To go hand in hand with a series of features I’m doing on a new wave of hip hop and electronic producers, which I mentioned a little while back, I’ve finished a mix featuring tracks from these very same producers.
In the past some of that stuff has been labeled glitchy, more recently wonky or bassy even but really it’s not about a term or another box to put things in, to me it’s just some fresh and exciting music. Of all the terms that can be used I like wonky the most because I find that in a lot of cases it does really define the music some of these guys make quite well. But I use the term really loosely and it’s really more of an excuse to mix stuff together which has got me really excited over the last 6 to 12 months. To me all this stuff is really a throwback to the days of the old boom bap, when tracks just made you want to bang your head and break your neck. It’s a real breath of fresh air for hip hop and music in general.
For the last 8 to 10 months I’ve been thinking about a feature I want to write looking at what I’ve come to think of as a ‘new wave of hip hop boom bap.’ Music and producers that have got me excited about stuff again like I haven’t been in a long time, starting somewhere with Madlib and Dilla and culminating in the last few years with the likes of Dabrye, edIT, Prefuse 73 and more recently a whole slew of new producers and collectives.
Like most things in the last 8 to 10 months though, I’ve sat on my arse and never got round to it. That is until about a month ago when I submitted a rough draft of the feature to Serie B who I’d pitched it to. They liked it and want to run it alongside a bunch of interviews with some of the artists mentioned in the feature. Bonus.
And around the same time I finally got off my back and did all this I started seeing other people talking about the same thing, but with slightly different angles. Which not only makes me feel good because I know I’m not the only one feeling like this, but also because it only makes me more inspired and gives me more food for thought over the whole thing.
May 21st is the date of the next installment of BTC, now a bi-monthly all nighter affair held on the third wednesday of the month. And it’s also my last BTC for the foreseeable future, so I’ll borrow from Skepta’s lyrics book and ask ‘Are you dumb?’ No? good cos you’d better get your ass down there, it’s a celebration bishes.
I’ll be doing a back to back set with the man like Ske for the occasion while 100 Mado rocks it back to back with ENA and Goth Trad does his usual ting of murdering the dancefloor. As for the live end of things, we’ve got Skyfish and Chinza Dopeness doing what they do best in fine combination style and Dokkebi Q dropping a live set! And seeing as these guys are living in London and not Tokyo, I’d say this makes the occasion a special one if it wasn’t already.
Full details are below. The venue is Club Asia, ladies are free till 1am, and there shall be bass and funky shit, a lot of it, truss. See you there! Peep the BTC blog for more and all that jazz. Oh yeah and there’s also a BTC Facebook group for the FB massive out there.
Despite dubstep’s rise in popularity and consequent rise in numbers, from artists to DJs and labels, there is still only a core number of labels which are of real, regular interest to me. DMZ and Hyperdub are two, and Paul Rose’s Hotflush is another. And even though Hotflush has been one of the busiest labels release-wise, it still regularly comes up with surprisingly refreshing music.
And so, it was a pleasure to be able to catch up with Paul Rose, aka Scuba, recently after I’d first interviewed him (briefly) for my dubstep piece in Serie B back in 2006. And it was Serie B who asked for a round two, this time concentrating on the man and his forthcoming album. The article appears in Serie B issue 21, out now and available in Spain, South America and most good European importers.
For the non-Spanish speaking massive though, the good people at Spannered are running a slightly longer version of the piece, in English. You can check it here.
I’ll be posting up the Serie B version to the portfolio archive later. In the meantime get reading if you haven’t and don’t forget to check Scuba’s new album and the excellent new series of free mixes from Hotflush.
Quick one. My good friend Mr Trick linked me to this excellent article on Word magazine’s site about why records all sound the same today. The answer is probably not so shocking for those who follow this stuff or have an interest in it, but the article makes some very interesting points and the examples and references are pretty interesting. Next time you turn on the radio you may well listen to it differently if you don’t already.
Last month’s edition of Back To Chill was special for a few reasons - end of year celebration, another all nighter and live sets by Japanese artists T2R and Quarta330. Quarta’s set was a particular highlight for me, as it was the first time I got the chance to see him do his thing live, which is pretty spectacular not the least because it involves him making some absolutely banging music using 2 Gameboys, some pedals and an interface. It was 30 mins of 8-bit, platform memories inducing, bass driven goodness. T2R’s live set was also nice, a lot darker than I expected it but very interesting.
And I guess even better is that we’ve managed to get audio from the whole night, thanks to man like Hyaku Mado. And so here’s a selection of sets from the night as well as the live from Quarta and T2R.
For more info on the BTC nights peep the blog. For more info on Quarta go to his myspace, and if you haven’t already go and cop his excellent Hyperdub release, which includes the devastating ‘9 Samurai’ refix.
Spannered is a year old this month, and for the occasion the guys at the helm of one of the nicest music sites around have decided to re-design the whole ting. As anyone who’s ever attempted such a thing on a site with a substantial amount of content will know, it ain’t easy. The guys have pulled it off nicely though, and the whole thing is a lot easier to navigate and still looks funky fresh.
If you don’t know about Spannered yet I can only recommend you head over and find out more. Not only do they have a nice archive of interviews, features and reviews covering a wide range of music, subjects and artists, they also do it in your earhole with a podcast series and a hefty archive of live, recorded and exclusive mixes from featured artists and others - all streamable and downloadable.
For me it’s definitely one of the nicest music sites around thanks to its content and variety, and no I’m not saying that because they’ve featured my interview with Goth Trad on there a few months back :lol: .
A new addition to the site is an mp3 blog, which will be taking shape over the coming month as the contributors get digging and uploading. The list of contributors is pretty sweet too, including the likes of DJ C, Kid Chameleon, Kone R and various other people dotted around London and the world. So I was pretty chuffed when they kindly asked me to take part as well. I’ll be contributing various bits once a month or so, with a look at exposing some of the weird vinyl I’ve come across in Japan as well as some rarer and more exclusive material from the Turntable Radio archive and artists I know. My first contribution should be up in a week or so, featuring a few bits from the TTR archive and some random Japanese records I picked up over the summer.
In the meantime, the guys have started it off with some wicked Brasilian gems and it’s only gonna get better so you know what you gotta do :smile: .
Music, the sweetest thing. Here’s a list of recent favourites I’ve been bumping in the iPod and on the computer (I don’t got a car!). It also kinda serves as an end of year list too, in case I don’t get round to doing one.
Pinch ‘Underwater Dancehall’ - quite possibly one of the albums of the year for me. It just gets better and better with every listen. The vocal tracks are superb. It has echoes of previous Bristol classics like Massive Attack, but it’s entirely its own thing.
Stones Throw ‘Now Again:Re Sounds’ - been a while since I bumped something like this. Re-edits and remixes of classic tracks unearthed by the Stones Throw historians. Some great moments with Percee P on there who proves that he is still one of the best.
Oh No ‘Dr. No’s Oxperiment’ - Madlib’s little brother does good and comes up with an incredibly funky collection of short beats and loops taking their cue from Turkish music. Another grower.
One more thing on the whole piracy subject, and this one is gonna be short and sweet. I came across this video on the dot-alt blog, and it’s another great addition to the whole debate about piracy, not just in music but in every aspect of society.
This is a video of Matt Mason, the founding editor of Rewind magazine, doing a presentation about his new book ‘The Pirate’s Dilemma’. The video is quite long but really worth it especially if you’re interested in this whole subject. It’s hard not to be drawn in by Matt’s cleverly put together presentation and pretty spot on argument. He doesn’t actually focus on just music piracy, though he touches on it, but draws an interesting parrallel between pirate radios, and pirate movements, and pioneering. It’s definitely on point I think and gives more ammunition to the whole debate.
UPDATE - hours after I posted this Ed sent me another link, and one that couldn’t have been more relevant to the subject. The head of Warner Music admits that the industry was wrong to go to war with consumers, and what’s more he delivered that speech at a conference for mobile phone companies warning them of not repeating the same mistakes on the digital platforms that were made on normal computer platforms. Additional food for thought…
Continuing the recent series of posts about piracy and torrents, a friend of mine (Ed again!) sent me a very interesting link from someone who used Oink, worked in the music industry at various majors and who puts forward some very interesting points regarding the whole debate surrounding piracy, outdated business models and new technology.
You can check the article here. While not everyone may agree with his total disregard for the record industry (the majors that is, not the indies) it’s hard not to see some sense in a lot of the points put across - especially with regards to the record industry essentially missing the boat 8 years ago when p2p networks first surfaced. Something I’ve also mentioned before and which I really believe is what this whole debates does boil down to. They missed the boat and then went for the worst of the two remaining options: pretending that they were the victims and continually refusing to move on and adapt to the new world of music as a digital medium, with no tangible, physical aspect. There are other good points, regarding the bully tactics employed by the remaining majors and organisations like the RIAA, as well as some of the suggested possibilities for a new business model (which I don’t totally agree with).
A lot is happening right now so I haven’t got much time to post, but I managed to record a quick mix the other day.
Was feeling pretty shitty but the mix actually came out all right. Made in Ableton for bumping in the iPod, maybe you’ll enjoy it as well. Some new and unreleased bits alongside some favourites of recent times - turn up the bass and sit back.
I’ve just found out that Oink, a website offering torrents of music releases in high quality formats, has just been shut down. As is the norm in today’s media free for all there is a grossly uninformed piece about it on the BBC website, and there is a well written and brilliant piece on the death of this music lovers’ haven on DJ Rupture’s website. The piece highlights the inconsistencies and dilemnas surrounding the whole music piracy debate that has been raging since people who make a lot of money from music realised they’d missed the boat to make more money 8 years ago.
Which made me think about the stuff I wrote earlier on this month regarding internet TV and free TV/movie content available online. Turns out in the guy who ran tv-links was also nabbed recently and the site shut down (though why still puzzles me considering that site was merely a recipient for links to copyrighted material held on other sites - the coporate machine obviously has intricate workings). UPDATE - found this amusing but also on point comment piece on the guardian site about tv-links being shut down.
Birthday celebrations are behind us, so it’s time for the next instalment of Back to Chill. Lucky number 13 will take place at the usual venue, Saloon at Unit, on Thursday October 4th.
Goth Trad’ll be back in town from his extended European escapade, alongside regulars and guests Keihin from Honcho Sound and MC Mal from Rub-a-Dub market. I’ll be playing b2b with Goth once more.
If you come down, don’t be a stranger. It’ll be heavy as usual, and I’m sure Goth will be packing a heavy bag of dubs fresh from his European trip.
Full details on the flyer below. Oh yeah and this one starts at 8 not 7 as before.
Damn it’s been 8 months already since I first played at BTC. Time flies as they say. What started as a favour has turned into a monthly ritual and some of my best moments in a city that still feels alien a lot of the time. When Goth Trad came to Europe last year, I arranged a gig for him at the Dragon Bar (where I did a monthly open mic session). The night was great, Goth flipped it as expected and he invited me to play at his newly started BTC monthly session in Tokyo when I moved here. An offer I was only too happy to accept. Fast forward to February this year, and my first gig in Tokyo as the guest at the 6th edition of BTC. And I thought it’d be that, but Goth very kindly kept inviting me back, so much so that I’ve ended up playing pretty much every session bar a couple since then, something I definitely didn’t expect but which has been an amazing experience.
BTC has grown a lot since it started last year. With Goth Trad at the helm, who himself has had a pretty incredible year with his popularity and interest in his music blowing up worldwide, alongside Hyaku Mado, Ske, Kaji Peace and Diagram, BTC has become an amazing little night, showcasing the dubstep and grime sounds that have come (and keep coming) out of London (and in the last year or so the rest of the world) to a growing audience of fans. The parties are held at Saloon, which is basically the downstairs bar/room of Unit nightclub, one of Tokyo’s best clubs. And this venue has also been key to the success of the night, as is always the case, giving it an intimate atmosphere which is definitely reminiscent of FWD>> at Plastic People or the early DMZ parties at Third Base. The vibe and people are what makes the night and while these can be quite different from what I’ve experienced in London or Europe, the audience has started to change over the months I’ve been here and witnessed it, gradually becoming more open and a lot more vocal.
I remember when I played in February and both Ella and I remarked that the crowd reactions were totally different to what you’d expect back home. People seemed a little subdued, and their wasn’t a lot of the usual reactions you’d expect at parties like this. Not that it felt like people weren’t enjoying the music, just that maybe they weren’t showing their enjoyment in the same way as people in Europe would. The only people who reacted as you might have expected were the few foreigners who came down ceremoniously every month (Dan I’m looking at you mate! :smile: ). 6 months later when Kode 9 and The Bug toured and played 2 special parties in Tokyo, the crowd went absolutely bonkers and the vibes were most definitely on par with the best parties I’ve been to in London.
Finally… after 6 months of gestation inside my brain and another 2 months spent actually putting it together, my new mix is ready. Following on from the mix I put together last year before leaving the UK, this mix covers a lot of different styles and spans 2h25 - because I am actually unable to limit myself to making mixes that are within the usual 70/80 minutes limit. So I’ve decided to keep on making mixes which are a lot longer than usual, mainly because I find it to be a lot more fun than trying to limit myself (not that that’s a bad thing either).
As opposed to the last mix this one was done entirely in Ableton - because I have no decks here. Whereas last time I opted for a mix of both vinyl and digital, and used Ableton to wrap the whole thing together, this time the whole mix is digital (though quite a few tracks were ripped from vinyl on my trusty portable turntable) and done in Ableton. Which has proved more than a challenge at times but has been really enjoyable - on the plus side Ableton allows you to really delve deep into mixing, tweaking and effecting as much or little as you want, yet at the same time this means that you can find yourself getting really anal about things, whereas with a decks mix there is going to be some element of human error, or a human feel to it. I’ve tried to keep some of that in there though, but I’ve also gone deep into the anal side of things, at times managing to mix up to five tracks together and play a lot with eqs, effects etc… Something I couldn’t do live, not only due to skills but also due to not having the equipment. While the majority of files are digital I’ve stuck to using only hi res files, 320 mp3s, wavs and flacs, so the sound quality is still good. This ain’t no iPod mix :lol: Continue reading »
Recent Comments