graces the decks at SF’s best club, Mighty, tonight. Lavelle is known for his role in UNKLE, bringing DJ Shadow to the world’s attention and for playing banging ass, eclectic sets that get crowds hyped and the parties rocking.

Should be a fucking good one!!!

Orr

New Unabombers/Electric Chair Mix Out On Tirk.

2008-10-17T10:16:00.001-07:00

The UK label, Tirk has just released a banging mix by Manchester’s Unabombers, the resident djs at the infamous, but sadly defunct Electric Chair party. The CD is called Electric Chair Saved My Life and it celebrates the club’s thirteen year run from 1995 til January of this year and includes some of the biggest tunes played by the Unabomber djs, Luke Cowdrey and Justin Crawford. The boys plough through eighteen of the tracks that defined the Electric Chair’s long history. These include, “Beau Mot Plage” by Isolée. “Let’s Be Young’ by Quentin Harris and NY Gospel/dance classic “Stand On The Word,” by Joubert Singers.

Cowdrey and Crawford deftly mix the electric with the soulful and bring you through the emotional changes that any good mix should manifest. The inclusion of classics like “I Need You Now,” by Sinnamon, “Gabrielle,” by Roy Davis Jr. Feat Peven Everett and Daniel Wang’s Sleeque sampling “Like A Dream I Can’t Stop Dreaming” will delight the trainspotters and groovers alike. Unfortunately, Electric Chair banger and boogie monster “Heat You Up (Melt You Down)” by Shirley Lites isn’t included.

Back in 2000 when this classic was reissued by Paradise Garage founder Mel Cheren’s Westend Records label, my recent magazine write up on the track was chosen for the sleeve sticker by kick ass label manager turned kick ass publicist, Andy Reynolds. In it I gave the Unabombers big love for being champions of this song, the first record I ever bought on American soil, in Vinylmania on Carmine Street, NY in ’95.

But they do close their set with the Frankie Knuckles dub of Rufus and Chaka Khan’s “Ain’t Nobody,” another fave that I’ve been firing on mix tapes since the mid ‘90s. Electric Chair Saved My Life dropped on October 6th so go get it, it’s great.

Orr

Robin Thicke, disco, soul, electro funk and painting the White House black

2008-10-15T11:23:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I wondered what had happened to R&B? When I say R&B I mean commercial or commercial leaning modern soul music, it’s top 40, you can dance to or chill to it. It kinda got caught up in the materialist cluster fuck that this decade became. Whereas some artists found their soul in the cell, R&B as a whole has lost its soul in the sell, a hard sell at that. But I just had a quick listen through Robin Thicke’s new album, Something Else and it does hold some promise and maybe indicates where R&B could go next…back to the 70s to trawl for ideas and inspiration.

I’ve a feeling that the next, post-Bush, era will be harking back to the ‘90s and by default to the ‘70s because the ‘90s were another disco era — remember early ‘90s house, De La Soul, Brand New Heavies and Deee Lite. Just as Aaliyah’s “Try Again” was an indication that Timbaland was aware of the burgeoning electro/new wave revival in 2000, Thicke’s album is a shot across the prow of this era, telling us that the next will be less about some of the noisy, empty and glitchy nonsense that exemplified this era’s music (not that this era didn’t have some jams too).

Bust out your Barry White, but remember the spectre of Kraftwerk looms, bringing in a soft machine music to ease the bumpy ride of the end of this bust, broke and bruised decade. We do like some soul in the machine don’t we? It’s the spirit of electro funk (boogie), Chicago, NY and New Jersey house/garage, when the beats and the vocals were on, and when you’d pick up that Ice Cube joint with the phat Evelyn Champane King sample.

So if Three 6 Mafia sample Zombie Nation’s “Kernkraft 400,” T.I. uses Crystal Waters and Mary J Blige can cover Salsoul classics, then what is next, who will — as PM Dawn said back in ’91 — thank Todd Terry? Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock already did it with their “Get On The Dancefloor” smash, will the Neptunes sample Gypsymen’s “Hear The Music?” Robin Thicke’s album is a subtle indication that the next disco era is on the way and if the white house is painted black, George Clinton’s visionary funk will be in there too, the perfect fusion of butt and machine. Whoever stole the soul, can you just hand it back, we need it for a paradigm shift we’re having. Thanks!

Orr

Random musical thoughts of a Tuesday Morning.

2008-10-14T10:14:00.000-07:00

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People often ask me, “Will you please leave me alone,” no seriously, people ask me how I can justify writing about Steve Albini one week and then the next write about top 40 r&b, punk one day and disco the next. Simple answer, step into your kitchen and take a common or garden spoon and a pot. Now turn the pot over with the bottom facing up (minds out of the sewer please) hit the bottom of the pot with the spoon. What just happened? A noise. Right, music is all just sounds and noise. There you go, now put the pot on the cooker and give me a call when dinner’s ready and I’ll be over with a cheeky bottle of wine. Ho ho, hyuh, hyuh, chortle.

“But It’s not as easy as that there buster,” I hear you plaintively say, “because Steve Albini has a certain attitude towards the music industry and you’re betraying that stance by covering goddamn Brandy.” Firstly do not use profane language around Brandy’s name, beg for forgiveness and listen to “The Boy Is Mine” twice, and secondly I am talking about Steve Albini not through him, nor have I really conveyed how he feels about the music industry because I haven’t, as yet. talked about that at all, and Steve Albini would be the best person to do that, not me.

In reality the issue isn’t really music, the issue is an unwillingness to cave to niche marketing and internalize it as a sense of taste and then worship at its golden calf. I like music and a lot of it, a lot of soulful stuff, a lot of noisy angry stuff, a lot of bleepity, bloopity stuff that’s fun to dance to, and a lot more. It might be Gina X at 1:00PM but by 4;30 it might be The Whatnauts and by 8:00PM Dinosaur Jr. and then I’ll go to a club at 9:00PM to dj top 40 rap and R&B and some classic jams for four hours, and then come home at 3;00AM and listen to Dexter Wansel on my mp3 playing device that I shall not use the brand name of.

Am I writing about this because I think I’m special, nope, I’m writing because I know I’m not and because I’m bored senseless and listening to Dee Dee Bridgewater to give me some motivation to go out, and anyway you’ve read it, haven’t ya? And please do keep reading.

Orr