my name is Con and these are my Picks

Bike Love

2012-01-16T21:39:00.003-06:00

Good ole Christopher put this up for me a while back and I haven't had a chance to share. Christopher is the kind of fellow that always has solid gatherings and because of his positive radiance, he has a smorgasbord of contacts that are willing to do anything for him but he doesn't really need anything other than enjoying people interact. That and he really likes minimal house and most things DFA. Hence:

Holy Ghost! - I Wanted To Tell Her (feat: Nancy Whang & Juan Maclean)

Those Holy Ghost! chaps got a lot of help on this one to really make it kick. Not only did they get DFA's king and queen on the track and the video, they also covered Ministry to get it all done with a pinch of nu-disco.

Ministry - I Wanted To Tell Her

What's more, to make apply a holy trinity of musical divination on the track, the video itself is a cover of none other than Rad, the righteous over-the-top movie from 1986 about falling in love, being the town hero, standing up to evil corporations, all via BMX tricks. And Lori Laughlin is a total hardbody.

Real Life - Send Me an Angel

And just because I love them so much, and I think that the frontman of Real Life sounds a lot like Klaus Meine of The Scorpions, you need to hear this song too. (This is where the covers end, unfortunately.)

Midnight Club For Mike

2012-01-15T12:46:00.005-06:00

Mike, listen to a group that takes every bit of the Valerie Collective's pre- and post-Drive fame: Midnight Club. Imagine gentle synth hands with shimmering cherry-polished fingernails glossing over your earlobe. She's telling you a story and you can feel the puffs of breath on your neck, but you need to step out to pick up a couple more Vangelis tapes for the deck. You get out to go; she gets out to stay. You turn around and see:

cred: TNUC

They are off of On The Fruit records (which has excellent pieces like this and this) and they are every bit of the aural bits you want them to be whenever you and your dame's moods point to a T-top cruise in between Medusa's on the way to the Warehouse.

Midnight Club - The Machine
Midnight Club - Escape Time
Midnight Club - Hot Space

Cred to Tracasseur for pointing me in the right direction on this one.

New PNAU Now Plus Spank Rock

2012-01-05T21:52:00.002-06:00

Yes, 'now' really was back in July, but since I haven't been paying attention to one of my favorite artists lately, they slipped right past the lighthouse. These guys are always a hoot and this album is full of happiness. 'Unite Us' is somewhere between doing cartwheels on the 4th of July at night and exchanging smiles with your best friend at a wedding. It should be no surprise that 'Unite Us' could feel a little like 'Come Together', and since I'm smitten by the smiles I really don't care as I'm sailing in these fellows' positive breezes. 'Everyone' reminds me a little of the Presets, vocally, but is distinctly PNAU with the waves of cymbals, octavonal synths, and never in a minor key. I'm trying right now not to beam too much, but it's a real trick especially after just watching Love Actually (my #2 uplifting movie next to High Fidelity).

PNAU - Unite Us (Kris Menace Remix)

Part Deux: Spank Rock has a new album
Not only was I sleeping for PNAU, I did the same for Spank Rock who apparently was hiding over in Deutschland with Boys Noize, not only working on an album, but signing up with them. Same old quality dirt. Yes.

By the way, the director of the video, Allen Cordell, loves the ridiculously / disgustingly / disturbingly / visually awesome (I think the hot pink, telekinetic Telly knockoff vid is my fav).

Oktober

2011-09-30T22:17:00.003-05:00

The other day I was in my car driving around and I experienced a "song in your head" moment with Mein Vater war ein Wandersman (Der fröhliche Wanderer) from German class circa 1998. It was part of our compulsory repertoire, however hearing more of them piqued all of our desires (like Himmel und Erde) to sing them more. After getting that in my head I was craving going to a German beerhall and swinging steins.

In the same vein while drinking one of the best oktoberfest beers during September is:

Beirut - A Sunday Smile

This is a great waltz, and waltzes make for great tunes while holding a litre and rocking back and forth while staying on your feet because the entire bar is swaying like kelp in a constantly changing tide.

Do you have any pub songs? I'm looking forward to having a pile of mates pinting away.

Pitchfork Day 1

2011-07-11T22:07:00.006-05:00

I think it's interesting that rather than going to both P4k and Lolla, I'm only choosing to go to Pitchfork this 2011. Primarily the reason is that I believe Lolla is too focused on the 18-25yo crowd, which I'm not a part of anymore. Am I a grown-up? Not by any means other than by age and responsibility, but I do see a shift in how P4k operates this year, especially with respect to their brand image of the festival.

For instance, looking at who is playing where and when, they don't show a timetable (I have one below) but rather merely organize it chronologically and visually, teetering on paragraph form. It's annoying if you're trying to set up the logistics of where to be and when, but if the setup were designed with a purpose (and why wouldn't it) then the focus is that they are trying to get you to see a show fully without breaking mid-way to head to the half-way finished show on the other side of Union Park. I think that's more sophisticated because you are there with intent, not to live the festival to excess.

Also, the new icon/logo for the festival is decidedly muted: not colored, not in your face, not even prominent. It's meant to be humble and that gives the fest greater credibility because it's not the advertising that's drawing you there (I'm not saying they didn't do that) but the quality of the curating. I like it. Speaking of, just look at the names of the stages.

Who are you anticipating?

Gatekeeper
They have figured out how to do the subdued banger but without actually being a banger or being over-the-top with typical distortion. The early 90's synth patch flavor reminds me of Alexander Robotnick's Shout borrowing the same. On the other hand of excellence, I get the same impression that I got from Daft Punk's Tron soundtrack in that every track stands up very well on it's own, but as an album I can't say that I would listen to Giza all the way through unless I'm on my way to some neon dungeon. Hey, what are you doing tonight?
Track to hear: 'Chains'
Verdict? 20ft back, all in black.

EMA
Judging by her glam photo with confident name on a chain, I wasn't expecting the somber, serene sounds she sirens, but I'm glad. Sometimes like a singer-songwriter, sometime like the XX, and sometimes like a passivated Go Team, it would be well-good to stop by and sit down. By the way, check this out.
Track to hear: 'Breakfast'
Verdict? Lying the the grass, problems take a pass.

Tune-Yards
Merrill Garbus has got lots of concepts. LOTS. Intermittent lounge singing, Wizard of Oz choruses, drum machine-drummer duet, distorted vocal sirens... all really cool, but in the end I feel like I'm eating food at someone's house that measures their culinary abilities by the number of ingredients they can add to a dish. If I listen to an album like WHOKILL over and over, I think the desire for instant gratification subsides and I may find and pick out the intricacies of the tunes. My girlfriend will have to press play though.
Track to hear: 'My Country'
Verdict? Passing through to get a brew.

Battles
These guys fit the exact archetype for a street music fest: bubbly, slightly weird for the olds, and like a parking meter, intended to make you leave. Sorry guys, not a fan. However, I would love to see if they do the live collab with Gary Numan on 'My Machines' so I can throw a rose at him.
Track to hear: ....
Verdict? Which end, is the opposite end.

Curren$y
Hearing hip-hop at Pitchfork is always a refresher for me as I hardly get enough of it. Curren$y takes care of my fix. You know what's perfect? The subtlety of the instrumentals, the lack of auto-tune, and basically the lack of gimmicks both in effects and lyrics. Like a primer-only coupe deville, this guy flows well without the flash and has it where it counts.
Track to hear: 'Breakfast'
Verdict? Listening within the masses, listen later after classes

Did I mention I like primer hoopties?

Thurston Moore
Almost immediately after pressing play, I got the desire to take a summer siesta after hearing him through mog. It's perfect. I woke up at 5am to take my pop to an epic bike trip today for the weekend and I'm beat. The delightfully plucked guitar paired with the swooning violas remind me of a high fidelity, sunday morning kurt vile without microphone pedals. I probably won't make it through his set standing up.
Track to hear: 'Benediction'
Verdict? Let the sun bake me, let the next band wake me.

James Blake
While glitch-minimalism may work for some, his CMYK EP doesn't really get it done, nor does Klavierwerke. Eh, I'm just not a fan of the style. If you love the odd / experimental / electronic sounds of samplers, this guy is for you.
Track to hear: ....
Verdict? Neko Case is the place.

Speaking of, what about the headliners? Guided by Voices, Neko Case, and certainly Animal Collective are all like gorgeous women: they are not in need of any more fanfare. So I'll be seeing them all.

Oh btw, some extra events are here.
And if you want to hear a medley of folk yourself: eMusic has a free sampler.

Saturday Night Live, ain't no jive

2011-07-02T00:27:00.006-05:00

Cred

I've been on the prowl to collect a mess of WBMX tapes and let them ride in the Accord. Deephousepage is a great resource and I'm a total new noob when it comes to 80's house. (I'm totally mining that decade for all it's worth.) I try and get this guy from work to come out to Neo all the time, but he says he's past his prime and besides he was Mr. Industrial. As he explains it to me "it took me a while to figure out that no girls liked Nitzer Ebb."

Farley Jackmaster Funk & Julian Jumpin Perez - WBMX Mix 1987

Naturally, I can't find these jams anywhere, because it's either the live mix or it's some rare mix that I can't find. Partial tracklist nonetheless:
Double Exposure - My love is free
Carl Bean - I was born this way (Better Days Mix) (vid)
Luthor Vandross - The Glow of Love
Fatback - Backstroke (vid)
Take That - Relight My Fire (vid)

And I just got this one (skip to 2min at least)
Bad Boy Bill on BMX in 88

For grins,

Search for all the mixes from that era.
Ah merde! And tonight was the night to go to Neo! 1st Friday's of every month is house music house music.

Vexed Pulp

2011-06-19T18:35:00.005-05:00

The primary motivation of me even listening to these guys is the return of Larry to Chicago for my bday:

I'm normally not a Britpop listener, but for a solid 2 weeks I've had these guys on repeat in my car and felt compelled to share. The tracks hark back to the days of Lipgloss in Denver for me, especially 'Disco 2000' where it begs to drink $2 gin/tonics while jumping up and down in everything Buffalo Exchange. Even further back, 'Underwear' was my exact feeling in high school at my crush sophomore year while she was dating this really cool fuck-up:

I couldn't stop it now. There's no way to get out.
He's standing far too near. How the hell did you get here.
Semi-naked in somebody else's room.
I'd give my whole life to see it.
Just you stood there only in your underwear.

Like my own from the same era:

Stop it Conrad
Stop looking at my legs
'Cause if I catch you
You'll be walking on pegs

Pulp - Common People
Pulp - Disco 2000
Pulp - Underwear

Different Class totally characterizes all the babe angst I've had throughout the years. Maybe I should have been writing music about all my failings so I could fall into the stereotype of musician-has-following. Every DJ gig I had included a fangirl or two with the same foolish output: "beat it, I'm working here." I now understand why parents give their kids advice... I just need to figure out a better marketing method than normally employed by the olds. You should have figured out by now that naturally I know nothing about Pulp... except for them handing me an old summer preview TV Guide with Season 2 of Voyager and the ghosts of girls past, my hands never held their ass.

The Yellow Happy Triangle

2011-05-06T01:11:00.004-05:00

I've seen YACHT before. I've heard YACHT before. The more I read about and experience YACHT, the more I want to read about and experience YACHT.

I'm standing at the head of the crowd at the feet of the lead guitarist; he's well put-together with his slick grey shirt, plain grey pants, no belt and haircut that reminds me of a young David Byrne. Claire Evans peels off layers of a white suit jacket, to a white thigh-length skirt, to just a wifebeater and white spandex shorts. It perfectly compliments the angelic perception I have of her enlightened soul.

Most times I go to a show and perceive the band's stage visuals while sipping my greyhound and being crowded in with the occasional patchouli fellow or sweet-scented female. This time, my divine essence is tickled. Truly the experience of hearing Yacht both in melody and in conversation conveys an embodiment of balancing subdued, Gaian worship with exercising group party yoga to advance human consciousness. At the show, Claire told me where their spiritual center is and now Marfa is my Mecca.

Which brings me to YACHT as a brand: human love and the pure, positive human experience. I can't think another appropriate word for it as the concept of a brand is fabricated, but YACHT's entire artistic vision is more of a discovery that they want to share in a focused manner with their audience. You could liken it to a religion but there is nothing overt or pressing about their message. Excerpt from their pamphlet "The Secret Teachings of the Mystery Lights" that I picked up from Jona Bechtolt himself:

Thankfully, the Universe need not be worshipped. The Universe is not self-conscious, not self-organized. It is merely an awesome extension of the space which we inhabit. We are part of its makeup as stars and planets are part of its makeup; if the Universe is infinite, then size becomes subjective. We are as relevant a part of it as anything else.

It may be difficult for you to picture yourself as an actual part of the Universe, to see your physical body as a visible nature through which the structure of countless waves of evolving life are unfolding their latent potentialities. But it is the case. Just as every cell in your body is an infinitesimal part of the system that is you, so you are an infinitesimal part of the system that is the Universe. And as we are part of all things, so we are capable of knowing all things.

Off their 7"...
YACHT - Dystopia
YACHT - Utopia

Experience them, travel to Marfa, and perpetuate positivity.

Another 90's post

2011-04-20T18:50:00.005-05:00

I'm not there yet. The 90's are not back yet... not for me. The closest I've seen grunge make a comeback are folks wearing plaid shirts, but the long hair isn't there yet, nor are the Vans, the JNCO jeans, or Daria. What are back are the early 90's, only insofar as an extension of the 80's. Case in point:

Lady Miss Kier

Deee-Lite - Groove Is In the Heart ... and video

Many moon ago at Coachella 2007, I was walking along and heard some real grooves coming out of one of the side dance tents. I'm always a fan of the fag jams, and with the boys' presence on stage, that solidified the atmosphere. It was a big girl, with big hair, and a hot dress pushing up her girls, going all out with her mix. "Damn she's the jam." Who was it? It seriously wasn't until a couple of days ago when I became reacquainted with Deee-lite when I heard that Lady Miss Kier was DJ'ing at Berlin this Sunday (seriously, a gay club on Easter Sunday and a school night?) and hence this post. Now I can't get enough of her.

Reading about her influence on the NYC dance scene in the early 90's and the fact that she was already heavily a club fashionista makes me even more drawn to her. Her relations with Grace Jones and Bootsy Collins make my social libido percolate and her rampant self-canvasing makes me want to be my future-daughter's tailor. Now that she's coming (back) to Chicago, I can only imagine what she's got in store for the current scene... and what she's wearing.

Oh by the way, I hope she wears her hair up.

WLUW Hints Part 1

2011-04-16T17:38:00.001-05:00

Living under a rock does have it its advantages...

1) You get more time to yourself
2) Nobody will judge that 6" beard after you keep telling yourself you'll get around to it
3) You can appreciate Lady Gaga two years later after The Fame since you just got it

Trends have flown past tending not to knock on their way through town. Fortunately, your radio that interprets frequency modulated air waves have given you a cracked-open window view of the music world. Enter WLUW, Loyola University's radio station. It's rare to hear the same song twice during any given month of listenership, so the opportunities to write down picks is on par with a grizzly bear catching horny salmon.

Enter White Mystery.

This is the kind of band that I want to see in my brother's basement, the Ice Factory, or the Mopery. (Oops, those are all gone.) Gruff, sweaty, and on Whistler Records, this pair are like a garage band for your next beach party: gleefully serrated. Alex White's sweet voice balances out the over-the-top drums of her brother Francis and is a perfect complement to her bad axe (do people still call it that? and bad = good, duh). Try their single on for size:

White Mystery - Powerglove

See them at Pancho's on April 20th or at the Abbey on May 7th.

So Much

2011-04-09T23:56:00.003-05:00

There is a small barrage of random events that are going on. For one, I just experienced Baconfest for the second time. From 12 vendors to 60 influential Chicago restaurants, this thing has grown like crazy. Bacon bloody mary's (bacon encrusted rim, bacon vodka, strip of bacon), chocolate bacon topped smoke-flavored ice cream with salted caramel at the bottom tip of the waffle cone, and souvee'd pork-belly over polenta with blue cheese sauce are some of the items that caused me to buckle over after about 30min (pace yourself!). Oh and this isn't just Chicago apparently, it's nationwide per google. I had a hummus/sprout sandwich for dinner.

Next a recent find via Lincoln Hall is their Chicago Rock Stars tour where they go visit various musically important sites with respect to Chicago between 1980 and ~2000. Wilco, the Smashing Pumpkins, Ministry, and Liz Phair. Amongst the Untouchables gangster tour, the haunted tour, and architecture tours this is a welcome addition.

Also at Lincoln Hall on 5May, they are going to have Del Rey (local, modern psych-rock) do the instrumentals to Fantastic Planet, a 1972 Cannes-winning animated film allegory of humanity. What I've seen so far of the original has been well done (think Monty Python for animation). You can watch it in all 8 parts starting with...

Finally, this guy popped in firefox via my friend Mike. Thanks.

When is this album going to leak already?

2011-03-19T07:07:00.005-05:00

I went to Buenos Aires my buddy Larry to visit our buddy Timmy, and if we weren't in a parrilla, he was searching for the new Strokes album. The obsession became most evident when I went to check my mail on Tim's computer and all the tabs in firefox were:
"angles leak"
"strokes angles early release"
"strokes angles forum mp3"
"strokes angles advance copy"
He would shuffle around our rental apartment after eating breakfast, then finally leave, exiting with "I'm going to go upstairs and listen to the album"... which was the 30sec snippet version of each track on youtube.

I even played my hand at it and called a couple of people since, after all, I agreed with Tim: how can a major cd release be under wraps for so long? Have the record companies figured it out? Was no human used in the manufacture and storage of these pieces of plastic?

After all that, a couple of tracks did peek out and we would sit around staring at various objects while Maccu Picchu would blast around us. Why is this so important? Simple: We want it to be the new 'Is This It?'. We want to be a stallion in college jumping up and down at a sweaty show in our sunglasses around beautiful friends and future friends... again. For a group whose public image smiles less than Thom Yorke, the Strokes are the reincarnation of the leather jacket, copious hair, converse, and the singular pair of jeans that only get washed once a month. They do everything rock and roll except elect a cab rather than chopper.

As for the album, they've chosen against the muted/distorted vocals that was (thankfully) everywhere in 'Is This It?' and picked the polished sound of First Impressions. (In contrast to Angles, First Impressions sounds a little like a modern day Scorpions but without the ballads.) Angles wins on well-placed subtleties where necessary and muted vigor elsewhere: Macchu Picchu is golden. But right now, listening to "Two Kinds of Happiness", the verses belong in Bright Lights Big City (that's a compliment), but the chorus needs to be turned down a little in favor of the rest of the album.

So til Tuesday, before you go to Twist and Shout or Reckless, you can listen to Angles here on the Strokes site.

from NME

"The best artists are the ones that work the hardest, and if you work hard enough, you'll eventually experience the happy accidents that are art. I learned that from my stepfather." - Julian Casablancas

Picks are hard

2010-08-06T11:25:00.002-05:00

Lollapalooza is here and now and we are full of dilemmas... choosing where to go while at Grant Park is not the issue: we have an explosion of aftershocks around the city. The options on the right side are just the things I think are worth parceling out your precious ears and Etnies to. Let's start with the easy stuff:

Friday
The Ettes - 12:30
...but I'll probably get there at 1pm
Mavis Staples - 2:15 (Ana Sia is 2nd)
Drive By Truckers or My Dear Disco - 3pm
~~Semi-precious weapons~~
Hot Chip - 6pm
Chromeo - 7pm
Tiga - 8:10pm
2manydj's - 8:30pm
Jet to the Metro - 10:30
Cut Copy - 11pm
Soul Party in Chinatown if it's still going on - 2am
Orchard Lounge at Smartbar since it's the only late night thing I've heard of

aaaaand.... let's update this tomorrow. Merde I need to get out of here.

Last day at Pitchfork 2010

2010-07-18T10:56:00.003-05:00

This weekend has been a whirlwind of festival get-togethers (my next door neighbor was standing next to me randomly. I love this fest.) I need to get out of the house to get to Best Coast right now. They really are wonderful. Below is the schedule and my projected path if you want to follow, or tell me about my maybies. Find a fellow and grab a ticket outside the gates for $20 if you can.

Best Coast - The Sun Was High (and so was I)

Pavement 8:30 (a)
Sleigh Bells 7:40 (b)
Big Boi 7:25 (c)
Neon Indian 6:45 (b)
Major Lazer 6:15 (a)
Here We Go Magic 5:45 (b)
St. Vincent 5:15 (c)
Surfer Blood 4:45 (b)
Lightning Bolt 4:15(a)
Local Natives 3:35 (b)
~~Beach House~~ 3:20 (c)
Washed Out 2:50 (b)
~~Girls~~ 2:30 (a)
Best Coast 1:55 (b)
----arrive----
Cass McCombs 1:45 (c)
CAVE 1:00 (b)
Allá 1:00 (a)

Aeprilplane

2010-07-14T18:00:00.006-05:00

Terrible photoshop job

I really should be napping, but this nagging mix really should be reposted. Recently I picked up yet another one of Aeroplane's monthly boss mixes. The one from 3 months ago that they did for Radio 1 is no exception of excellence. It starts out a little slow, which makes the mix a little short, but then again if you are itching for some more pulsating rhythms that means they are doing a good job. Also, the big hullaballoo on this is that they are Radio 1's 500th DJ's to be on their show.

Aeroplane April Mix on Radio 1.
(In case you don't know how to download off of soundcloud, there is a little download button just above the play button. Sometimes it's activated and sometimes it isn't, depending on the artists. Click that button!)

Tracklist:
01. Aeroplane - We Can't Fly 
02. OTP Party Breaks #1 - Lifetime Groove 
03. Radiorama - Vampires ( Remix )
04. Marta Acuna - Dance, Dance, Dance 
05. Lucio Battisti - Ancora Tu 
06. Aphex Twin - Iz-Us
07. Friendfly Fires - Paris ( Aeroplane Remix )
08. Flight Facilities - Crave You 
^^ 7+8 mixed create: Friendly Fires vs Flight Facilities - I Crave Paris (Aeroplane Mix)
09. Human League - Don't You Want Me (Instrumental Edit) 
10. Black Van - Yearning
11. Les Rythmes Digitales - Sometimes 
12. Casco - Cybernetic Love 
13. Fox The Fox - Precious Little Diamond ( Shep Pettibone Remix ) 
14. Patrick Cowley - Right on Target 
15. Goldfrapp - Alive ( Joakim Dub ) 
16. Lime - Unexpected Lovers 
17. Children of the Mission - Tears

I always get a little giddy when I hear good DJ's play tracks that I have, especially if I have them on vinyl. I randomly got the Human League track a while back and it wasn't labelled as such, but it's instantly recognizable. If I rip it (unlikely) or find it online (more likely), I'll update this. Enjoy!

Alternating Current / Direct Current

2010-07-13T22:21:00.001-05:00

Ah blog. Where have you been.

Let's not talk of our brief separation and just work on getting back to having some sort of friendship. Let's go to all the things we find and then tell everyone the story. We're always there together, but I can't have you acting too clingy because that doesn't make me want to write. Let's be relaxed about it so you can be important in my life, but I need to get out there and do different things too. I know I want to write a book, but I know it can't be with you, and you know that too. You love all the same music I do, but dare I say that I need to look at the other blogs? I'm a man afterall. I actually have another blog. I never told you but there it is. It read you one day and it didn't like the fact that I was posting, but that was to be expected; I would imagine you would have the same reaction. Towards the end there I was writing over there more and I realized that I couldn't keep both of you up forever. We had a long stint at Coachella, then Soundset, and I'll see you again at Pitchfork for sure, but I need to write for the other one. I'm sorry it had to be this way. Can we just listen to music like old times?

Speaking of dreaming, even though Cut Copy hasn't made an album in ages.. AGES I say, Dan Whitford (Cut Copy * 1/2) and Joel Dickson (Riot In Belgium) have come together like hydrogen and oxygen to explode into this fluid fantasy for my aural entertainment. How could you not play this at eleven? You can definitely hear the Cut Copy arpeggiation, the signature synths, and catchy chorus. Can't characterize too much of Dickson since I don't know too much about him other than RIB's "The Acid Never Lies" (fantastic) off of Azuli records. Clicky!

Voltage - All Night

Voltage - All Night (Azari & III Remix)

Riot in Belgium - The Acid Never Lies (3PM Rough Rave Version)

Little note behind AC & DC. After the advent of the electric lightbulb, cities were considering switching from their night light fuel from gas in favor of electricity. One region in particular was around Niagra Falls where a hydroelectric plant was beginning to be built. (side note: did you know that because of all the generators in the area, the falls actually used to pump out about 20x more water and were that much more awe-some?) There sprung a debate about how to carry the electricity from source to bulb over the huge distances of demand via cable. On one side was Nikola Tesla (of the Tesla Coil), proponent of the AC system and on the other was Thomas Edison with the DC system. DC was what Edison's lightbulbs used, batteries inherently have DC, no AC motors were around, not to mention all of Edison's patents were using DC. Unfortunately, AC had the super-advantage since transmission costs ($ per mile) for DC were much higher than AC since DC required additional generators ever couple of miles because the power lines would lose current and heat up if you tried to push it further than 2 miles. AC needed a similar station every ~15 miles so building sending electricity in rural areas was much more economical. Niagra was a done deal with AC and Edison ate his hat. More.
I love being a geek.

More music devotion

2010-07-13T12:23:00.001-05:00

I've always wanted to run a tracker for bands like on the side of conspicks for the rest of the country so it's easy to find good shows wherever you are. The flip side of that is me traveling around the country to see people that wouldn't normally come to Chicago / get a different vibe. Coachella has it's scene, Pitchfork & Lollapalooza their's, but after going to them year after year there becomes a twang of familiarity bordering on repetition. That's why I went to Soundset this year since I've never been to an all hip-hop fest, but my true desire is to go to Belgium or Japan for a quality electronic music fest. (I've never wanted to go to WMC in Miami due to massive bro-dom.) Well, I found out the other day that I am a lucky man.

Enter Sonar Music Fest - Chicago.

Based in Barcelona, I've always talked about going there with Larry but it's always been time/cost prohibitive (I already plunk $1k for Coachella and I think he does the same for Lolla). This year's acts in Spain that I wouldn't see anywhere include Air, Roxy Music, DJ Hell, and Booka Shade and I would gladly pay more festival bucks for. As it pertains to my town, they say that they are focused on cultivating the North American and Catalonian (not necessarily Spanish) scenes at the fest. In similar regards they did other versions already in New York and in DC, and are doing another take this year in Tennessee. I'm excited.

I should also honorably mention that North Coast Music Fest is also going to be around in early September. Not purely electronic in nature (it almost seems like they're jumping on the festival bandwagon) but I'll be happy to see Pretty Lights, De La Soul, Moby, Boyz Noise, and Chemical Brothers. Oh my.

As a sidebar, I should mention that Sonar is still looking at various venues to hold their event, including Millennium Park, Congress Theatre, and the Metro. WHY can't they revitalize the Uptown Theatre? I understand that cost to rehab the place is astronomical, but with the presence of something like Sonar or whatever other music fest, I would think that it would be a great place to have a show. Do other cities in the US / the world have as many music gatherings as we do? I'm ignorant to whatever street fests go on in NYC or Paris or London, but I would imagine that with their glut of talent that there would be something to go to. You know what the best way to find out is, right?

UPDATE:
I actually wrote this entry last month. Since then, it looks like Sonar is going to do their spiel at the Cultural Center (the city's old library) on Sept 10-11. Announcement here.

Ante Neo Post Neo

2010-05-18T19:30:00.004-05:00

Nicked from bluewhale

Found on youtube, then led to the website of DM ecstasy, and after massive difficulty (via Rapidshare) and patience, I am pleased to present Dominatrix, aka Andrew Ektom. Man I love the internet.

This guy remixes Depeche Mode songs. But unlike many other remixers, he does it as if it were the second track on the B-side of the single. I feel like he had Martin Gore standing over his shoulder the whole time while he's making this stuff. Needless to say, I'm putting this on before my Saturday night Neo trips.

Depeche Mode - The Things You Said (Kernfusion) <--
Depeche Mode vs. Bronski Beat - Free (Smalltown Boy Mix)
Depeche Mode - Lie To Me (Madtracker Mix)

I'm trying to get more right now by cross-referencing via his youtube (he has 300+ tracks!) to make sure I'm getting exactly what I want. Check it out yourself.

A cut above

2010-05-17T23:59:00.006-05:00

Via Zonders

Thanks to good ole TNUC, I've been reintroduced to that fantastic sound that is Diamond Cut.

Cassette Kids - Lying Around (Diamond Cut Remix)
Datostrom - All I Ever Needed (Diamond Cut Remix)
LexiconDon - Heart Attack (Diamond Cut Remix)
Cinnamon Chasers - I Like Watching You (Diamond Cut Remix)
Evermore - Hey Boys and Girls (Diamond Cut Remix)
M'Black - Heartbreak (Diamond Cut Remix)
Hail Social - No Paradise (Diamond Cut Remix)

Once again, my heartstrings are pulled for the same reasons: that sure-fire distortion synth, the lyrics a la lady, and quality pop structures. It's like they came up with a formula and targeted it for me:

"What would Conrad like? What if we could work on a song with someone like Little Boots singing, but with actual lyrics, and turned it into something hard that Moullinex would be proud of, but just a little smoother so Classixx would approve."
"Yeah, and let's use that sweet bass synth that Futurecop! has in Eyes Like Ocean."
"Dude, this will be so jam."

Futurecop! - Eyes Like Ocean
Moullinex - Breakchops
Yacht - Psychic City (Classixx Remix)

Fingers crossed for a x-atlantic adventure to see them do their thing.

clicky for their soundcloud.

P.S. Repost of this sweet Futurecop! fan vid:

Post Coach

2010-05-12T19:10:00.001-05:00

There is a great debate between my friend Jenny and I: how do you say Coachella? Is it Coh-chella or Coh-ah-chella? Our ears were perking up every time somebody said the place and each time we were racking a score for our respected sides. According to my unbiased buddy Larry, only me and Prince say Coh-ah-chella whereas the rest of the world does it the other way. Obviously Prince is correct...

What is NOT up for debate is what a fantastic time people had. We all saw (in order of aud/visual enticement, yes ranked):

La Roux
This should come as no surprise as who my #1 pick is. After some initial hesitation starting up with Tigerlily, Elly took control and had a blast on stage especially when there was a roar in the crowd of everyone singing the lyrics with her (I lost my voice as a result). I appreciate the fact that Elly doesn't seem to smile to change the mood, but rather to reinforce it.

2manydj's
In a close second is Mr. Dewaele showing up and rondvoll killing it. There isn't much time to set up after Die Antwoord's 20min set, so to get things kicking he plays around with a radio trying to find a proper station while the background the equipment is getting connected. He finds a station he likes and then starts mixing their version of Hey Boy Hey Girl into it, quickly moving to Dominator. Damn it's a jam... especially 5 people away from him.

Fantastic energy notwithstanding, probably the best aspect of the show is the fact that while doing the mix, his brother (I'm assuming) was doing the VJ work by taking the album covers of the remixed tracks and turning them into a Monty Pythonesque Flash animations. After looking for videos, it's not a new concept to them but I had never seen it before so Larry and I were blown away and the sheer simplicity and joking manner in which they were done.

Everybody likes techno music. Not to mention a techno ticket tape parade.

...mini youtube playlist

Gossip
I can't listen to Music for Men all the way through, but individually they hold muster well... and at the show they are amazing. Beth Ditto has amazing presence and an equally amazing voice. She always connects with the audience with he chatty Kathy attitude and what seems to be everyone she meets. Damn she's good. But what really got me piqued is the finale. They already did Standing in the Way of Control, they already did Yr Mangled Heart, Coal to Diamonds, Dimestore Diamond, what could she have up her sleeve? ...how about a Grace Jones cover? Perfection:

Major Lazer
I couldn't believe that I was finally going to be able to see Switch & Diplo do their thing. I missed them in Chicago... twice. I can't imagine a similar show being done at the Metro or Smartbar: people flying off ladders, booties in the air, ...CHINESE DRAGONS! Oh shit. I wish I could experience it from a 15-year-old's perspective. This was a show and a half.

Fever Ray
We had a quick glimpse of Fever Ray. Same setup as at the Metro but it didn't have the same ambience as there were too many people that were already pumped up rather than being in a relaxed w/ pupils wide open state. It was still intense for me with its Nordic soundtrack of wicca approaching on tundra while riding Banthas. I highly recommend going to see their show.

Phoenix
Great show at the Aragon. I took a nap. Great show!

Passion Pit
Ahhh! I had to skip them in order to go to the La Roux signing. I don't care, I'd do anything for Elly. Great show at the Congress!

Gil Scott-Heron
I'm an idiot. I thought Gil Scott-Heron was Jill Scott, which my senior year art teacher would play on repeat while giving my friend attitude. I should have come early and not been so ignorant of the sweet tunes that they played. Billy Glen Turner, the fellow on bongos killed it at the end (when I got there), after the rest of the group got off. Gil's voice is the perfect raspy embodiment of blues: too much singing, too many smoky rooms, and just the right mumble. Even his look is classic: overgrown facial shadow, needing a haircut, worn jacket, and flat cap that comes to his eyes almost like Rudy from Fat Albert. If ever I have the chance to see him at House of Blues in Chicago or hopefully at Kingston Mines, I'm def there.

Hot Chip
After seeing their show at the Aragon the day I came back from LA, they totally got cheated out of an extra hour they needed to do a proper show. Part of the issue at Coachella was that the vibe also wasn't there but if you go to a sold out show, you have 5000+ people going nuts for the one artist while being squashed up in the front jumping up and down (this is turning out to be a theme in my life). Yay!

Mayer Hawthorne
Winner. See him. Once.

the XX
I love the XX, but I just grazed by them this time. They were unfairly scheduled between the Gossip and dinner. Go see them for sure. They opened up for Hot Chip at the Aragon and they blew my mind. Again.

Gorillaz
I always like Gorillaz, but I never delved into learning more about them or hearing the latest album. So if you already know, skip this part. Gorillaz is a collab between the fellow from Blur, Damon Albarn, and the co-creator of Tank Girl, Jamie Hewlett. I didn't know anything about Tank Girl but now the animation style carries over.
The trouble is, I never was a fanatic about Blur, nor do I read comic books so I wasn't instantly captured by them. Knowing the premise now, and the fact that they opened up with Snoop Dogg doing Plastic Beach as well as seeing all the intense animation I'm more interested. I think I'll pick up their DVD's as you'd think this would be the true method to experience these guys, other than the actual show. Larry, Jenny, and I skipped the last half of the show to jet back to LA early and beat everyone else.
For kicks, here is my favorite Blur song, that I found using Soulwax as my source (of course)...

Blur - Song 2

Matt & Kim
Saw them from a distance. Seems like the same show everytime and everytime they play it's awesome. No show would be complete without Matt standing on his chair but still playing the piano at seat-level. They are so intense.

Jónsi
I listened to enough to know that I need to investigate more. He was excellent to just hang out and take a mild nap to. He, the lead singer of Sigur Rós, has a voice that can melt Reykjavik away. What I like most about his work are all of the different instruments that he brings into it. Executed incorrectly it can propel into cacophony, but in this case it makes the pieces well rounded by telling a story through the different voices. I feel like this is the kind of stuff you need in order to test hi-fi systems since everything is so balanced.

Beach House
These guys are nice to listen to and it's cool to see how they've progressed since I first saw them at Pitchfork '07. They seem to be a staple at every festival. Yup, that's about it.

MGMT
I can't say anything about these guys that hasn't been said already. I'm a little disappointed that they decided to take their music in a departure from Oracular by not being as dreamy and druggy and turning more into what I regard as the general alternative genre. Have they gone mainstream? Oh shit...

Die Antwoord
Um. Who are these guys? There were a pile of Antwoord fans as we were waiting for 2manydj's to come on and they were going nuts. Nuts! This guy was explaining to me that this was their debut performance outside of South Africa. And they only had a 20min set. Unfair, right? Dude comes out on stage and starts up the bumping tunes. All of a sudden, this little girl comes out on stage and starts rapping. Crazy! No way! This is fantastic. She's wearing white sweatpants and a white hoodie filled with black doodle tags. Then she takes off her hood and keeps going. I'm feeling it and it's pretty good.
Then the guy comes on. Ok tight flow, he's got the same tight clothes. Aren't these guys getting warm? They think so too and they start taking off their hoodies. Ok, this girl is not a little girl but just looks like a little girl. The guy has a sweet flat-top that reminds me of Guile from Street Fighter. Now the visuals are turning into some sort of happy hardcore, flash-based, cartoony yet suggestive, trippy craziness. "Huggy Huggy Party Party Fun Fun Fun!"

And then the masked fat guys with no shirts came out as backup dancers...

By the way, according to this video, this actually wasn't their real US 'debut' but it happened before at a Dim Mak party night.

Z-Trip
Larry and I have decided that Z-Trip is old. Whereas mashup styles have been cool, he really has been stuck where I first saw him back in Denver in 2004. Style notwithstanding, he is a fantastic scratching DJ, something that is seemingly rare nowadays especially with the perpetual rumors of hip-hop falling off the face of the earth (P.S. it's not true, it's just not as popularized). Also the guy has great energy and loves the stuff that he does. I just found myself getting bored at his sets because of his selection. I think the most recent track that I recognized was Pon De Floor... which is turning into MGMT's Kids in my book.

Gah! Don't end it on a low note! Go to Coachella next year! Find a cheapo hotel! Have a fantastic time! Here, get excited about this:

Caplin Band - Il Veliero
Boney M - Nightflight to Venus
The Three Degrees - The Runner (Soulwax Edit)
off of As Heard on Radio Soulwax v12. Play them in order. Mmmm rough disco...

Coachestrictor

2010-04-13T07:09:00.004-05:00

This is about the time where I should be picking favs to see at Coachella. By the way, here are the set times. Actually, this is about the time where I should be heading to work...

Friday movement
Kate Miller-Heidke (if we get in early)
DJ Lance Rock (to check out)
Perry Farrell vs. Steve Porter
Calle 13
(nap)
Aeroplane / She&Him
Gil Scott (to get close to...)
La Roux
Imogen Heap
Fever Ray

Saturday movement
Girls
Beach House
Gossip
The xx
Hot Chip
MGMT
Major Lazer or David Guetta or MGMT??
Z-trip
Die Antwoord (to get close to...)
2manydj's

Sunday movement
Mayer Hawthorne / Deerhunter
Yo La Tengo / Julian Casablancas
Miike Snow
Gary Numan
Thom Yorke
Gorillaz (if there's time)
Julian Casablancas
De La Soul

Biggest Crimes of Humanity
2ManyDJ's vs. Devo
MGMT vs. Major Lazer vs. David Guetta
Phoenix vs. Julian Casablancas

Another update to this later.

House house house house house house house

2010-04-12T21:03:00.002-05:00

This is what I should have been listening to rather than going to 3rd grade...

Classic, but I love what the guy did on the youtube with the cutscenes. Next task: be a VJ.

And oh if Frankie Knuckles could have only done some sets on Sesame Street for me...

Frankie Knuckles on WBMX, Halloween 1986, compliments of the Deep House Page

This mix has been on repeat for the past 3 days and I need more. Cheesy Casio claps, toms, high hats aside, this is decent.

Sandra is my former Lover

2010-04-01T21:05:00.004-05:00

Most recently I was referred to this vid by Art. My jeans were tighter for sure after watching that. In the same vein of 80's excellence but not as italo, is Sandra. Similar vocal impressions as Sabrina, but less uber-dancy. Now that spring has sprung in Chicago, these will be the jams for this ~~weekend~~ year.

Sandra - Maria Magdalena

and
Sandra - In the Heat of the Night

While reading an f'book post on TNUC's wall, this guy posted a link about this Finnish goth rock group (To Die For) who did a cover:

And after these tracks, take the Ralph Wiggum quiz...

Cornball

2010-04-01T20:32:00.004-05:00

How could I not capitalize on this tradition of tomfoolery and put up some gag tracks? Although I haven't April Fooled anyone today (not inventive enough yesterday). Rather, I'll focus my passing attention span on a completely random minimix for the day.

Raffi - Banana Phone

Wayne Newton - Danke Shoen (from Ferris Bueller's Day Off)

Fats Waller - The Spider and the Fly

Bubbies - Bidibodi Bidibu (from Supertroopers soundtrack)

I'm not going to lie, I got the Raffi tip from the Mad Decent blog where two of my Chicago fav's put up their April Fools remix. Naturally, it was done by Autobot of Flosstradamus fame and Willy Joy, who is always the jam at any jam.

Ok that's all. I'm going to run to the Black Lips show at the Logan. Guaranteed quality time... unless it's sold out. Wish me luck!

Exhibit B: Vuk

2010-03-24T18:01:00.000-05:00

I told you before what a great time I had at the Fever Ray show, not the least of which was the opener, Vuk (pronounced Vook). She was so folky however with instruments other than your classic Americana folk implements (fiddle / harmonica / banjo / etc.) using a pump organ named Myrtle and filling the air with her caressing, eloquent, empowered lyrical melodies accompanied by a backing of whimsical yet apropos tunes. She's good. You could use this album for the soundtrack to the sequel to Amelie, but with vocals.

I knew this would be the first and last time I would see her for a very long time, so I made special note to get her album (The Plains) especially to have her sign it. I highly recommend you pick up a copy too. I wish I could say more about the show, but it happened back in October of 09 and honestly it was totally eclipsed by Fever Ray's show (just like many other shows I've seen). She is chatty with the crowd and very inviting into the experience of her performance. Hopefully she will come back to the States so more folk get to accept her invitations.

Vuk - Barefoot in Arizona

Vuk - Flint In The Pines

Conspicks is Dead. Long Live Conspicks.

2010-03-16T09:48:00.003-05:00

I could make a lot of excuses as to what I've been doing with my time in the meantime (like preparing for my Japan/China trip, working a lot, and instead working on jetlad) but instead here are a couple things worth mentioning:

16Mar - White Stripes come out with a live album / DVD "Under the Great White Northern Lights" showing off Jack&Meg playing in really tiny Canadian joints for their 10th anniversary tour as well as sitting in on them being together sans performance
19Mar - The Glamour from Milwaukee is playing at Smartbar. Always a jam.
25Mar - Beauty Bar Chicago opens up in Sonotheque's old spot 1444 W. Chicago

This needs to be much longer... (via)

I sent back a whole set of vinyl jams as well as some radio Soulwax comps from Shibuya (Tokyo) which should be arriving shortly. Expectations are high. See you soon.

Refresher Course

2010-01-24T11:47:00.009-06:00

My morning commute normally is comprised of songs that aren't just stale in my car, they are downright turning rotten. I'm not home long enough after work to ever really play anything but some random things that fill in my void. On those uncommon Sunday mornings and post-nap 2am weeknights, I get a chance to delve into those morels in my pantry. Such a fancy feast includes this compilation from Sympathy for the Record Industry aptly named "Alright, This Time Just The Girls, Volume 2".

The A-lines - Four
Matson Jones - A Little Bit of Arson
Candypants - Nerdy Boys

Favourite line: "Why don't you take off those tight-whiteys. No, I don't think you're butt is pasty... it reminds me of the sands of Tattooine."

Normally, my judgement of music relies on how well my körperteile respond to the aural-to-pelvic triggers found in Out Hud or Vitalic. Not to say that this album doesn't garner a similar experience, it just does it by injecting emotion via my left hemisphere. Find it and listen to it.

The Doctor

2010-01-11T21:16:00.007-06:00

Compliments of Jonty.

I have to throw this one up here. I didn't grow up watching the show, but Dr. Who was big in the UK with a theme song that is leaps and bounds better than Knight Rider's or possibly any of these.

Speaking of doctoring, I'm always into analyzing how any particular track is made. It sucks to be at a show and not being able to stop that automatic drive, which is where the booze comes in. I'm pretty sure I can deconstruct rhythmically most songs, but tweaking and finding sounds is a whole different arena. Watching this video gives me a whole new appreciation for The Prodigy. This guy managed to reconstruct Smack My Bitch Up using Ableton, which is impressive, however The Prodigy managed to do it back in the mid-90's without any CuBase's, Abletons, or m-Audio anythings. Maybe my ignorance of their methods it what elevates is to a perceived level, but no doubt The Prodigy has talent.

What's new in the next decade?

2010-01-08T22:24:00.004-06:00

I'm not going to joke about it, 2009 was a great year. A ton of shows, an even more number of evening dance events, and meeting some great people. I've had lots of visits from out-of-towners that I need to return the favor to and I'm experiencing the pending return of Intro Body. I've seen the rise and fall of bangers (hopefully), discovered music that isn't joke rap (think Benzino) for the first time in college, and went to a decent handful of Coachellas and Lollas (SXSW's are next). Its difficult for me to grasp the fact that this is a new set of 10 years (2000's were the noughties, we're in the tens or teens now? there's no good way to say it) seeing as I lived through a millennial transition with some heavy playing of the artist-formerly-known-as. Regardless I've got some things to look forward to:

Possible Gary Numan & Little Boots collab?? To those readers who are unfamiliar, imagine taking someone as seminal and experienced in the electronic music world like Kraftwerk and mix with a rising star with angelic voice who already has a set of pop tracks underneath her belt. Numan is responsible for a vast set of influences not least of which are Basement Jaxx, Nine Inch Nails, etc. I only have I, Assassin (remember, there are two ass's in assassinate) and I think half of it is decent and the other half is rubbish, or at least I've never been in the proper mood to relish, but you should appreciate the era this stuff was made in. By the way, read this post about Numan.

New Albums Coming Out
19Jan, Spoon - Transference
26Jan, Beach House - Teen Dream
-Beach House - Walk In The Park
26Jan, The Magnetic Fields - Realism
-The Magnetic Fields - Everything Is One Big Christmas Tree
9Feb, Hot Chip - One Life Stand
23Mar, Goldfrapp - Head First

Jam Shows
Passion Pit, La Roux, King Sunny Ade, Miike Snow, Vitalic, The xx x2, Hot Chip

Things To Do
Go to SXSW, attempt to go to all the events I list on here, learn to play the keyboard, run, design shit, buy a vcr, dj more, blog more, facilitate more hand holding, get out of the country.

Winter Chill

2010-01-01T22:14:00.002-06:00

I've been on a hiatus. I've started so many posts that I haven't had the 'proper time' to finish; I am the king of good ideas and unfinished projects. Most recently the Christmas cards (yeah I know, cute) that my roommate finished designing, writing the innards, and putting address labels on around week 1 of December I'm almost done with finally putting my 2¢ of text in. That's really what's eaten up most of my time in the past 2 weeks when looking for something to do with my vacation, which has been anything but relaxing... just the way I like it. But amongst the procrastination, I still managed to pile up a healthy heap of harvested tracks. In the spirit of the Chicago cold causing my lengthy lethargy, queue the Winter Mixtape.

Mayer Hawthorne - Green Eyed Love (Classixx Remix)
Memory Tapes - Bicycle
Fever Ray - Keep The Streets Empty For Me
Ohbijou - Last Christmas
Regina Spektor - Blue Lips
The XX - Fantasy

I always forget that I like Regina Spektor. File her under heart-caressing vocalists swimming in sweetness. These are meant to be listened to under the comforter at 5pm when it's dark out, or in Chicago's case, when there hasn't been any sunshine for a couple of days and you're finishing that raspberry preserve open-faced sandwich while sipping on left over mulled wine from last night's party dinner party.

The latest batch of sweetness

2009-12-04T23:56:00.005-06:00

So unless you've been a scared ostrich for the past 6 months, you've heard about Duck Sauce, a collab of A-Trak and Armand Van Helden. More specifically, you've heard at least while weekend jamming:

Duck Sauce - aNYway
but probably not the original funky disco house jam
Final Edition - I can do it (any way that you want)

and the tight video

Also, I just picked up (via rcrd lbl) a Woven Bones jam. Imagine grungier Kurt Vile vocals deep with heavy reverb along with guitar distortion that rivals bangers that belongs in an apartment with a 100 sweaty northwest teenagers from the 1990's. They are touring the west coast/side/region of the US and I'm waiting for them to put their back towards the setting sun and make way for my way.

Woven Bones - If You're Gold, I'm Gone

There is also this Alan Palomo jam (why did I miss him when he was in town!) using Ed Droste's voice to overarch the melodic, andante, dreamy-eyed instrumentals. I don't know if the Lo-Fi is intentional, but it kind of sounds like something Pretty Lights would put out and only make a bootleg copy of.

Grizzly Bear - Cheerleader (Neon Indian 'Sega Genesis P-Orridge' Mix)

What else to unload, oh how about confirmation that Michael Jackson wrote some of the music for Sonic the Hedgehog 3? Wow. In a nutshell, he didn't give/get the credit because he thought the sound quality was poor in video game form relative to records/CD's as well as the whole children issue.

Not to ruin the video, but speaking of kids and Grizzly Bear and to make a Venn diagram of this post...

Thanksgiving for Thanksgiving

2009-11-30T20:07:00.009-06:00

Wow. This was an amazing weekend. Honestly, I think year after year my life gets better and better. You know, I always showcase people from everywhere else and hardly from Chicago. Our local scene is fantastic. All the random house parties, the neighborhood DJ's, the local celebrities, and even the local-turned-national celebrities make my nightlife a true pleasure to live in. Sonotheque is a dream now but my other favorites the Hideout, Smartbar, Logan Auditorium, Debonaire and Empty Bottle are still going strong. Lincoln Hall just opened up, we're getting a Beauty Bar, and the Empty Bottle is opening a new place in Logan Square that has a place to nap? There's a new record store in my hood, I discovered Johnnie's Beef in Elmwood Park, I just ordered two Sergio Mendes and Brasil 65 LP's. Oh, and my roommate is great.

Although I still think Moneypenny together are just ok, divided they conquer my flabbergasted feet. Highlights from the weekend are:
Darkwave Disco DJ's
LA Riots
Rose and her flygirls at Dragonlady Lounge
Mother Hubbard (Chess Hubbard)
Bald Eagle (Chris Baronner)
Willy Joy
Hey Champ DJ's
Million $ Mano (Emmanuel Nickerson) even though he just hosted, he is still tight.

Prime dancing

Woo!

Thanksgiving Chicago

2009-11-27T00:26:00.005-06:00

I saw on my clock that it's Friday right now, but it's only just after midnight -- not before. I was worried that I was going to miss LA Riots and my Darkwave Disco dudes at Smartbar. This weekend has quite the compressed schedule into a couple of days. Just a quick calendar rundown now:

Right now I'm missing New Wave night at Neo. All my buddies are tryptophaned out.

Friday

10pm - My friend Mike Biederman is playing at Uncommon Ground.
10pm - NOMO at Schuba's
11pm - LA Riots and Darkwave Disco DJ's at Smartbar.

Saturday

8:30pm - Salt n' Pepa revival at Dragonlady Lounge featuring Rose Perez!
11pm - Life During Wartime at Hideout with Bald Eagle and Mother Hubbard
12am - Dim Mak dance party at Empty Bottle with Steve Aoki, Million $ Mano, Willy Joy, Moneypenny
12am - Nitzer Ebb at Double Door?? Wow.
2am - Neo.

Note that you can also see most of these on the right column. I don't know if anybody ever uses it (as no one ever comments) but chances are that I'll be attempting to show up to them. Be busy, folks!

In the meantime, check out the video. It's a little fetishy, so be forewarned.

Here are some jams to hold you over. I rediscovered a great site called NightMagnets by finding this post. Download everything off of it. (Read it too). Here's a smattering:

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll (James Iha mix)
Empire of the Sun - Standing on the Shore (Cassian Remix)
Datarock - The Pretender (Holy Ghost Remix Radio Edit)

All these foot-stompers should be on a Moneypenny mixtape. Not that I'm keeping my nose up because those pair are really good DJ's, but they should dabble in tunes that aren't just last month's hipster essentials. That was kind of mean; I should take that back... later.

Where is Cut Copy?

2009-11-24T21:21:00.005-06:00

Occasionally along comes an artist whose work is so intertwined with certain facets of your life, particularly those that have become your foundational bricks, that a mere smattering of their samples can bring about both the savory reminiscence and the sting of repetition. It's been some time since I saw Cut Copy and much longer since In Ghost Colours came out. Naturally to assuage my selfishness, I hope that they are working hard on:

- Coming back to Chicago
- Making a new album
- Making sweet remixes
- All of the above

Fortunately for me, I've found a couple of gems that they have been putting their pen to. The latest of which (last few months) are:

Munk - Back Down (Cut Copy Jackmaster Remix)
The Juan Maclean - Happy House (Cut Copy Space is the Place Remix)
Mercy Arms - Kept Low (Cut Copy Remix)

Looking at their myspace, they are doing the DJ circuit in Australia and NZ now until the end of the year. Discogs' only 2009 entry is their remix of Move by CSS. Hypemachine gives only old mixes and other people's mixes of Cut Copy. I guess I'll have to keep waiting for something to happen. Here are some more from months / years past.

Kaiser Chiefs - Never Miss A Beat (Cut Copy Mix).... can I repost this enough times?
CSS - Move (Cut Copy Remix)

Also, while pursuing these folk I found I Thought Of Numbers from 2001 -- quite a departure from their current polished melodically moving sound. This stuff comes out of the early 2000's electroclash introduction which Bright Like Neon Lights also takes some cues from.

~~Cut Copy - Rendezvous~~
~~Cut Copy - Sitting Down Standing Up~~

Enjoy!

Remembering being chilled out

2009-11-17T22:53:00.003-06:00

So I just got the blue Memory Tapes LP. It is great. This guy, Dayve Hawk needs to come into town for sure. I don't know if you're into sparsely dancy, electronic, dream-pop, but after a quality eve of finding a Hugo Boss suit (named The Connery on the tag) that fits me perfectly on the super cheap at consignment (had to brag) and some quality Cesar's and hookah, Memory Tapes is all kinds of fantastic right now. Here's a mini-mix from Aug09:

Memory Tapes - Magic Sequence

01. clip from See Magic bonus disc
02. Memory Tapes - "Green Knight"
03. East Hundred - "Hammerhead (Weird Tapes Version)"
04. Memory Tapes - "Bicycle (garage boombox take)"
05. clip from Seek Magic bonus disc
06. Memory Tapes - "Plain Material"
07.
08. Fools Gold - "Nadine (Memory Tapes Version)"
09. clip from Seek Magic bonus disc
(tracklist from p4k)

It is some sort of wonderful. Dayve is a very prolific artist with Wierd Tapes, Memory Tapes, and Hail Social all under his belt. Hail Social isn't around anymore unfortunately, but here's a track that I dig. Pulsating with melodic overtones and a simple yet effective bassline.

Hail Social - Paralyzed
also,
Hail Social - Heaven (Anoraak mix)

You'll recognize Anoraak from the Valerie Collective of folk. More winners. Dig through their folks' stuff.

Cute Jams

2009-11-13T18:38:00.006-06:00

I get the feeling this blog is very male-centric, which I'm ok with naturally. Not that these are necessarily for the babes, but I think they have more feminine appeal than say... Soulwax? Give them a listen.

Devendra Banhart - Baby
Fats Waller - The Spider and the Fly
Girls - Laura
Candi Station - Stand By Your Man

I think it's important that you tell people where you found specific items in hope that they will utilize those sources for their future music pursuits. No idea about Devendra, but Fats Waller I was looking for Ain't Misbehavin' on hypemachine and came upon this, Girls I found from my friend's now-retired radio show on cfuv, and Stand By Your Man I was reminded from from the always awesome Alanna. Granted you are probably not going to be able to pillage from Alanna, but it is all the more reason to seek her out and extract what you can of her music and film knowledge.

Sadness

2009-11-08T22:38:00.002-06:00

Jerry Fuchs, drummer from !!! & Juan Maclean is no longer with us.

http://beatcrave.com/2009-11-08/jerry-fuchs-dies-after-fall-down-elevator-shaft/

Exhibit A: More Vitalic

2009-11-07T14:11:00.004-06:00

I'm feeling very anxious right now. I've got so much energy that I decided to... blog. It is a gorgeous day (gorges!) and although I already had a promenade on the boulevard du Logan, I need more. I saw my friend Kevin last night with his brother and cousins, I had brunch with Ileya and her husband today -- who else is visiting Chicago now?

Since I was listening to the D is for Disco mix, it's high time I clean out my cupboards of all the albums from the last month or two I've been holding out on you guys with. Exhibit A is Flashmob. I can't really say that it's typical Vitalic because I only have one other album to base him off of, but I can say like OK Cowboy there is a healthy mix of what I would relegate into a dream-acid-jam category as well as the more intense hair-flaunting, armpit-licking, visage-punching intensity I (you) know and love.

Vitalic - Still
Vitalic - Poison Lips

Sweat Rag

2009-11-07T14:00:00.000-06:00

It was this day last year that I started writing this post about a mix album with this man with a mane inside that I got back then. I immediately ripped it and lent it out to my cousin who kept it ransom for about 6 months. That's ok. That's ok.... and then I finally got it back and realized what a fantastic mix it was. Wow. I say that I'm starting in general to grown out of the whole uber-dancy genre, but I think that its just that it's retreated into the closet now since at clubs it's getting stale (think Soundbar and Vision, not to be confused with:

David Bowie - Sound and Vision (David Richards Remix 1991)

Back to the point, so I got my D is for Disco, E is for Dancing in the mail, complete with an Aussie perspiration cloth. It is some kind of wonderful. Dare I use the dreaded Nu-Rave to describe it? Plenty of pulsing distortion keys to propel your hips in their natural direction. On disc 2 (the E-disc), it is a jam without fail. Don't believe me? You really have no reason to but just in case:

5. DJ C - Juce (feat: Jorge Stylo)
6. Brodinski - Bad Runner (Crookers Gone Electro Remix)
7. Underworld - Ring Road (Fake Blood Remix)
8. M.I.A. - Jimmy
9. Digitalism - The Pulse (Derdiedas Remix)
10. Shit Disco - I Know Kung Fu (Dabid Rubato Remix)
11. Beni - My Love Sees You

Eines Snippette des Jams

Yeah yeah, some of the songs are a little stale but you really can't blame my laziness in writing this post can you? Don't answer that.

Halloween Jams

2009-10-25T20:01:00.000-05:00

I love Halloween. Escapism? Excuse for ostentation? A method to differentiate and filter out the whores? No, it's obviously the music... not that these are necessarily just for the weekend of the 31st. Speaking of which, daylight savings is on Sunday morning. Whoever thought of putting it there was a genius.

PNAU - Donnie Donnie Darko
Clinic - Harmony
The Rakes - Terror
Sufjan Stevens - They are Night Zombies!!!...

I've always try to play this song every year post-Denver:
North American Halloween Prevention Initiative - Do They Know It's Hallowe'en (Wiki about it here)

This year, can we just please, please not play Thriller at every party... especially the banger version?
Well.. maybe just a little bit but mixed in:
Michael Jackson - Thriller (instrumental)

also def Halloween worthy:

The Knife - Silent Shout

The 'crowning' piece of my costume this year with my roommate still needs to be found... tomorrow. What's your costume?

Balki vs. Balki

Stumbling through rock and roll

2009-10-24T11:32:00.007-05:00

This morning a buddy of mine asked how I found a certain link. No idea, only that it probably was a result of looking through ffffound or google images. Thinking about it made me think that I should record internet paths and perhaps retrace steps later on. While looking for Devo's 'Girl You Want' after hearing it at The Gossip show (which was badass by the way even though I got twice-groped) I found this joint and furthermore an excellent resource for classic rock n' roll (NOT classic rock): anything from garage to surf to Chubby Checker-ish, lo-fi, 'The' bands. Examples include:

Devo - Girl U Want
The Elite - One Potato <-- The Jam
The Pleasure Seekers - What a Way to Die
The Rockin' Ramrods - She Lied
Supercharger - Sooprize for Mr. Mineo
Sam Cooke & The Soul Stirrers - I Need you now

So just from that one Mummies post (which I want to believe is a real compilation album) I've been on an old rock n' roll kick right for the past week. I'm going to completely pillage Debbie's stuff.

New News about Old Folks

2009-10-16T20:05:00.006-05:00

I recently received an email from mog about how they are going to offer their own version of a music subscription service (see Napster / Rhapsody) but for $5/mo. I don't know how they're going to do it, but maybe they figure not to make as much money on selling music, but rather attract people and suck them into the mog life and continue to rely on ads.

It worked for me.

I haven't really looked at mog in a while other than the weekly digest emails that they send out which are nothing compared to actually browsing the site and doing discovery by myself. Enter the current update on old friends:

New LCD Soundsystem
Jimmy is working on the next album as announced last week and the sneak peek is already here. You can stream it but not download it? We'll just see about that..

LCD Soundsystem - Bye Bye Bayou

Bloc Party to break up
Maybe I'm just perpetuating rumors here, but it makes sense to me. Considering that while on tour Matt Tong had to go to the emergency room due to a collapsed lung makes me think that he can't keep up doing the riffs that they want to do. Notice the intensity of the drumline in Silent Alarm vs. A Weekend in the City and Initimacy which started to use drum machines. I'm just happy I went to a bunch of their shows during the course of their lifetime. Matt ~~was~~ is fantastic.

Flaming Lips to cover Dark Side of the Moon
You know what I'd love more than this is if they were to do their entire show doing this version that I haven't even heard yet. I understand that 'Do You Realize?' is a religious experience, but conceptualize a Coyne version of 'On The Run'. Wow.

Come to Chicago already

2009-10-11T13:31:00.003-05:00

Among the many other reasons to learn French, I've never heard Vitalic speak...

I've ordered Flashmob and it's on its way over across the Atlantique. Can't wait.

The By-gone Days of Lipgloss

2009-10-08T20:23:00.007-05:00

When I was living in Denver, dating my then girlfriend, and being even more picky of music, there was a place called Lipgloss where all the then ~~indie~~ hipster kids would hang out. They even had a deal that if you drove your Vespa to the club you would get in for free. It was, and still is, located in La Rhumba at 9th and Broadway. DJ's Michael Trundle (whom my ex went to high school with apparently) Tim Cook, and Tyler Jacobson would totally kick everybody's ass with sweet dance music and there was cheap booze and there were ridiculously hot girls (coat check girl on the right) that I would never talk to and it was always a fantastic time. They frequently were giving away shit and always between 11-1130 at which point the music would stop and they would make an announcement, which was my cue to immediately book it to the DJ booth and get whatever CD they were giving away that day. (That's how I discovered Bloc Party.) When we first started going there, they had 2 boxes in the middle of the dance floor. People would put their drinks on them, but they were meant to be danced on and there wasn't some bouncer shooing you off because you were a dude. Rocking out and posing with Larry across the room was pure delight. After I returned to Chicago I vowed to find the Lipgloss equivalent, but it was too unique. The closest I found was Darkwave Disco in 2005 and then my love turned to electro...

But back to Lipgloss. My iTunes fell haphazardly on Moving Units and I remember that they were one of the frequenters of the tracks to hear there. So, here's my little tribute to the days of yore:

Moving Units - Anyone
Moving Units - Between Us and Them
Bloc Party - Helicopter
Enon - Disposable Parts
Ms. John Soda - Go Check
Arcade Fire - Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)
The Faint - I Disappear
Annie - Anniemal
David Bowie - Rebel Rebel

Oh the reminiscence... "Drinking alcohol without the olives, is like making love to a woman without a breasts." - old guy to me before trying to get me to introduce him to Christi and Rachel.

UPDATE: How could I miss this song?? This is probably the quintessential track of Michael Trundle's..

The Stills - Still In Love Song

Hot Tix

2009-10-07T04:20:00.003-05:00

La Roux is coming to Chicago on 21Oct to Lincoln Hall.

Buy tickets here.

By the way, all of the shows that I'm going to are underlined on the column to the right. So.... you should come with me to stuff.

This weekend just keeps getting better.

Best show this year

2009-10-06T20:41:00.007-05:00

I bought a Fever Ray ticket a while back knowing that I probably wouldn't have the opportunity to see her again. My affinity for Karin Andersson because of The Knife was up there and I thought Silent Shout was a decent album, but I definitely would not have put it at #1 back when it came out. All expectations were crumbled.

Fever Ray is haunting
Fever Ray is a dream world
Fever Ray is putting me in a trance

I had to be sneaky to take some pictures using the phone since the staff (at Karin's request) wouldn't let you take any pictures. I thought that was rather lame, but after seeing what the show entailed I now understand. Right now I'm in conflict in as to whether or not I want to divulge the scenery to you, dear reader, because I have never experienced anything quite like it. So, let's compromise.

Fever Ray - When I Grown Up

SPOILER ALERT

more photos

You will notice a multitude of things in this photo. Lasers juxtaposed with your grandma reading lamps, a man (#3 from left) with feathers protruding from his chest, a dark blob of cloth in the middle (Karin), and not noticeable is a man behind the lamp right in front of me. He has a large hat and seems like he is doing all the programming (maybe the lights too). Most of the show was enshrouded with fog which made me feel like I was on the Swedish tundra and then sneaking into a crystal concert hall watching some dark religion's evening entertainment. The scene, whether in my mind or on stage, was perfect for the pulsating music and lights combined with Karin's vocodered demon-voice only to be confirmed when the fog was blown away.

This thing was better than Of Montreal and on par with Flaming Lips or Super Furry Animals in terms of scenery and concept, but was the polar opposite in what in conveyed which I found refreshing. Fever Ray was uplifting not because it was fantastical and whimsical, but rather because it wasn't cartoonish and you could be sucked into it.

Stand in front and go see the show.

We've Been Waiting a While

2009-09-26T07:39:00.004-05:00

Deep from within the crystal caves of southern France emerging from his cocooned chamber of foot-stomping, leg-writhing, positively asymptotic electric bliss comes Monsieur Arbenz, Mr. Vitalic. Oh my. There is a new album coming out and even though my foot is sprained and swoll from Logan jogging, it is going to fall off on November 3rd while my landlady next door complains to her upstairs neighbor about the bass for the second time.

Oh my.

Minimix preview. Clicky.

cred

Vitalic - Your Disco Song (Extended)
Vitalic - See the Sea Red

Worth Jamming

2009-09-21T22:36:00.006-05:00

Eleni

Nothing overly underappreciative to say about these tracks other than some quick recent pieces that I've picked up:

A-Ha - The Sun Always Shines on T.V. (extended)

Julian Casablancas - 11th Dimension

Vicious Pink - Cccan't You See <--

Actually, the Vicious Pink track I've been searching for a while now after hearing it on a random mix. I feel like it's a worthy addition to the fag jams. The repetitive sample contrasted with the smoothed out backing vocals always works. One of these days I'll put together a song just to show off all the things I've learned about making pop music. Contrasting, combining, and juxtaposing a 'smoothed out' sound rather than one that is more staccato is a fantastic effect that Vicious Pink did very well here. Exhibit 2:

Soulwax - E Talking (album version)

Notice the bongo's and synth chords with the over-emphasized, crescendoing sustain for ~16bars and then go into the jug-jug-jug-jug base line. Just before the transition they reduce all the other parts of the track to ~solo the sustained synth. That's hot.

I'm a sucker

2009-09-14T21:48:00.004-05:00

cred: punkreas
Every time i'm listening to a song and I surf to punkreas, this guy shows up. He's always right on.

Every now and again I talk to some far off friend of mine, and being the music pusher that I am, I feel obligated to share some stuff with them that I figure that they would dig. My most recent trade (20min ago) was with Sabrina, a real character. I gave her some Memory Tapes and she gave me Shadi. Shadi Toloui Wallace has a beautiful voice. Notice that I didn't say sexy because I want to preserve the innocence that is my friend. I haven't listened to the album yet, but if this Strokes cover is any indication of it, I need to get it right now. By the way, shouldn't those guys be making a new album or something? I guess they aren't running out of money yet..

Shadi Toloui-Wallace - You Only Live Once

Oh I can't sit on this one all by myself; it's too catchy.

Memory Tapes - Plain Material

This either. Clicky! Video!
Memory Tapes - Asleep at the Party

La Roux mon La Roux

2009-09-09T00:51:00.007-05:00

So I can't tell you how much I love this girl and this album. I think the CD laser is going to burn through it by the end of the month.

Not only is she beautiful, but her voice pierces my heart with femininity darts.

However, (there's a however?!), yes however I don't think she's matched up with the right production people. Already I've got 20 different remixes, with 10 just for Bulletproof, that different people have mixed. Her voice and lyrics are fantastic, but the current instrumentalism behind her is lacking. I can understand it's synthpop and I love that sort of sound, but sometimes it is just downright cheesy (Cover my Eyes, As if by Magic). After seeing the same thing for the video for 'I'm Not Your Toy', I almost feel that whoever is managing Elly is taking advantage of her talents.

Decent video:

Bad video:

Great Video:

AWESOME:

WAIT
According to La Roux's myspace, she's supposed to be playing at Schuba's on 21Oct. I don't see anything yet, but I will be there for sure if it's the case. Checking tomorrow.

UPDATE
I emailed the booking manager at Schuba's and he tells me that she's scheduled to play Schuba's new venue. It is occupying the space where the Three Penny Cinema on north Lincoln avenue used to take up. Excellence.

Hard Con

2009-09-05T12:51:00.004-05:00

After reading about the new album by Pissed Jeans on Sub Pop and this guy saying that it's best album of the year recorded by any label (Sub Pop here), I found myself desiring to put up some of the more intense stuff that I love. This is the foot-breaking-because-you-stomp-so-hard and two-minute-sweat-generation-four-minute-pass-out music that I'd need 3-4 timeouts during a show in order to recuperate.

The Randumbs - Gas Pumper

White Rose Movement - Love is a Number

Volt - Testbuild

Hands off! Dance off!

2009-08-27T18:42:00.007-05:00

5min wake up bike ride at the company gym and a red bull later, work was still fading me. Luckily there is the Accord and the Bang Gang DJ's (another post). After seeing my downstairs neighbors take the dog out for a spin, that leaves me power on the 200W amp...

Yello - Oh Yeah

(You will recognize that from Ferris Bueller). Still not satisfied as the song that kind of goofy in its entirety (sampling is great of course), I needed to kick it up a notch.

Boxcar - Free Mason

80's ladies and purveyors of classic fag jams will love this one. If someone is interested in opening up a discotheque with me whose digital effects consist of massive 7-segment displays and a programmed, backlit dancefloor sign me up. Neon is a must. Once we get there, the first playlist will consist of:

DVAS - Eternity (Beyond Forever) 
Jan Hammer - Payback (DVAS’ Nash Bridges Edit)
 Grace Jones - Williams’ Blood (Aeroplane Mix)
 Funky Family - Funky Is On
 K.I.D. - Don’t Stop
 Force of Nature - I-ight
 Kris Menace - Metropolis (Serge Santiago Italo Boot Edit) 
DVAS - Le Tino (Radio Edit) 
Tangerine Dream - Le Parc (DVAS’ Norman Tuttle Edit)
 The Korgis - Drawn and Quartered (DVAS Edit)
 Zombi - Zapphire (Escort Remix) 
Danny Howells - Right Off (Faze Action Remix)
 Fallout - The Morning After (Sunrise Mix)
 DMX Krew - I Won’t Forget
 Hot Cold - I Can Hear Your Voice

To really put yourself there, close your eyes and click...

DVAS - Panoptic Animations

Midnight mixtape wednesday

2009-08-19T23:38:00.005-05:00

cred

You know how Sunday is supposed to be named after the sun? Monday after the moon, saturday after saturn, thursday after Thor, what about the rest of them? I'm glad you asked.

They are all named after pagan symbols and gods (for those too lazy to click)
Sunday - Sun
Monday - Moon
Tuesday - Tew
Wednesday - Woden
Thursday - Thor
Friday - Frigg
Saturday - Saturn

ok, how about that mixtape? basically it's what i have been listening to for the last hour or so (with the shit removed for you, naturally).

Empire of the Sun - We are the people
!!! - A new name
Thunderball - Solar
!!! - Yadnus
Vega - No Reasons
White Lies - Death <-- I should have saved this for later
White Stripes - Jolene (Electric Ladyland Sessions)

K, that was in honor of Mike showing off fridaymixtape to me.

Sundaze

2009-08-09T04:20:00.004-05:00

I should probably throw up my Lolla picks for Sunday. Man, that Friday post took me long enough to do that I don't want to do anything so epic for the other days. By the way, winners so far in order of excellence:

Diplo
Miike Snow
Santogold (I don't care that its not her name anymore)
LA Riots
Hollywood Holt
Million $ Mano (Yo, you plugged your boys, I know that's great, but I came to see you.)
DarkwaveDisco DJs
Crystal Castles

Notice I didn't mention Depeche Mode. They decided to play a lot of their new album. My my my, does it suck. Old? Busted? I hope not. Day and night comparison to them at Coachella. They killed it there.

So, what's on tap for Sunday? I'm glad you asked:

Deadmau5 (Perry's 8:30pm) or ~~The Killers (Chicago 8:30pm)~~
MSTRKRFT (Perry's 7pm)
Boys Noize (Perry's 6pm)
Lou Reed (Budweis 6:30) ahhhh, so much conflict!
Passion Pit (Citi 5pm)
The Hood Internet (Perry's 3:30)
Kaiser Chiefs (Bud 2:30pm) maaaaaaybe
Car Stereo (Wars) (Perry's 1:30) or Bat for Lashes (vitaminwater 1:30) Ahh x2!

Damn I need to get there at 1:30? Shit. See you there! Go afterparties!

The XX are smart

2009-08-09T04:05:00.005-05:00

Have I mentioned that the internet is great? Good ole wearehunted told me about The XX. They have it right. Probably the easiest way to describe them is Lykke Li if she had a dude with her and they danced in a candlelit room solo with a wooden dancefloor and they are dressed to the 9's

The XX - Basic Space

The XX - Crystallized

Enjoy.

Tracks stumbled and found through Punkreas though... after wearehunted.

Whom to see Saturday edition

2009-08-08T02:15:00.008-05:00

In true style of doing things at the last minute, here's the proposed course for Sat at Lollapalooza. Apologies for the lack of detail. Trust me on these though:

Miike Snow (1:30, Vitaminwater)

Miike Snow - Cult Logic <-- Winner

Santogold (5:30, Playstation)

LA Riots (6:30, Perry's)

Diplo (7pm, Perry's)

Major Lazer - Hold the Line

transitions well with (duh)...

The Trashmen - Surfin' Bird

Dick Dale - Miserlou (Pulp Fiction intro)

Yeah Yeah Yeah's (8:30 Bud) or get ready for afterparties

Afterparties.

I'm going to throw this out there too because it's too tight.

Holy Ghost! - I will come back (Classixx Version)

Oh hey non-paragraph form. Let's throw a Teddy III shot in here for good measure.

Oh La Roux, why did you cancel on Lolla?

La Roux - Quicksand (Beni's sinking at 1.56 mix)

Whom to see, whom to see...

2009-08-02T22:23:00.004-05:00

Lollapalooza is this weekend, and I've been garnering some research in order to figure out my route. Naturally I'm looking back at prior gatherings and being reminiscent. I'm very lucky to have been to so many great shows at these festivals. Here are the current winners that I can think of in 5min in no particular order:

Daft Punk (Coachella 07), feet so tired from dancing
Spank Rock (Coachella 07)
Depeche Mode (Coachella 07) sneak
Out Hud (Intonation 2005), a religious experience
Flaming Lips (Lollapalooza 07, Pitchfork 09, Monolith 08)
Justice (Coachella 07, Coachella 08)
Kraftwerk (Coachella 08)
Prince (Coachella 08) very talented
!!! (Coachella 07, Lollapalooza 08)
Of Montreal (Pitchfork 07) Kevin Barnes' wife in a gold leotard...
Klaxons (Pitchfork 07 Coachella 08)

I'll give you the advice, but naturally this list is very Con-centric. I'm trying not to put up a band's remixes no matter how good it is (We Are Scientists - Chick Lit (Danger Mix)... Ay Ay Ay!) since obviously they won't be playing those at the shows. By the way, have you utilized hypemachine's mp3 player? I just really starting using it just now. Now, here it is in a true betrayal to proper chronological order:

Friday August 7th

Depeche Mode (8pm Chicago Stage)

No contest. When I saw them at Coachella last year, they put on a fantastic performance. Two UFO's of electrobrilliance to put forth their amalgamation of massively pumping masterpieces and breath-inducing jams. Dave Gahan's resonating voice is def in my top 5 all time male vocalists. Again, no contest.

(waiting and pressing to get closer to DM) (6:45-8pm)

A-Trak (Perry's 6-645pm) or taking a bathroom break
It's not very flattering to be pitted against a port-a-potty... and lose. However if I don't have the urge to purge then I'll stop by and check out A-trak. You know, if I remember correctly, there are some stages that are not listed on the program schedule especially the dance tent(s). Maybe I'll check that out instead. In any case, maybe my company will want to eat dinner or something. Ha, sorry A-T.

Crystal Castles (Playstation, 5pm)

nicked

...or...

Fleet Foxes (Vitaminwater, 5pm)

nicked

I've seen Fleet Foxes before and I wasn't crashing down the doors in order to see their show. After seeing it however, with their chatty cathy antics and hearing Robin Pecknold perform 'Oliver James' and melting into the person next to me I'm a fan.
Crystal Castles however, I have not seen. I've heard some less than favorable things about their live show in terms of their audience interaction, but I have higher hopes. Plus, it's dancy electronics versus more acoustical vibes (and relatively stinky audience members) and dance tends to beat chill like scissors vs. paper.

Hollywood Holt (Perry's 3:45pm)

Yeah, I just saw him at Sonotheque on Friday, but the guy's stage presence is remarkable. He's slightly shorter but the energy he puts out in jumping up and down on stage and going absolutely nuts is a fantastic sight to be seen.

Now we get into the realm of exploration. Most times in the early afternoons of the concerts are great because they are a chance for trying new things. So we have a couple of options here.

The Virgins (Citi, 3:30pm)
Indie-pop that is worth mentioning. Depending on who I'm with at Lolla, I may check them out.
The Virgins - Rich Girls

Darkwave Disco (Perry's 2:45pm)

My old standby. The reason I go to Sonotheque. The reason I listened to bangers. The reason I love the electronic dance. It's another guaranteed show even though I haven't been to Darkwave in a while (actually I don't think they do it anymore). Truly though, I feel like it's the old me of 2005-2009. Oh shit, am I getting old?

White Lies (Bud 2pm)
It's tricky for me to go see a band that I haven't heard before a couple of times, but that's why I'm doing what I'm doing right now. The couple of songs that I have heard just now are interesting enough for me to check them out. Again, it is the vocals that are attracting me to these guys. I think the guy's voice sounds like a cross between of Paul Banks of Interpol fame and The Killers' Brandon Flowers. I don't know who the gal is on the cover song below, but winner too. Downside of these guys? Very poppy and overly refined.
White Lies - Death
White Lies - Death (Chase & Status Mix)
White Lies - One Ones Who Know (Arctic Monkey's Cover)

~~Amazing Baby (Citi 2:15pm)~~
Yeah, you know... these guys haven't done it for me. I feel like I should see them just because they are in town. They were supposed to be the next MGMT according to this guy but they may afford that more to the fact that they are buddies with them. I think the blogworld response to them has been super hyped and their association to hipsterdom doesn't help their cause in my world either. Eh, you make the decision:
Amazing Baby - Supreme Being

Dental Appointment (Dr. John 10am)
No seriously, I need to go to the dentist in the morning.

Nothing else is really catching my attention in the morning. Maybe I'll just wander and try not to tempt myself with buying stuff at the Virgin store.

(Hmm... now I have to do Saturday and Sunday. Next one...)

"Smashing Greg, Simply Smashing"

2009-08-02T17:02:00.008-05:00

Hopefully this post isn't getting deleted immediately. I found this guy while looking for a little icon to make bulletpoints on another post. The above shot is one taken by Greg De Stefano. I think it's amazing as usually Mr. Mario isn't some angry character trying to actually smash people into smithereens but bounces on those goomba heads with a smile and a wink. Looking at his other stuff, the use of personally costumed photography looks good. This one's for you Sam & Mike.

Kurt Vile's splinters

2009-07-27T05:28:00.004-05:00

This morning prior to heading out, I'm checking out one of my buddy blogs, Cold Splinters. Jeff, has a penchant for really chilled out, really good music that is oft guaranteed to put me in a quality relaxed mood. The concept behind Cold Splinters takes the outdoors and puts it in a practical/spiritual/emotional light that continuously makes me desire for a doppelganger life in Yosemite (with easy access to snowboarding of course). This one he put out by Kurt Vile is no exception.

Kurt Vile - Overnight Religion

I can also see why he likes the song as the style is akin to what Jeff would play too: primarily lo-fi, reverbed/delayed vocals with a progressing guitar riffs. I can't actually upload the tracks I have of his because they aren't mastered yet, but believe that when he actually releases his album that you will want to pick up a pair of copies.

Neglection and Distraction

2009-07-25T21:46:00.005-05:00

cred: Robin McKendrick Pesceone via Neo 30th anniversary pics on F'book

I got a Valerie Compilation mixtape some moons ago and never really did a proper post on it primarily because I didn't think it was all that great. I have to say, the human element amongst the boop-boop-beep-beeps of the track sends me into guaranteed gyrational korper-movements. The Valerie folk on the tape have the electronic part on lock, but it's the lack of vocals that really distressed me. Enter the Maethelvin Mix.

Maethelvin - MTLV Time Travel Mix

-Tracklist-
Casco - Cybernetic Love
Kasso - Dig It
Angie St. Philip - Light Up My Heart
Exposé - Come Go With Me <----
Nuance - Take a chance
Future World Orchestra - Captain Coke
Combo - Just Change (Loose Shus Remix)
DVAS - Society
Maethelvin - Delight

Big big holy shit. This is pure mental extraction of my personal delights robbed from me while I was unsuspecting to create a concoction consisting completely of my desire to be born again but in 1963 with infinite supplies of Dep. The last track is def in the Intro Body vein. Speaking of which, a quasi-reunion tour is forthcoming.

For your portable YouTube DJ playlist:

And the real thing (update 25Jun11)

Expose - Come Go With Me by jpdc11

My real family

2009-07-20T09:15:00.004-05:00

I take it Anthony Daniels was taking the picture...

Meine Liebe ist La Roux

2009-07-16T22:13:00.004-05:00

La Roux - Quicksand (BENI's Sinking at 1.56 mix) <-- Blast right now

Let me tell about the things that I should probably keep to myself:

1. I want to fondle La Roux's hair but only if it snaps back to the proper new-wave-feather-to-the-side style.
2. I want to dance with La Roux to La Roux.
3. I want to make a comforter 35 acres in size with Elly Jackson's voice so I can wrap myself in a ball while I'm melting into bubbling pool of ecstasy.

And for those who ~~haven't been~~ don't pay attention:

La Roux - Tigerlily

Turns out that the guy doing the quasi-Thriller voice at the end of the song is actually Elly's father.

Cinematheque

2009-07-06T21:23:00.009-05:00

Betty Boop just sounds so much sexier when played through Funktion-Ones.

Sonotheque has a new monthly gathering headed by Joe Bryl and his penchant for artistic development. I missed the first one, but have gone to the last two (including tonight's). In a nutshell, Joe shows film that normally is not screened that he personally feels has merit to get people watching it not simply as an alternative to normal blockbusters. And in the spirit of abnormality, seeing Jean Isidore Isou's Traite de Bave et d’Eternite (Treatise on Venom and Eternity) makes it a Con's Pick primarily because of the parallelisms between Jean's character David and myself: a cocky, 'spoiled', mid-twenties guy who lusts for women who have substance even if society may deem them obtuse in figure. But that is not the film's purpose.

Part 1 of the film is Isou's theory that cinema has been knocked down to the lowest common denominator of shit, where shit is defined as the all glitz and glam of depression-era and post-depression era film meant to transport people to an idealistic and therefore unreal world. Consequently, the world's shit is his Taj Mahal masterpiece. He means to destroy cinema such that the individual elements are 'divided and conquered, as in war': those elements being video and sound. He propounds rules for this film and for future films which (I can't remember them all but) are:

- The display has nothing to do with soundtrack
- The video is nothing but old filmreels that could be old out-takes, loops, blank film with scratches whose only purpose is to exist as nonsense
- The only music available is that of Lettrism, which is again meant to be a lack of music however likens itself to atonal rhythmic sensations of pre-historical Indian culture (I saw it in a documentary) crossed with the knights formally known as the Knights who say Ni

Part 2 is David's love story with respect to various temporary loves ultimately concluding with Eve, painting the picture of a spoiled jerk who is compelled to accelerate to the climactic pleasure of a relationship only to find that the downward plunge into complacency resulting in his lover being completely infatuated with him is more than he can handle and pushes her away in hatred only to bring her back not necessarily due to his loins.
Part 3 is a summation of his story and also where the experiment in cinematic destruction plunges from an audio-visual disconnect of quasi-coherence to total nonsense (which gets boring).

I would probably want to see the movie again to explore the cultural references it cites, like Lettrism and Ubu Roi by Alfred Jarry, as well as picking up the relevant quotes to my life: "To truly love mankind is to detest it", "every person who has changed the world has been a spoiled child", "those interested in the opinions of others are never themselves, but rather are their neighbors."

So, how does David relate to me? First off, almost formulaically, because I want what I can't have, the best thing a girl can do to pique my interest is to say no to me. Next, I can't stand unintelligent women and because it is so difficult to find an equal-or-greater-than-me individual (again, ego) I can forego the popular beauty rubric and accept someone that has my personal definition of aestheticism. Furthermore, I'm rather disgusted with the world right now and how local/global politics and more importantly global economies have been manipulated to the will of a few men. The movie gives me hope in that it urges me to do something about it, only that on a global scale I feel so helpless. The result is I need to be more active locally as well as succeed in business (even though I despise money but not as much as injustice) so that I can gain an influence beyond the scope of Chicago.

I feel like I've given away the movie, but it is long enough and with enough intricacies that one would still find it interesting. I would suggest learning French before seeing this movie even though I saw it with subtitles. Personally, I loathe subtitles: you are not watching the movie but rather watching the text flicker with some background image. Isou specifically wants you to watch the visual babble while you contemplate his characters speaking to you; it is as if he is specifically trying to distract you so that you are forced to concentrate intently on what the message actually is and when one is staring at the words, which are meaningful, the visual effect is lost. Perhaps someone can dub it in English in the future.

4sec samples

2009-06-26T18:56:00.007-05:00

I've realized that my new favorite thing is getting a group of about 15-20 people and just taking over a random dive bar that otherwise would have more bartenders than customers. Playing pool and conversing this song came on the jukebox

Tina Turner - I Can't Stand the Rain

right after

Alice Cooper - Feed My Frankenstein

Tutti gusti son gusti, but it's no secret that I love the 80's pop sound bleeding over into italo disco. I don't care how much flak I get for putting these up. The songs in their entirety aren't exactly what I'd listen to, but rather little snippets: the initial vocal chord of Alice Cooper, the intermittent synth power chords with Tina Turner, and her arpeggiated bass line. Truth be told, I like this version better as a song

Ann Peebles - I Can't Stand the Rain

I do like parts of Tina Turner's voice on the track because it reminds me of a black Alison Moyet. Maybe the track harks to my deep desire to constantly jam to Yazoo with its minimal backing track thereby accentuating the her vocals.

I didn't like hair metal until I started listening to WLUP in the summer of 2000 driving around in my dad's 1987 Camry that would overheat in the summertime and then you'd have to crank up the heat to full blast to get it to cool off. I took that car to see Bon Jovi in Tinley Park then listened to an all Bon Jovi set on The Loop afterwards. After a Scorpions concert or three, it further crystallized the 80's in me.

Side note to Jimbo Baggins:

Remember when we drove back from the Bon Jovi concert and we saw the construction worker guy driving in front of us throwing sandbags on the horses? He kept missing until he finally got one, we honked, he yelled, we gave thumbs up, he smiled.

Honestly the only reason this song is back on the radar for me is because I recently saw Wayne's World again and forgot how sweet Alice Cooper is in it.

Canadance

2009-06-23T18:32:00.002-05:00

Granted I'm still smoking the same hookah from before, I can't in all honestly do two posts about chill tracks; that's not me. I figure it was time to delve into the more upbeat stuff that I received some time ago from the Victorian ~~era~~ region.

Handsome Furs - Legal Tender

Dan Boeckner's voice reminds me of Philip Oakley of the Human League. Sorry, ADD here. Human League = 80's -> octavian chord progressions. In the same vein of the same playlist from the same gal this track is worth mentioning

Metronomy - Holiday

Metronomy - A thing for me

I don't really want to write about these songs. I am too focused on lower appendage perturbations. Where is that impromptu dance party that I keep trying to start?

Wow. I could never write for Pitchfork if I keep this up.

Where there's fire

2009-06-23T18:15:00.003-05:00

Whenever I smoke the hookah nowadays, I'm reminded of that one evening where I took my first trip to Neo and then came back to watch Blade Runner on mute, listen to dubnobasswithmyheadman by Underworld, and smoke. It's too bad that no one was there to accompany my retreat into my personal relaxation chamber that was my living room. Right now, my body is drained from an evening of egotistical happiness, 5hrs of sleep, a morning of biking on Father's Day, mother's steak, but I have a restless mind of self-reflection. I tried to nap but whereas my korperteil is tired, my brain is not: hence hookah.

Múm - Behind Two Hills,,,,A Swimmingpool

Múm - We Have a Map of the Piano

The internet has been out at the place for about a week now, and I don't blog at work so I figure I write some stuff in textedit (notepad) to pass the time. Mum is one of those groups that is heavy on the ambient chill, meaning there is a flurry of background noise (to me, but some can argue that it is DnB) with the overtones of simpler, slow relaxation in the foreground that you can nod (off) to.

Styrofoam - It Wouldn't Change a Thing

Styrofoam - Forever, You Said Forever

Exhibit B is Styrofoam. I find similarities in peoples faces all the time as if God ran out of genetic permutations and localized them enough such that I could discover them. It is more that certain folk trigger a familiarity and even though I say "Hey isn't that Cheryl?" I should really be asking my companion of that moment "Hey, that looks like Cheryl, no?" However, auditorily, I got it right with Styrofoam and my then companion in late college verified (she was good like that); it is a project by Arne Van Petegem with Markus Acher, (part of The Notwist). The structural concept is similarly in line with Múm's style although the tone is rather melancholy. I wonder if there is a genre name for these guys. (Wikipedia says glitch electronica)

Now if you excuse me, I will retire to my radishes...

Make a new album already

2009-06-06T11:08:00.005-05:00

Gawd, I never though I wouldn't ever want to hear that song again and just had been tactfully avoiding it, but I heard 'Kids' last night at the Hungry Brain. After about 15sec I noticed a small rush to the jukebox to try and figure out where the button was or at least dump some dollars in and make a wish for it to end.

Oh hey MGMT, what's up!? Didn't see you there. Yes I saw the video you just made of your #1 smash hit. (inspiration). I have to say that babies actually crying because they can't act isn't really my bowl of pudding, but your ending animation was excellence.

This doesn't really fly 100% with the MGMT thing, but here is probably the first coherent blog post I've read on HRO that didn't use alt-bro-2k10 language to excess. And speaking of meme's,

The original: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J---aiyznGQ
The mp3: Play him off, keyboard cat.

Another cutsie-poo video

2009-06-06T10:11:00.002-05:00

First of all: Rose, we're really sorry for missing your birthday party.

Second, here is a video invite to a wedding. Maybe I'll crash it.

I just had a concept for an art show. Sam was just putting tacky paper on the back of a Michael Jackson puzzle in our place that has been up for a while, but the paper is what you would use normally to line your cupboard shelves. As he turns it around, he exposes the puzzle. Now, what if the entire show was of paintings with a normal pattern on the one side, however it is your job as a viewer to turn around the painting and look at the other side, which has the real artwork. It is a bit like unwrapping a present, however I think it'd be a joke for me just to stand there and look at people looking at the art and not understanding why are they at a gallery opening for shelf lining.

Anything is better than Girl Talk

2009-06-04T05:49:00.003-05:00

I'd have to say that I was within the whirlwind of hype that is Girl Talk. I was interested in the concept of mostly hooks and only 20sec of any song. However, it's like eating just the frosting off a bunch of cupcakes: you never get into the substance. As a result, your teeth (brain) rot. It's great for the ADHD youth of the nation but why promote it? I shouldn't be likening Pretty Lights to Girl Talk, but he does plenty of sampling and seamless puts them all together. I guess a better comparison would be to an earlier RJD2 who used primarily all samples (versus now where he writes his own stuff). This sound is similar in groove, downtempo, chill step, whatever to RJ.

Good news for you, all of Derek Vincent Smith's stuff is available for free at his website. Why? I don't know; I'd probably buy an album and play it for the babies. Give the guy some money, folks. In the meantime...

Pretty Lights - Cold Feeling

Patrick Watson

2009-06-01T01:23:00.002-05:00

This guy is rather neat. I heard about him here. He definitely has that dreamy, floating sound. Go reverb! It's time for bed, so this mini-set is perfect.

GAH!!

2009-06-01T00:37:00.004-05:00

Ok, so I knew about Flosstradamus playing at the Burlington way back when and I either didn't go there because:

a) I was doing something I thought was better
b) The last Flosstradamus set I saw at Sonotheque I wasn't impressed with
c) I said 'Eh, fuck it'

Well hearing from this guy about the sexy results that ensued sent me in a rage of disappointment for about 5sec... apparently DIPLO showed up and started to PLAY A SET that night. FML.

Ok, enough dwelling on the past, let's reminisce instead. How about a choose your own adventure? Would you rather:

a) Take Charge at 16Hz

b) Conquer the Wind

or

c) Shoot and Drive Away via Giorgio Moroder

P.S. Remember, a Stamos boner, is not an awkward boner.

P.P.S Thanks TNUC.

Resourcefulness

2009-05-30T09:14:00.006-05:00

O'Spada - Time

Our first track comes from Swedish group O'Spada, dubbed due to lead vocalist Julia Spada. 'Time' sounds like classic disco house except without the cheese. It's probably redundant for me to claim this to be a great track when it's me that posting this on my blog called my picks. This is a great track. However, when I first heard it, it was a lo-fi, live version and I just imagined being in this dark and sweaty VFW hall that we broke into for one night to throw this jam of a party... rebroadcast on AM radio.

Speaking of lo-fi, what are your thoughts on it? Annoying? Classic? Hearing 'Time' again makes me almost prefer the grimey version because of the image it provokes. I liken it to reading a book versus watching a movie; you are casting your own perceptions of what a given moment is like and how the sound really would sound if the production was glossy format. With old jazz/blues recordings, I feel like that is the sound that is proper for the time, almost a part of the tune's credibility. Naturally, the other side of this is that if I heard a song before and are hearing it again on a shitty 32kpbs MP3, I'd throw a fit.

Back to the tune, I feel like it has too many stop/starts in it. Luckily for me (and you) they put out a remix comp so you can sleight your own hand at it.

O'Spada - Time (producer remix pack)

---

The Radio Dept. - David

Track 2 comes from these guys. This should be on your personal picnic mix to play after you've eaten too many PB&J's and you stare at the sky in your poodle skirt or high pants, whichever you prefer. The strings, high-pitched synth vamps, and bells give it just the right amount of sugar especially when coupled with the dreamily distorted vocals. >>This is a great track.

P.S. I didn't plan for this, but these guys are Swedish too.

New resource

2009-05-29T20:12:00.006-05:00

source

So I was checking out my analytics one day and I saw that I got a hit from wearehunted.com. What is it? Basically whereas traditionally charts rank their music according to record/mp3 sales, these guys blogcrawl and try and figure out what people have been talking about and they base their rankings on that. Interesting concept: instead of looking at the economic side of music, it takes into account what all the fanboys are saying. Anyway, it turns out that La Roux is up there and I'm part of the cause. She's great!

I've come to appreciate good vocals in music now. Not so much the content, but the delivery. This is in contrast to opera or other classical music where the goal is to achieve a sort of perfection therebywhich everyone starts sounding the same. Elly Jackson (La Roux), Hope Sandoval (of course), Stephen Merritt (The Magnetic Fields), Alison Moyet (Yazoo), Morrissey, and Laura Marling specifically on young love. There are more, but let's not advertise everybody just yet. You know if a voice is good when you can close your eyes, nod your head, and feel enchanted with goosebumps and want to go to their next book reading written in Italian or Portuguese with lots of vowels.

P.S. Just found a new blog whose last like 10 posts align perfectly with my tastes. Winner: offtheradarmusic.com

Like Sita Sings The Blues, that's all.

expansion of new Desires (part 1)

2009-05-25T20:55:00.006-05:00

My musical tastes are expanding. More specifically, I am ~~utterly~~ tired of bangers. I think I've mentioned it before that I've been getting more and more into is chiller downtempo (but not necessarily electronic) tracks. Specifically it has lately been The Magnetic Fields.

source

The Magnetic Fields - All The Umbrellas in London

The Magnetic Fields - Underwear

I actually was first introduced to Underwear via Dedric, alongwith he added

The White Stripes - Handsprings

Not exactly within the scope of this post however it is a fantastic song.

Anyway, I'm not saying that I no longer appreciate the hard hits... hardly. I think that as of late I'm more attracted to the slower grooves especially by Fred Falke, Hope Sandoval, Badly Drawn Boy, Chad Van Gaalen. It's probably a reaction to the popularity of the harder stuff. Now, a more important question to myself is why am I repelled by the popular? I'm not actively trying to put my nose in the air (most of the time), it just turns out that it's part of my personality. I guess if it is an innate quality, I'm not going to start going to delve into my childhood to figure out why I became me (my grandma custom-made my clothes, my ma made my lunches from polish ingredients, I was in the IB program, my dad knew the answers to all my questions, all my friends were all different races...). Ok diary, that's enough of that.

I think I said it before when speaking of this that this is my prediction for the next trend in electro-indie-pop. It's true; the saw wave with distortion has its limits. Hell, distortion itself has its limits before the stuff all starts to sound the same and starts to border with just looping a sound bite to a 64th- or 128th-note (yes, that effect transition is used a lot). What about that transition in other instruments? Done that. That hard/forceful stroke with the bow on the violin, that hard growl vocals you hear in blues, same with saxophone. I wonder how one would take those transitions and put them into electro? DEF the saxophone. There needs to be more of the soulful jazzy sax tracks in electro (case in point 'Hearts on Fire'). But in terms of a loop -> distortion there would need to be some analysis done of the sax growl. For one, it is a singular note, but how do you analyze the timbre? Man, I've always wanted to make my own synthesizer.................. dedric?

A day being wasted?

2009-05-24T18:47:00.004-05:00

I really really wanted to do a vinyl rip of Zombie Nation's Zombieliscious. Lo and behold, I look at the bottom of the vinyl sleeve and there is a little card for getting the mp3's. Fantastic! Please don't stereotype the guy from the old song that has become uber~~klassik~~-overplayed. (Did you know that it was a remix of a game song from within Lazy Jones on the Commodore 64?)

Anywho, for some reason I want this album to be the next OK Cowboy for me. It doesn't have the hard-hitting distortion, but rather more rough melodies con driving beats. Some of it even sounds like it's meant for bboys. Hmm...

Zombie Nation - Filterjerks

Zombie Nation - Get It

Zombie Nation - Supercake 53

By the way, please go get the rest of the album. It's begging for your attention. And your feet's.

Maybe now that it's 7pm I should go outside a little more and perhaps crash a bbq somewhere. Or I could just deliver a loaf of pork loin. Have meat will travel.

It is a crime!

2009-05-24T18:05:00.003-05:00

WHY! Why have I not put this song up yet. AAH!

Yazoo - Don't Go (Whorehouse remix) Vinyl rip

Not only is it Yaz, it's massive dancy. You>> download now. Naturally it's hard electro clubby.

Followup

2009-05-24T16:50:00.003-05:00

If you are in dire need of a conversation sound effect, here is easy access to my favourites:

Rim Shot
instantrimshot.com

Waa waa
sadtrombone.com

Price Is Right epic fail:
bombombombomwooooo.com
4 Boms, 1 wooooo.

Bull Post

2009-05-24T13:48:00.004-05:00

Whenever I have issues as to what to write about here but want to do it anyway, I hope I don't end up putting up some bull post on whatever. Mild inspiration last night by ddrake making me take another gander at motelmoka as well as being a social recluse at my own party caused me desire to start blogging.

Glenn Frey - You Belong To the City

Granted I'm not even watching the video right now and just keeping it there as background noise.

So I bought this painting the other day for too much money. My tax return check came just in time. I feel like it would be too pompous to post how much I actually got so I'll leave it at that. The painting is supposed to be Loki, Norse god of mischief. Now, I'm no expert on Nordic mythology but I like it. I was going to say that he doesn't look very norwegian but that's because he doesn't have blonde hair. He also looks like Captain Hook as a spectre, or at least that's what I've been telling people. I imagine in the future hanging it up in my future house with my future kids running around at night and coming upon it. What the fuck am I listening to? Pink Floyd - Free Four? No thanks. You know, I've been listening to Pink Floyd all morning thanks again to ddrake for getting me to dnload "in through the out door" by Led Zeppelin. It was a natural transition. Jeez, I need something better. Here we go.

The Beta Band - Little Bird

How about a repeat of some of the Oink playlist from last night?

Blur - Coffee & TV

King Tubby - Silver Bullet

Faded Paper Figures - Track 06

Manu Chao - Bongo Bong

New Order - True Faith
^^ much better in this mixed version

Lali Puna - Faking the Books

There. Much better.

Vinyl Rip

2009-05-21T23:22:00.004-05:00

While having the old compy hooked up for the flyer art, I figured it was time to rip a vinyl. When the needle started to constantly skip, I cleaned the platen (no dice), then I cleaned the cartridge (nothing) and adjusted the weight (nope). You know what worked? 3-in-1 in the two tone arm bearings. God I love being an engineer.

UMC's - One to grow on

Excuse the scratchiness. Need to figure out how to filter that out...

It has that definite jazz groove like most classic hip-hop and in another track on the EP it has Large Professor on it. The story was they were playing this at Gramophone and I had to have it. And here it is... 4 years later.

Daft Punk Daft Punk Repost Repost

2009-05-18T20:36:00.007-05:00

I def have been missing out.

This post has given me a lot of information:
A) I don't check the blogs enough
B) Daft Punk bloggers are putting out a remix compilation
C) I just found 9 new blogs

First of all, the superfrancos put out a remix album but exclusive to Japan (why does that happen all the time?) and it seems like folks got a little unhappy at the fact that they didn't live a Tokyo trainride away from the record store. As a result, this group of blogs did something about it: each one of them picked a song (or got dealt) a track and it's their job to find a producer to remix their particular track. The datebook reads 19May to say who is their producer, and put out a 128kbps version and then 20May put the song out... just in time for the weekend. Sonotheque are you listening???

Second of all:

01. Human After All —> Chosen by Disco Demons
02. The Prime Time Of Your Life —> Chosen by Data Sapiens
03. Robot Rock —> Chosen by The Cold Cut
04. Steam Machine —> Chosen by Cream Team
05. Make Love —> Chosen by Sheena Beaston
06. The Brainwasher —> Chosen by Danger! Danger!
07. On/Off —> Chosen by The Lemur Blog
08. Television Rules The Nation —> Chosen by Noise Porn
09. Technologic —> Chosen by Pretty Much Amazing
10. Emotion —> Chosen by Binary

That's it. Excuse my tighter pants.

20May09 Edit:
Here it is: clicky.

Chilled out

2009-05-17T23:01:00.002-05:00

It's about time to go to bed so I need some nappy time tunes.

The Magnetic Fields - Take Ecstasy With Me
The original to the lovely cover that is always perfect. I actually think this track is better than the cover because it captures the dreamy sensation better (by being less dancy). By the way, I just listened this song 3 times in a row. Wow, what if Hope Sandoval sang it?? I'd be in a heaping pile of swoon.

Amazing Baby - Supreme Being
My temporary Cut of your Hands connection said that these guys are the next MGMT coming out of AUS/NZ. Interesting. Funny how I just bothered getting this song yesterday while recombing through the blargh X months after actually doing that interview. Anyway, I think that when I heard 'the next yadda' comment I was looking to basically hear more tracks by MGMT. Keep your mind open, people.

Diesel Desi

2009-05-16T02:29:00.002-05:00

Another video that I think is tight. And Sam tested and tested and tested and tested and tested

A New Hope

2009-05-15T06:18:00.003-05:00

I've found a new music resource and his name is Kyle. Kyle is not hyped up on electro like I am but prefers the more (relative) slow jam. I can't delve into description as to what he's recommended so far, however he has given me a super tip: her name is Hope Sandoval. Former lead singer of Mazzy Star, she has one of those voices that makes your body melt like a candle. I retreat all my reality into her sound. I've heard her voice before, but never took the time to research as to who she was. Here are some favorites currently:

Hope Sandoval - Clear Day

Hope Sandoval - Cherry Blossom Girl (cover of Air)

The Chemical Brothers - Asleep from Day

Thinking about it now, it sounds like she never fully experienced a vocal coming-of-age; she has a sultry, young voice. Don't call me a creep until you've listened.

Did you really believe this was going to be a star wars post? So did I...

Recent acquisitions

2009-05-14T21:22:00.005-05:00

People have been sending me stuff and I've been pillaging hard drives and sucking the life out of the my circle of blogs. Below are the fruits of my ~~laziness~~ ~~thriftiness~~ resourcefulness.

Major Lazer - Hold The Line (LehtMoJoe Remix)
Quasi-dancehall remix of Toto's Hold The Line. If I were to DJ with this track, I'd just sneak in about a 1:30 of it for a mashup set (if I did mashup sets). Good.

Chad Van Gaalen - TMNT Mask
From the same guy who brought you this excellent ultra-creepy video comes this jam track for driving/biking. Everytime I listen to this I think of the original TMNT movie and how I would blast the stereo when I was 7 to the TMNT cartoon theme song. Personally, I prefer the 'real' life lingo a la Malibu.

Jet Taylor - Output One-Two (Demo)
I got sent this. Indie dance winner. Waiting waiting waiting for the mastered version.

Health - Triceratops (Acid Girls Remix B)
It doesn't quite have the pure Megaman-nery of Adventure, but it comes close. Perhaps if he added the distortion keys and a had a real drum machine the two could merge into a single member of video game dance fantasy.

Speaking of which, there is a mariokart contest combo dance party at the Congress tomorrow eve. $1 to watch, $5 to compete. I'm going to kick all of those 15-year-olds' asses.

Feeling down?

2009-05-14T21:13:00.002-05:00

Do bloggers dream of electric blogging?

2009-05-10T03:49:00.006-05:00

(best camera phone shot)

It's really sad actually. I'm sitting here in my underwear reliving my night of excellence and recounting how I needed to blog in the midst of what I wanted to blog about. The evening's purveyor was Diplo. Oh wow. He played a ridiculous amount of baile funk, Mad Descent stuff, M.I.A., and then this pair one after another with some loops/effects on them to make them a bit more Smartbar worthy.

Dick Dale and the Deltones - Miserlou

The Trashmen - Surfin' Bird

Damn. So tight. Listening to that right now makes me want to just have at it on my rug here. MM mmmhm. After gyrating through the crowd just to try an get an underexposed shot of Diplo, and repeated comings and goings of alcoholic beverages (cherry vodka, water, cherry) I couldn't take it anymore and had to leave. Too many couples. That and I lost my buddy Christopher whom I then spoke with 5min later as he was leaving Smartbar as I was in a cab. Oh well. Alles gute. Bottom line, if you have the chance to see Diplo in your town, wear something that you know you don't care getting sweaty in and run for it. After pushing through the line outside Smartbar "Hey where do you think you're going??" "Hard tickets, bitches." it was fantastic.

The one I've been meaning to do for a while

2009-05-09T10:39:00.002-05:00

While living in Denver, or in Chicago or going anywhere, I have a natural draw to spend a couple of hours in a local record store. It is not news to anyone of the interesting things that you'll find. Seeing as I have a poor memory and even poorer associative memory of text to sound, it is difficult for me to find things I'm actually looking for that I've heard. Most of my purchases are based on how interesting I find the cover art, or band name, or whether I've heard them before and can recall their name at that specific time. One band that I gave a chance to were The Buggles.

(reverse cover)

Yes, they have the obvious song, but the whole album is really good.

Buggles - Astroboy

Buggles - Elstree

Buggles - Kid Dynamo (streaming track on youtube)

I highly recommend picking this one up.

College

2009-05-03T13:54:00.003-05:00

Back when I started this blog my main source of inspiration was stuff that I've been listening to for a while and needed to document it somehow. Today after making an omelette and putting on some slow jams it turned out that there were all from days of yore; reminiscing. Hedlund, Lipgloss, Lesbian Carebears. Here's my 'morning' playlist:

Air - Kelly Watch the Stars
Air - Cherry Blossom Girl
Air - Run
Aphex Twin - Bbydhyonchord
Arcade Fire - My Body is a Cage (Live at St. Michael's Church)
Badly Drawn Boy - Once Around the Block
Badly Drawn Boy - Fall In A River
Badly Drawn Boy - Cause a Rockslide
The Shins - Sphangnum Esplande
Smashing Pumpkins - 1979
The Smiths - That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore
The Starlight Mints - Buena Vista
Stellastar* - My Coco

Not to brag, but I won a Lipgloss contest for free tickets to Stellastar because I sent in a submission explaining in one word or less why I should get them. My text body was: *! .

Now if you excuse me, I've got cookies in the oven from my awesome neighbor, Rose.

Wow this song is really fucking good.

KaraokeMF - 6:12am, train

80's in Chicago

2009-04-23T23:14:00.005-05:00

It's going to be 81 for a high for the first time in town this year. What does that mean?

Driving (more) quickly with the windows (more) open
Button down short-sleeve shirts
BBQ's
Beach blanket bingo

I heard this song on WLUW today this morning. I didn't write the name of it down assuming that I'd find it on their twitter where they usually have the playlists show up. Not there, but I remembered the name of the band and after a good ol' hypemachining, I recognized the name. Summer jam candidate?

Pomegranates - Everybody Go Outside! (Live on WOXY)
(For whatever reason I can't upload the track to my own mediafire so you'll have to get it where I got it from for now.)

It's indie rock out of Cincinnati. It has some tint of Arcade Fire and is dancy in a Pitchforkmusicfest-not-darkwave-or-electronic sort of way. Yes, it is atypical to what I usually listen to but I recommend it.

So it turns out I like Phoenix

2009-04-10T13:10:00.000-05:00

I lied. I'm not doing a Nancy Whang post. And why the H in Whang? That's an english unnecessary artifact, not a la Chinese. Anyway, Phoenix is pretty good. I've already posted a track or two but they are worth writing a little about. I don't really care about the text here as much as I do about just posting up the mp3s. So....

Phoenix - 1901

By the way, sorry Phoenix about ignoring you since college. Maybe it's because I associated you with a certain make-out session way back then. Honestly, don't you have song associations with people in your life? It's not something that I consciously do until I realize that when the song comes on I think of the ~~person~~ girl. It's always a girl, who am I kidding.

Nadine: Human League - Don't You Want Me
Katelyn: Any Elliot Smith song
BK: La Roux - Tigerlily
Maria: Jimi Hendrix - Bold As Love

That's all I can think of right now. Wait, isn't this supposed to be a Phoenix post?

I've been looking in all the wrong places

2009-04-04T14:38:00.003-05:00

As a treat for doing the dishes this morning, I was thanked by the computer. Let's back up.

A couple of months ago I saw Collette at Smartbar. She was on fire. And while I was dancing, she started to play this one song which I figured was 'As I Run' because that's the chorus. "This sounds different. Why does this sound so good?" I look over at the DJ table to give her a yeah! face and figured it out. It's because she was singing it live. She just threw gasoline on herself.

Seeing as I was never really into her, I aligned my internet abilities to the myspace/hypem/elbo/google/facebook search. Nothing. Trip to gramophone? Nothing. Nothing. Nothing could be found. Until....

Today. This song got queued on the computer.

The Juan Maclean - Happy House

Checking out the label text, it's Nancy Whang. Huh? Doppelganger? And who is Nancy Whang? Looking her up, wow I've been missing out. Everything she's been in on everything that I love. She has the quintessential vocal timbre for my feet. I can do a volume 1-2-3 post set just on her. Maybe I'll post it post this post.

Yeah!

P.S. Adrian doesn't work Chemical Overtime because they don't pay. Now there's a band name.

FAC51 Mix

2009-04-01T21:56:00.007-05:00

photo cred

A la Trashmenagerie, they did a repost of a mix from 2007 from Radio 1 to celebrate the life of Tony Wilson who had died 2 weeks prior to the release of the mix. No joke, this mix is sweet if you are/were into the Factory Records, Hacienda scene. While you're downloading the mix, you should queue up 24 hour party people in your Netflix. P.S. You need to get all 3 files in order to extract properly since my mediafire account limits the filesize to 100mb. Blah. Extract all to the same directory.

Radio 1 Hacienda Mix (part1of3)
Radio 1 Hacienda Mix (part2of3)
Radio 1 Hacienda Mix (part3of3)

PETE TONG - FACTORY - HOUR 1
Joy Division ‘Transmission’ (Factory)
Joy Division ‘She’s Lost Control’ (Factory)
A Certain Ratio ‘Shack Up’ (Factory)
A Certain Ratio ‘Knife Slits Water’ (Factory)
Joy Division ‘Atmosphere’ (Factory)
Durutti Column ‘Otis’ (Factory)
New Order ‘Confusion’ (Factory)
New Order ‘True Dub’ (Factory)
New Order ‘True Faith (Morel Pink Mix)’ (Factory)
Happy Mondays ‘Step On (Accapella)’ (Factory)
Happy Mondays ‘Hallelujah (Oakenfold Remix)’ (Factory)
New Order ‘Fine Time (Steve Silk Hurley Remix)’ (Factory)
New Order ‘Blue Monday (Original)’ (Factory)
New Order ‘5-8-6′ (Factory)
Electronic ‘Getting Away With It (Nude Mix)’ (Factory)
Electronic ‘Getting Away With It (Original Mix)’ (Factory)

MIKE PICKERING - HACIENDA - HOUR 2
Marshal Jefferson ‘Move Your Body’ (Trax)
Hashim ‘Al Naafiysh’ (BCM)
Orange Lemon ‘Dreams Of Santa Anna’ (Champion)
Adonis ‘No Way Back’ (London)
Tcoy ‘Carino’ (Deconstruction)
Jomanda ‘Make My Body Rock’ (BCM)
Kenny Jammin Jason ‘Can U Dance (Bonus Jack)’ (Champion)
Rhythm Is Rhythm ‘Nude Photo’ (Transmat)
808 State ‘Pacific State’ (ZTT)
Marshall Jefferson ‘Open Our Eyes’ (FFRR)
Inner City ‘Good Life (Derrick May Remix)’ (10 Records)
Stirling Void ‘Its Alright’ (Dance Division)
A Guy Called Gerald ‘Voodoo Ray’ (Warlock)
Ce Ce Rogers ‘Someday’ (Atlantic)

I do have to admit that the Pete Tong part wins over the other one.

By the way, if the extraction doesn't work, try him.

Slow Jams

2009-03-29T10:22:00.003-05:00

A wintry Chicago morning... in March. Oddly enough the first thing I thought of when I saw the snow was "Damn, frost for crops," which translates to "Not as great farmer's market this year for me." Now hearing of tales of packing snow, I think it's time to go outside and have a ball.

In the meantime, curl up and watch these:

From Sam:
Oren Lavie - Her Morning Excellence

From the BSQV:
Department of Eagles - No One Does It Like You

From a long time ago. Hopefully I didn't post it up before (too lazy to check):
Sebastian Tellier - Divine

Booka

2009-03-27T00:18:00.003-05:00

I just returned from a Booka Shade show. I was tired at 9pm and sleepstanding in the hallway when Sam return and asked me if I was sleepstanding. It's funny how it is such hard work to get the desire to go to a show on a school night. Could I miss the show and still be ok? Is it really going to be that awesome? Naturally, the gamble is there and depending on who is play and what the crowd is like it can turn out a number of ways. But I tell you this: If you had a desire in the past to go, go, and stand in the fucking front and center and dance it. The Booka Shade show beat Cut Copy by 3:1. After sleeping in my contacts the night before making exposure to anything more than 3 candlepower an excersize in sustained squinting, the sign warning me before the show "This show has intense strobe effects" did not bode well for my well-being. Just the RGB lights on stage prior to anything even happening cause a retinal aversion to everywhere but the floor. Bite it, and dance through it.

No there are no pictures. No i'm not posting a song. Perhaps you are disappointed. Know this: if you ever get a chance to see them live, you better go for it and do what I did right in front of them to where the beatmaster (the other guy was just playing electrodrums over a beat) looks at you straight away and opens his eyes momentarily at you suggesting "yeah, this is pretty good eh?" while you answer as a dancer.

Thank you Christopher for reminding me and quasi-dragging me out.

Videos to watch

2009-03-26T19:18:00.004-05:00

Two, one old and one new (to me.) I suggest watching these full screen.

Etienne De Crecy did a show:

I don't mind people taking the Daft Punk concept of the pyramid and making it their own. I wonder if those guys took the concept of performing in a 3D shape from someone else? Also, I was hoping that Etienne would incorporate the Star Wars targeting computer when used on the Death Star. Oh man! That would be tres geeky pour moi, n'est pas?

Next while looking for the video from the prior post, I found this one by the Pet Shop Boys of their new single, 'Love Etc.'

That is all. A quick one while I'm sitting being king for 15min...

Now for PNAU

2009-03-26T19:02:00.002-05:00

After a posting misshappening, I need to throw this one up again. First off, the video for Baby

Next a track,

PNAU - With You Forever

Both are tight.

I finally got PNAU's cd in the mail after waiting 3mo for it. I'll make this short and sweet and you should go and find the album if you can in the US or pay the big bucks and get it imported from AUS. By the way, lately FR has nothing on AUS.

Lips at Logan Square again

2009-03-21T13:23:00.005-05:00

I wasn't going to go to the show until Tim convinced me to head out to it after an internal struggle of picking these guys over Cut Off Your Hands since I saw them the day before. Luckily for me, COYH played later and I got to see both shows.

They finally get on stage and the lights still haven't come on yet. People are losing it in front of me, where I am the line of demarcation for slam dancing. Stage lights up and the first thing I see is this guy with his fantastic grill the price is right shining disco lights. cred.

Tim pointed out to me that we've been to three Black Lips shows at the Logan Auditorium so far and asks "Why don't they play the Metro or something?" They're big enough, their shows are high energy, and they've been coming to Chicago how many years now? I don't know what's the last show I've seen at the Metro with a mosh pit, but I'm pretty sure that has a big part to do with it since stage security at the Logan is lax.

Black Lips - O Katrina

Black Lips - Short Fuse

After returning from the show, I had to play this guy:

The Stooges - I Wanna Be Your Dog

MM! Money.

Strange Love

2009-03-21T13:05:00.002-05:00

I've been trying to find this fantastic video (with minimal effort) for the past month or so online. I have a DVD of music videos by these guys and rather than going through the trouble of ripping it and posting it somewhere, I'd just figure someone else has done it already (are you noticing a trend here?). It reminds me of this past video from Front 242. Is it too pompous to reference yourself in your writing?

Maria Eisen is a Badass

2009-03-21T09:39:00.005-05:00

I got invited to Morseland to hear my friend play in one of her bands (she's in about 10). After seeing her mother and pop for the first time in I don't know how many years ("Hey, so what ever happened to you being a chef, Conrad?") she then introduces me to the lead singer of Rubblebucket Orchestra, Kalmia. Pretty, a little shy, but so far winner by association (and by her light red (not pink) dress wardrobe selection).

After trying to have conversation with my company, I find it too distracting from the music. This is not what I would normally be listening to: a crooning madame backed by chill afro-funk. Maria is playing bari sax and rocked it; I haven't seen her yet not. Not only that, the trunk of Maria's musical branches was there too playing soprano sax.

I've always associated that clarinet of an instrument with Kenny G, which in turn gave it a very sour stigma in my mind. No more. Anyway, I got their CD hoping that Maria would be on it, but I didn't see her in the liner notes. The album doesn't do the live show justice (which is saying a lot). À Bientôt Maria until you grace Chicago again.

Rubblebucket Orchestra - Rubblebucket

Rubblebucket Orchestra - Kuma

Chat: Cut Off Your Hands

2009-03-14T19:05:00.007-05:00

Last night while at Darkroom, I had a bit to drink and I got the idea that I should do an interview with Cut Off Your Hands. Well, I did. Today. My first. Sauntering sheepishly into the Hideout with notebook in hand I saw their press dude ~~Jay~~ Ché (nice guy with dreads, Chicago local that told me to come during soundcheck at 6). Nick, the lead, was hungover and huddled over on one of the side tables in the stage room, so I was introduced to Phil Hadfield. In the morning the folks were hanging out with these girls and since it is Pi day (3/14), they made pies for them. Phil, though, raves about the savoury rather than sweet pies in Auckland from Big Ben and Mrs. Mac's. (He was part of the Drudgie pie kids club). He hasn't tasted a White Castle yet.

I made the comment that I thought the album was rather varied in terms of style and it sounded a little like they brought together their best stuff to show off. Furthermore, I conjectured that they had a lot more stuff put together in the background. Before the album, they were doing shows and people wanted to buy stuff, so they finally put together the Shaky Hands EP right before a show just so the folks didn't go away empty handed; it was the same for Blue on Blue. Phil says "yeah, everyone writes. The next album should be a much tighter fit," which they have been working on since Dec. "Each one of us probably could create a solo album if we wanted to." Nick for one has a project called Stealin' An' Thievin'.

With all their touring, they are going to a wide variety of clubs but not finding a wide variety of music. I tell people to listen to COYH but they are still hung up on MGMT. Phil says that everyone keeps playing Electric Feel and Vampire Weekend tracks and it is getting bothersome. It seems that the country is getting inundated with the same promotional gig and if you're moving around the country by large distances in short periods of time, you are experiencing the national marketing campaign that is MGMT. Don't get me wrong, I love Oracular Spectacular, but please be a little more creative in your music selection. I then suggest that they go to Neo.

Speaking of them, the tip from Phil is that you should check out Amazing Baby (CMJ) who has been dubbed by someone as the next MGMT. Future post material while eating a Mrs. Mac's?

P.S. Looking on their blog now, they have a picture of the US up of their tour route and I made an extremely similar sketch on my little pad. I don't ever remember seeing it though. Maybe Phil was thinking of it a the time.

P.P.S. Don't use pickup lines in AUS or NZ. The girls will not dig them the same way they do here. "Oh, are you in Camera Obscura? No? Can I buy you a drink anyway?" It probably helps to have an accent too.

P.P.P.S. I've got a difficult decision to make. Black Lips or COYH tonight. Merde. Even my interviewee wanted to go to that show.