Month: August 2007

IN MY MIND

these two songs are related. And in a sense, adjacency is everything.

Fruko y Sus Tesos – Improvisando

Dead Prez – F&ck the Law

the first one comes from a lively new Soundway compilation CD/2LP, Colombia! the Golden Age of Discos Fuentes, the Powerhouse of Colombian Music 1960-76. Martines recommended it, “perhaps the most important Colombian label.” (Lemon-Red revs it )

A few years ago I received an invitation to DJ some shows in Colombia. I was burnt out from travel & said no. I’m still kicking myself for missing that chance.

 

BECKETT’S HALO

machinima — filmmaking using video game footage & voiceovers — was new to me until W&W showed me this 2-minute piece a few night’s ago… Godot-infused punchline existentialism in the theater of war. apparently Red vs Blue is a massive phenomenon, but if you haven’t seen it:

Machinima makes inevitable sense. It is economically & creatively liberating. Fantastic cinema/animation on the cheap! Episode 1 of Red vs Blue: the tip of an enormmous potential iceberg (they didn’t need those other 99 episodes, in many ways this one did all that needed to be done)…

between machinima & DIY youtubery & stuff like videojockey translators in Uganda, I’m feeling vaguely optimistic about local art & reverse Ikea & maybe even the elimination of the middleman. (& imagine these hackery concepts taken into the realm of politics, a million kid editors not making flash-in-the-pan entertainment but using their fluency in new tools to break or build things in the name of economic equality?)

Elimination of the middleman: when the story becomes not ‘talented youth get bought up by major label when their viral video sparks local dance craze’ nor ‘talented youth spark local dance craze, bypass label, get rich on micro-income from 1.7 million other kids viewing their viral video’ (although this would be an improvement) but when the story becomes not ‘the story’ (or Slate’s) but your story and the cultural heat generated by it turns into money in your pocket and they don’t even need to hear about it or attempt to explain it.

MP3s and money always travel so much more freely than people.

In a few years, most American children will live inside video games or have microchips for virtual world wireless connections implanted into their navels. Drug dealers, old people, and winos will finally get run of the parks and playgrounds they deserve. Only the poor kids will read books; rich parents won’t dare risk their children’s success in a postliterate society by teaching them to read (Brunner). The adjective ‘virtual’ itself will fall into disuse, describing a quaintly archaic and increasingly irrelevant concept.

Wayne’s delicious points towards the 1st hit when searching for “I’m a african” on youtube. big up Eka.

Blackness has always been virtually real and really virtual, so hearing Dead Prez (a virtually political music group) rap while machinima video-director Eka lip-syncs their lyrics as his Grand Theft Auto videogame edits depict what’s being said makes future-now sense:

 

BRIEFLY

there’s a big post bubbling (BECKETT’S HALO) which i havent had time to finish ; until then-

3 radiolandia items of note:

yesterday’s 3-hour show was ‘accuplaylisted’, which means you can listen to the streaming archives by song — a very useful feature. i’ll do this on my regular slot whenever possible. We also accuplaylisted the interview session w/ Sonido Martines, although the start times won’t be as precise.

my regular show will be rebroadcast by an FM station in Brussels! big up Charlotte L, a true superhero. more info soon.

It turns out that Dave Mandl, host of the show following mine, is an editor at Brooklyn Rail, and, more stunningly (to me), he co-edited the best anthology of writing on radio ever, Radiotext(e). (Amazon used copies)

cover art’s kinda crappy but this book contains an unsurpassed assortment of essays exploring what radio is & can be.

 

radiotexte200

EL PROGRAMA DE HOY

today from 3-6pm (EST) I’ll be hosting Maria’s show on WFMU. The three-hour slot will give me the chance to stretch out & air some sweet long-playing records. including gorgeous vintage Salif Keita material.

bonus: today I’ll be ‘accuplaylisting‘ which means that if you listen via WFMU’s internet streams, you’ll be able to get realtime track + artist info. Tally may even pick up the phone if you call!

Then at the regular hour, I’ll have Sonido Martines in to the studio for a bilingual interview follow-up to his Las Rebajadas Van a Brooklin mix, which aired a few weeks ago on the show.

Today “DJ Rupture welcomes Argentinian producer/DJ Sonido Martines, who will discuss las cumbias rebajadas and other unexpected mutations of cumbia in South America, as well as the contemporary electronic scene in Buenos Aires.” More info on that.

below, relevant youtubery courtesy of Sonido. “te mando una de Andres Landero, uno de los mas grandes artistas de la cumbia de y el vallenato colombianos , y en mi opinion uno de los mas originales, tenia algo muy especial, mucha locura. puedes verlo aqui tambien, es la misma cancion, interpretada ya viejito pero super salvaje”

(lots more on vallenato colombiano in the weeks to come)

MAKING OF

 

magabo-alif

[Maga Bo video shoot w/ ALIF, Waru Studio]

Maga Bo video shoot! (2nd post there, i can’t direct link)

MB also contributed a great photo-essay for an XLR8R article on ‘New Whirled World Music’ (profiling him, Diplo, and a few others), the issue is downloadable.

speaking of soot-style, La Fiesta Soot in NYC will happen on Oct. 5 at the Bowery Poetry Club w/ sound reinforced by Funkworthy FM’s reggae system. In addition to Filastine, Maga Bo, and myself, there will be sets by Matt Shadetek (spinning 100% Eurotrance!) and Reaganomics.

I would post the flyer but i can’t find my designer, so it doesn’t exist yet. Are you my designer?

 

magabo-alif2

[Maga Bo video shoot: ALIF]


magabo-car

BASSLINE FLAVA

basslineflava6

i first bumped into bassline via Dexplicit, a producer i knew from the grime scene who also creates powerful 4-on-the-floor tunes. If you’ve caught me playing in a club in the past year or so, chances are you heard at least one bassline track by Dexplicit.

i’m no genre cop, but i think of bassline as 4/4 housey stuff wrapped in (obviously) elephantine basslines with grime/dubstep synth programming, ravey fx & vocal cut-ups, some MCing, and, deliciously, those triplet breakdowns that Wiley throws into his riddims. (Check ‘Eskimo 4×4 on DJ Murkz MySpace to hear a grime anthem rebuilt by bassline logic)

Wordthecat’s new post on bassline sketches the genre’s UK geography & offers a bumpin’ Dexplicit-heavy mix. “It’s interesting to see a style that is popular all over the north of england making inroads into the capital,” writes Chris, “(Londoners like to think) the currents usually move in the opposite direction.”

the two mixtape excerpts below come from Bassline Flava vol. 6 by DJ Total (buyable). They contain a lot of what i find thrilling about bassline… The first flips a triplet time-shift (then the mix throws in a Jay-Z vocal on hyperspeed), the second hits that rare elegiac / unrequited love thing (the heart-stricken diva) which gets me every time…

DJ Q – Tea Bag (remix)

dj q

[DJ Q, myspace cellphone shot]

 

DJ Murkz – Dark & Grey (special)

djmurkz

[DJ Murkz, myspace cellphone shot]

 

the lactose intolerant may denigrate bassline as cheesy, but its dancefloor power is undeniable.

Low End Spasm ups a basslinely mix (which i havent heard yet), noting that, “our 4×4 obsession is a reaction to dubstep’s flatlining rhythm (not to make sweeping generalisations or anything – tunes like Night by Benga & Coki still totally destroy the dance and there’s more). But in many ways 4×4, especially niche bassline house, is the anti-dubstep. Huge banging blines that buzz and wobble like the best of em, but also no reserve on the drums, no holding back, just euphoric breakneck tempo all the way.”

The great part about having a thing & an anti-thing is that, if they have similar tempos (and they do), you can mix them together, bend ’em into both and neither on the turntables…

But then you go to Italy, not a ‘nice’ city but Milan – expensive and user-unfriendly – and you find Crookers. Sound leaks, no matter how carefully you package it up. Bass travels through any wall. Although what you hear on the other side might not be…

I AM LEO, HEAR ME ROAR

yes, i’ve lived thru another year to reach MY BIRTHDAY!

jacecito



no surrender, no delete, baby!

this is my first stateside b-day in ages, and Brooklyn obliges with perfect weather. before i head out again-

if you feel inclined to send a GIFT — an mp3, a link to some crazy blog, a book recommendation [check the new but growing ‘muddy books’ section on my sidebar], an invite to some awesome bittorent club, blank checks, whatever — comment below or hit me at: nettlephonic at yahoo dot com.

ps. this is my birthday jam, from this cassette.

4×4 = HOOD POLYRHYTHM

Matt Shadetek doesn’t blog often, but when he does it usually involves fascinating polemic. check the new post, ‘Hecko‘ (which i can’t link to directly), a youtube-enhanced argument for hood nationalism in 4/4 dance music. (be sure to watch the Godfather vid!).

here’s a quote:

Techno, house and electro came from the hood in America. Techno was invented in Detroit and House came from NY & Chicago. Bambataa in NYC was doing electro at the same time as he was involved with hiphop and those two were much closer to one another in the beginning than they are now. The Europeans grabbed them and turned them into predictable robot music for pill poppers and did it with a lot of enthusiasm and conviction. So much so, that we, the Americans, basically forgot our claim to this music and started looking to Europe to define what this music was. One of the main reasons I don’t like the Euro variants of these styles is that they are too repetitive, predictable and un-funky. The rhythm is reduced to a pulse that just stays steady all night and by being the same for so long makes you forget about it. This is the ‘Flow’ that so many DJs talk about and think is so great. Godfather on the other hand is constantly breaking the flow, interrupting it, shuffling it, putting the emphasis on the off beat, changing tempo through juggling, building tension through scratching. Basically keeping you from falling into a trance on the dancefloor, which would probably be annoying if you were on ecstasy and trying to zone out, but for someone like me who isnt, is great and exciting. I love the feeling of being thrown off beat for a second, wondering where I am, and then having the next track slam in.

 

bounce! bounce! ba ba ba ba ba babababa bounce!