NETTLE AT ZEBULON

Nettle is a band I started in Barcelona which knows nothing if not change. This spring we will release an album — a soundtrack to a remake of The Shining, set in Dubai — on a label I’ve admired for awhile. (details soon…)

This Thursday we’re playing a free show at Zebulon in Williamsburg. It’s an intimate space where you can come get close to our strange music. There will be a little bit of singing and 100% no guitars. We use old instruments made from trees (Lindsay’s violin, Brent’s cello, Bill’s bendir frames), and homebrew digital tools (Sufi plug-ins, #mudd) and if you like to listen then this is your night. Icing on the cake: Lamin Fofana will DJ throughout the evening.

CORRUPTED ARCHIVES

A laptop hemorrhage left me flustered and spectacularly unprepared for last night’s radio show, but these things have a way of working themselves out. We are all listeners.

you can subscribe to the Mudd Up! podcast for downloadable versions, issued a week after FM broadcast: , Mudd Up! RSS. Also useful: WFMU’s free iPhone app. We also have a version for Android (search for “WFMU” in the marketplace).

tracklist: Continue reading CORRUPTED ARCHIVES

HARLEM IS NOWHERE


I just finished a new hour-long mixtape, made with writer Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts and inspired by the sounds of Harlem. The project is the second edition of the Cities Mixtape series by Milan-based DOMUS, a magazine focusing on design, architecture and urbanism. This mix is titled “Harlem Is Nowhere”, after Sharifa’s new book which, in turn, borrows the phrase from a 1948 essay by Ralph Ellison. You can stream or download the mix here, and read our write-up, which begins:

Once, a group of tourists were asked what came to mind when they heard the word “Harlem”: some said “music” and the others said “riots.” The connection between the two is a story for another time. This Harlem mixtape is born of our own free associations: For Rupture, Francophone songs sold by scowling Africans along 116th, or old soul and R&B memories being hawked alongside the now-thing bootlegs across 125th; for Sharifa, church sounds tumbling onto the streets and distorted strains of jazz heard from a boombox carted around by a wandering neighbor.

COOL & OUT

Last night’s radio show was, as listener Marmalade Kitten commented, “cool and out.” And Ike noted: “Is it just me or is this show awesomely slower and creepier and glitchier lately?” So it goes. Emotional radio. Skip straight to the Quixotic track for sublime slow & creepy…

you can subscribe to the Mudd Up! podcast for downloadable versions, issued a week after FM broadcast: , Mudd Up! RSS. Also useful: WFMU’s free iPhone app. We also have a version for Android (search for “WFMU” in the marketplace).

tracklist: Continue reading COOL & OUT

WORLD’S FAIR USE DAY

wfud logo

Next Thursday, January 13 is World’s Fair Use Day, “an annual, day-long celebration of fair use, creativity and remix culture.” It goes down in Washington D.C. and is free & open to the public [RSVP to guarantee entrance]. I’m pleased to announce that I’ll be giving a keynote speech, and my talk will also involve 3-turntables and a mixer…

The entire day looks to be truly engaging and energizing – peep the schedule. As one friend phrased it, WFUD is “working hard to get actual media makers into a conference that is likely to be attended mostly by policymakers and lobbyists. It could be a great chance to shape the conversation.”

Things kick off with Kevin Driscoll moderating a panel on ‘Fair Use in HipHop Culture’ featuring Das Racist and Larisa Mann (both have been previous guests on Mudd Up! radio: you can listen back to Larisa + Das Racist). Other talks focus on fair use in the visual arts, video games, and more. Including Lolcat meme-godfather Ben Huh, founder of Can I Haz A Cheezeburger! (see lulz below) and ‘real people’ like Maria Pallante, who runs things at the U.S. government’s Copyright Office.

My question for you D.C.ers — what’s the best Ethiopian/Eritrean food in town?

+

the next day, January 14th, I’ll be DJing at Holocene in Portland. Details soon…

VERY BE DUTTY

verybecareful

Very Be Careful are from L.A. and play a rowdy rootsy version of Colombian vallenato & cumbia. VBC have released a number of albums over the years but it’s their live shows — legendary, high-proof fun — which have won them a kind of cult following. Accordion cultists, it turns out, are the best kind.

Catch em in Brooklyn’s Coco 66 this Saturday Jan. 8th, along with yrs truly, DJ Rupture & Lamin Fofana. Not to be missed! I’ll give away some tix on my radio show tonite, 7-8pm WFMU.

For a bit more on VBC, try this post: “The cat pours the dog a stiff drink. The dog longs for opposable thumbs so he can reload the shotgun.”