Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Stinky Grooves 26.10.10 and some choice chicha from manic Manzanita

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Sad Mood (Gregory Isaacs Tribute) - Lotek ft 1/6 (soundcloud)
Loving Pauper - Gregory Isaacs (Rods)
Thief A Man - Gregory Isaacs (African Museum)
Slave Master - Gregory Isaacs (Island)
Going Downtown - Gregory Isaacs (Taxi)
Rumours - Gregory Isaacs (Music Works)
Raggamuffin Rise Again - Gregory Isaacs & Pinchers (Pippers)
Inner City Lady - Gregory Isaacs (Necessary Mayhem)
Inner City Dub - Da Grynch (Necessary Mayhem)
Bucovina (Catar Sys, Karim & Villa Diamante - El Hoyo del Queque Remix) - Shantel (soundcloud)
Dumbia De Los Barrios - Polymiller (soundcloud)
Latin No Plastic - El Hijo De La Cumbia (Ya Basta)
Platatinos - Lido Pimienta (Club Fonograma)
GUerrero - Maria y Jose (Club Fonograma)
La Paz y Adora - Sonora
VCR (Four Tet Rmx) - The XX
Ever Or Not - John Roberts (Dial)
Craig Machinsky - Paris Suit Yourself (Big Dada)
Four Horsemen - Ghost (Hip Drop)
Spring's Got Next - Alphabethead (Hip Drop)
The Rudest Dub - Lotek HiFi (soundcloud)
Medusa (Let's Get Stoned) - The Knux
I Need A Dollar Freestyle - Yelawolf
Phantom - Computer Jay (All City)
Archipeligo - Teebs (All City)
Sky Fall - James Duncan & Chelsea Jade (bandcamp)
Bunalim - Bunalim (Worldwild)
Colegiala - Los Ilusionistas (Barbes)
Agua- Manzanita (Barbes)
Gold - Darkstar (Hyperdub)
Broken Fingers - Ronny & Renzo (King Kung Foo)
Fun Over 100 - The Gaslamp Killer (Brainfeeder)
Devil Is At Large - Sugar Minott (Wackies)
Solid Rock I Stand - Willi Williams (Wackies)
Slow Temp0 - Black Roots Players (Wackies)
Up Tempo - The Black Roots Players (Wackies)
Agave - Botany (Western Vinyl)
Losing Game - Mugwump (Kompakt)
And - BGM (Vanity)
Yes, Every Africa Must Be Free Eventually - RNA Organism (Vanity)
Duran Poco - Que Nombre (soundcloud)
Hang On (Kinky Electric Noise Rmx) - Unitone HiFi (Round Trip Mars)
Hang On (UHF Rmx of K.E.N. Rmx) - Unitone HiFi (Round Trip Mars)
Blue Steel (Instro) - Bot'Ox (I'm A Cliche)

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GREGORY ISAACS R.I.P.

T'was a bit of a rush and I wish I'd had time to go through my sevens and pull out some utter faves from the Cool Ruler but I hope that the first half hour of tonight's show was an adequate tribute to one of THE voices of reggae. I suspect that there is a huge swathe of people, say roughly between the ages of 35 and 60 for who Gregory was one of the guiding lights that steered their musical ship into a long time residency in reggae's heartical harbour. I know that was the case for me, and I strongly suspect I'm not alone in that. Isaacs was amongst a clutch of artists (alongside Prince Fari, Culture, Dr Alimantado etc) who was truly taken to heart by the punk rock and post-punk crowd and I suspect it's a closeness that has remained for most, wherever they have ended up.
It all seems a bit morbidly synchronous as I has planned to mention the anniversary of John Peel's passing, and also the sad demise of Ari Up last week but they've all been superbly covered elsewhere and I'm done with death. Incidentally I have to say that I really enjoyed the honesty in some of the tributes to Ari Up which were unanimously respectful but not afraid to point out that she was often a colossal pain in the ass, and her 'uniqueness' could be trying. I tend to think that many of the supposed great leaps forward through internetery are overstated, and often actually are potentially regressions or even stumbles backwards in the big scheme of things, but I do love that there is a forum where people can point out that they heckled her a year ago and now they're really bummed she's gone. That is so much more human and real than the tidied up obituaries that talk about her pioneering spirit etc, considerably more punk rock imho too.

Hanyways a track you say. Well here's a corker. This has been covered extensively elsewhere too, but I have been holding back as I don't like playing less than toppus notchus quality mp3's and its' only last week I got round to grabbing thems at ye olde iTunes. Before that I had a (gratefully received) promo of the album but the 192's sounded a bit too wan and wispy for broadcast so I held my musical breath. More of a grower than the 'knock you on your ass' vibes of the first Roots Of Chicha comp, Volume 2 is very definitely worthy of getting your hands upon. Refreshingly there's a bit of a vocal focus this time round, and particular points and prizes go to the well decent sleevenotes (which also come in the iTunes package as a PDF, why aren't more folks doing that??!!)
This track isn't actually my favourite off the album (that's a ludicrously close tie between about five others) but it's the one they've been happy to have posted, and it's darned fine, so who am I to argue.
Get Roots Of Chicha Vol 2 from iTunes or Barbes (check their other excellent releases too, their mail order service is v good btw) ....just get it.

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AGUA - MANZANITA

And a bonus, you ask.... a bonus you shall have. Our man in the Mt of Heathen James Duncan has only gone and made a beautiful choon with Chelsea Jade, who also features in James's live band and vice versa. Being of a Santa Clausulary type nature James and Chelsea have opted to give this little beastie away even though they could probably sell it for thousands of groats on the international charming song exchange.
All you needs to do is follow the link to James's bandcamp page and follow the instructions (though if you don't follow the 'pay nothing' part - you'll probably make their day....awwwww) and then your sky shall fall....hurrah!

Peace in....
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Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Stinky Grooves 19.10.10 and a Unitone HiFi Bank Holiday Treatetito

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Sweet Jamaica (Vibes Mix) - Mr Vegas ft Shaggy & Josey Wales (Big Yard)
Stronger - Cham ft Bounty Killer & Mykal Rose (Madhouse)
More money - Busy Signal (Jah Snowcone)
Iron Balloon - Bruck Up (Seanizzle)
Hush (Iggy Iggy) (Douster Rmx) - Tim Turbo ft Spoek Mathambo/Gnucci Banana (Big-N-Hairy)
Like A Gypsy - Kenyatta Fire (Kenyatta Fire)
Yengeh Riddim - Mafia McKoy (Loud Disturbance)
Ruffa & Tuffa - Alpha Steppa (soundcloud)
Leggo Violence - Alpha Steppa (soundcloud)
Frequencies - King Midas Sound (Hyperdub)
Ironman (Tetsuo Dub) - Lee Perry, Dennis Bovell & The On-U Sound System vs Pempi (On-U Sound)
Free To Funk - Sub Version (Soul Jazz)
Bucovina (Catar Sys, Karim & Villa Diamante - El Hoyo del Queque Remix) - Shantel (soundcloud)
Hang On (UHF Rmx of K.E.N. Rmx) - Uniotne HiFi (Round Trip Mars)
Duran Poco - Quenombre (soundcloud)
Bleep!! Maru!! - SamuelDemite mas (soundcloud)
Nima Diyala - AfroCubism (Nonesuch)
DJelimady Rumba - AfroCubism (Nonesuch)
Gold - Darkstar (Hyperdub)
And We Gonna (Samiyam Chopsticks Rmx) - Shigeto (Ghostly)
Fates Say - Daedelus (All City)
The Making Of A Slave aka Willie Lynch - Dubbledge & Metabeats (bandcamp)
Learn To Duck - Freddie Gibbs (Bootleg Kev)
Impending Doom (Rustie Rmx) - Daedelus (Ninja Tune)
Losing Game - Mugwump (Kompakt)
Night Air - Jamie Woon (Candent Songs)
Lesser - John Roberts (Dial)
In The Way - Darkstar (Hyperdub)
When I'm In Awe (ft Gonjasufi) - The Gaslamp Killer (Brainfeeder)
Shattering Inner Journeys (ft Computer Jay) - The Gaslamp Killer (Brainfeeder)
Stanley & Stuff (Copia Doble Rmx) - System (Rump)
Pasame a Buca - Rita Indiana & Los Misterios (Dutty Artz)
La Grimas (Future Feelings Remix) - Carla Morrison (soundcloud)
Buena Persona - Lido Pimienta (Ku De Ta)
Dakan - AfroCubism (Nonesuch)
Cumbia Kikuchi - Greenwood Rhythm Coalition (Names You Can Trust)
Blue Steel - Bot'Ox ft Anna Jean (I'm A Cliche)
Pruned - John Roberts (Dial)
Spak & Spenning - Frisvold & Lindbaek (Full Pupp)
Spak & Spenning (Prins Thomas Rmx) - Frisvold & Lindbaek (Full Pupp)
August - John Roberts (Dial)
Shaka The Great - Overnight Players (Chanel One)

This weeks burnt offering and crisp cruciality is very close to home since it's one of our Unitone HiFi tracks that has been through the spin cycle a couple of times.
The original of 'Hang On' is yet to be completed and has a full vocal from our man the Mighty Asterix. When Miami's cumbia captain Kinky Electric Noise expressed an interest in a touch of remix swapology, it seemed like the natural contender.
It sounded like his mix turned into a bit of an odyssey with parts added from Canada and a sizzling Peruvian style guitar track, heavy on the chicha hoohah. It was well worth the effort and it's a scorcher, that has justifiably been picking up the props and dls on soundcloud and sneaking onto blogs and mixes and what have you. However Ken did say he'd gone as far as he could with the track, and offered up the parts for further interference - of course we were up for that.
So here you have it the remix of the remix of an original that remains unfinished…the world we live in. As ever monster props to Angus for his mastering, particlularly happy with how this one turned out especially with the awkward bass and looming presences in the low end dept, ....top notch! Incidentally I've upgraded ye olde Stinky Jim soundcloud account which means our King Step Dub and the El Malodoroso mix are downloadable again, woop woop.
You can download directly from the embedded player below or click onto me soundcloud page and do the same there and/or leave a comment, favorite it..whatever tickles your fancy. If you feel really moved you could even go to the Unitone HiFi bandcamp page and shake some shekels in out direction… but let's not get carried away.
Aromatherapy at the Minx as ever this Thursday and Aloe Blacc & Wrongtom transcripts soon..ish…approx…repeat to fade….


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HANG ON (UHF RMX OF THE K.E.N. RMX) - UNITONE HIFI

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Lloyd Miller interview Part Two

To be brutally honest transcribing this long interview was a major job, and once I had reached the stage you're about to read I had given up writing anything I'd said. So I don't have my questions for Lloyds answers with this part (and I wonder how we got onto some of those subjects!) but you should get the picture. There's a link to his (almost) full life story at the bottom of this post and it's well worth a read..


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On becoming a Sufi Ascetic…
Did I tell you the one that my music master said? The guy who I met up with who really taught me how to play the santur. He took my instrument away and wouldn’t let me touch it until I learned the correct mallet technique, he would only let me play in his presence until I learnt a whole modal system perfect and that’s the one that’s on Gol-E Gandom, it’s a cut down version of the mode he taught me. Exactly note for note from what he taught me, not one idea of my own in there anyplace handed down from probably David in the Bible. David went to Bablylon and from there the Persians liberated Babylon, it went to the Persian empire. All of the Israelites that were living there many of them stayed, some were sent back to rebuild the temple of the one true God they believed in, just as much, maybe even more than the Jews and those were the golden days of the world when the Persian Achaemenid empire ruled and then along came the Greek creep who thought he was something, some sort of juvenile delinquent and destroyed it all. And God said in the Bible I’m going to take care of the Persians and the meek until the King of Greece comes and then I’m out of here. I don’t want to be around that guy (laughs) But actually towards the end of his life he became a Persian and almost a human being, you know he gave up some of that stuff and started fitting in but it was too late he’d already wrecked the Persian empire and bought in a bunch of goofy Greek garbage so they could never go back. Before they didn’t drink wine they drank water, and there was a lot of other sins he bought in. You know …progress. All this stuff, progress – we’re going some place. Yeah we’re going some place to the end of a cliff and we’re going to fall right down into some horrible abyss and its like hell and we’ll never come out. Some people say 2012 I don’t know if it’s that quick but it’s going to be there somewhere.


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Continuing on the Sufi Ascetic tip….
So what I was going to tell you was bout my spiritual music master. He says there’s two ways to play music you can sit here and learn note by note, and memorize it for hours and for years and years and years. You can do it that way, or there’s another way that maybe you can do it, he told because he saw that I had that possibility. He says you can polish the mirror of your soul and perfect yourself to the point that you can reflect the divine light, that is always there, to others and help them make their lives more brightened up by the divine light you’re reflecting to them. Like Jesus did for anyone that was around, even the bad guys. So he said that’s the other way of doing it and music will come straight from God to you. I guess like David did in the Bible and passed on to the Babylonians, the Persians and the rest of the Middle East. Then you can get it direct, but you have to perfect yourself, that’s the key to open the door. It’s like on a computer, if you don’t type exactly the right password you are toast. So one wrong letter in a password, a capital instead of a small letter and it wont work. That’s the same thing. So he said you have to perfect everything. So I said what does that mean? That was at a time when I had already given up all my bad habits, no alcohol, tobacoo, tea because that against Hussien, the blood of Hussein in Sufiism. He didn’t say much about coffee but I never saw him drink it, but he became a vegetarian, so did I right about the same time, we became vegetarians together. No junk food, nothing that you crave, and no intimacy with anybody outside of marriage, and only marriage if its planned. So people think this is horrible you’re giving up all your freedoms. No, you’re actually getting freedom because if you think about that, you don’t have to think who am I going to invite over to sleep over tonight? is it Sally or Sue or who? Oh and she’s mad at me, because I didn’t do this, I forgot her birthday or whatever. I’ve got find somebody, I’ve got to cruise some chick on the street, I’ve got to find somebody. Well if you don’t need anything then you’re free.


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Not sure quite how we got here but this is Lloyd on being a Mormon and misconceptions about the Church’s attitude towards homosexuality…
I’m part of the Mormon Church and a lot of gay people think the Mormons hate them and that’s not true. We just ask of them what we ask of ourselves, which is to be celibate. There’s nothing wrong with that there’s a lot of very cool gay guys who aren’t with anybody and aren’t doing anything at all and they’ve forgotten about that part and they’re just working in the arts or theatre or whatever. There’s nothing wrong with them they are totally acceptable, it’s the practice of stuff that can become attachment and can end up being slavery that they need to get away from.

On modern music (again)….
People are being musically starved and that why I’m trying to occasionally give people a drink of coconut juice or wheatgrass through this music, but because it’s bitter and kind of tastes funny no one wants to know about it. We need something different, we have enough of that (modern music) I don’t care whether its Bach or some syrupy Sinatra, I’ll take anything over that. Maybe that’s the trick that God is showing us letting the devil have the music industry for a couple of decades. Alright guys, you can see what would happen if he takes over, go ahead and listen to this and now we’re going to have something that’s not that and see if you can tell the difference. Maybe we wont hear it till after Jesus returns.

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On furthering Oriental Jazz etc…..
72 years! The first two I probably didn’t know what was happening, to try and get something a little different happening, but its only gotten worse. I think I was more successful in the ‘50s than I am now. I tried to get people to check out some of this stuff like Ravi Shankar or anything, Japanese Noh Music. Me and Tony Scott played together and hung out together in Italy for a month or two, we did our Eastern stuff separately, but we finally met up, which was great. We were going to do an album together, but most of these guys are dead and I’m still alive.

Did you find you were lumped in with exotica back in those days?
Its sort of like a crowded place, a tube station or whatever and someone walks by you and it’s half kangaroo and its half human, but its real, its isn’t like a costume or something, it’s something that really happened, someone got mixed up with a kangaroo the DNA has got mixed up or whatever. And it walks by you, and smiles at you and waves it’s paw, but it’s a real person. You would just ignore that, it would be too weird to even admit, almost everybody in that train station would turn aside say they didn’t see that. It’s too weird to even acknowledge it exists. Well that’s what happened to me in the Inter Collegiate Jazz Festival National final is St Louis, the judges just didn’t even admit that they had seen it. Some of the winners went to the judges saying that guy was amazing, he played seven different instruments in one ten minute slot, and he played them all to perfection and he played all these musical styles and sang these different ways and you guys didn’t even see that, and they just sort of crouched. They just couldn’t admit it, because it didn’t fit any category. It was supposed to be the vocal category, I sang all the pieces but I was playing instruments and singing in Persian and Indian and scat singing so fast they couldn’t hear the notes going by, because I figured out how to do that. So I didn’t win anything because they couldn’t admit it had happened. John S Wilson who was a famous jazz writer for the NY Times and wrote books on jazz and stuff, probably the most after Leonard Feathers. He was there and didn’t write about anything else except me. So I got a piece that I’ll never top in the NY Time, the head of the Jazz studies Department at the University waved it at me and said you’ll never get another article like that!


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So you weren’t even really acknowledged?
Well they didn’t see me but I’ve been unseen my whole life I’m used to it. Its kind of nice to be in disguise, incognito, walking around nobody will ever know me and I don’t care if they ever do.

It must surely be gratifying to be getting the recognition and credit for you music that is obviously going on now?
Well maybe when I die off they can add to my gravestone. PHD that’s the only thing its good for, it looks good on a gravestone Then after that they can say ‘finally made it, two days before he died’. I’ll be invited to tour Asia, and wont be able to do it because I’m frozen in some nursing home. I probably wont do that, I’ll probably die like other health food people , a surfboarding accident, a board hits me on the head or playing too loud on a clarinet in a parade or something!

In the interests of not making this a veritable novella I haven’t included all of Lloyd’s bugbears and mini-rants that came up, but here’s just one that I can't really argue with…
Do you have those cars..you know ..you’re at the stoplights. I kind of wish we could use some of those cars with the big speakers as target practice for bazookas. It’s the only thing that makes me angry, I’m a pretty mellow guy but when I hear that think, its not even hearing it you feel it, it hurts your internal organs, you want to just assassinate someone you know.


For more on Lloyd his life story 'Sufi, Saint & Swinger' can be read online. It's a fascinating wild read that documents his teenage tearaway years and ending up in a mental institution, how he came perilously close to being lobotomized, his time in Iran, his battles and triumphs at various places of learning, his Mormonism and heaps more. Trust me you'll learn something but you'll need a bit of time...it's extensive!

Follow this link to cop an mp3 from the wonderful album below featuring Lloyd and The Heliocentrics. You'll need to register with your email address but it's Strut so it's not like you're signing up to Beelzebub or anything.

Check the previous post for links to buy.... and follow' em for deep audio satisfaction and enlightenment.


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Huge thanks to Lloyd for being so generous with his time and providing me with more info, music and DVDs than I could possibly have ever wished for. Also large gratitudinal tidings to Marty from Border for setting this all up, and the wonderful Trevor Reekie who did the interview before me and obviously put Lloyd in a great frame of mind (not included in my transcript is Llloyd's suggestion that he's going to form a band with himself, Trevor & me. As I told him ... he's onto a winner with Trev who can spank that axe real nice... but for me..probably the triangle or a washboard and limited duties!)

And if you made it this far and read it all....respect. There should be some sort of prize!

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Lloyd Miller interview- Part One

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Interviewing Lloyd was a gas. At 9.30 a.m. on a blustery Auckland morning it felt like being transported to somewhere else completely. Amongst many, many other things the man is a raconteur par excellence and it would be impossible not to be captivated by him, even though his views may not always be palatable.
I had a ton of questions, I got to ask a few, some were answered - others led on brilliant tangents, but it was a absolute privilege to talk to (or be talked to) by Lloyd. Aside from puling out a couple of chunks that were used in the Real Groove feature (sadly for the last ever issue) I've decided to run this as it was said, I think Lloyd returns to the first question half way through the hour plus natteration, so it does take a bit of following...but trust me it's worth the time. This is the longest post ever on stinkinc (I think) and it's only Part One.
Read on and do please check the bottom for links to Lloyd's outrageous life story, his youtube channel, links to buy etc etc. This might be a good time to boil the kettle, do whatever is necessary and settle in...


How did your interest in non western music develop?
Well its kind of a strange story. Basically I was playing jazz in the LA area in my late teens, and I was trying to get a chance to get in. Actually I didn’t realize I’d been performing with some pretty important people. In fact one of the very important people I guess in the music field that I grew up with, I started him out on drums, was Spencer Dryden from Jefferson Airplane. Me and Spence lived a block from each other in a really fancy chic part of Glendale, California, up on the hill. Which is the other Beverly Hills, we think it’s the best Beverly Hills because there’s hardly any industrial, anyway in our area there wasn’t. So he and I were kids together, we used to play together, and do stuff, and I was really interested in music. I had a player piano that you pumped, so I was pumping the pedals and the rolls would go by, and the music would play, and I would try to play clarinet along with it, and he said ‘I want to do something’. I said ‘why don’t you be my drummer?’ and he said 'I don’t have any drums'. I said 'well Spence I’ll make you some drums', because there was a little workshop that my folks had in the garage. That was a garage band alright!
So I got some old barrels and knocked the heads, the wood, out of them, and I went to the tyre shop and got some old inner tubes. I put the inner tubes on, with some thumbtacks and they didn’t hold, so I got some nails and made him a couple of drums, and then we put some books underneath so you could hear it. And he’d play plink plonk, and I’d play the player piano with trumpet or clarinet, or cornet actually. We were 10, 11, 12 years old and making music. Pretty soon, his parents who had a lot of money I guess, they felt sorry for him, and bought him a real drum kit. So from listening to the radio I heard that the best jazz was Bunk Johnson, that was about when he came with his album,’42 a little bit after that, late 40s. So we tried to imitate Bunk Johnson and he did a perfect imitation of Baby Dodds (check this link for a cracking example of what Lloyd's talking about) even down to the ‘nerve sticks’ where you get two sticks in each hand and you rattle (pppppppprrr) ‘em together really fast, and he did all Baby Dodd’s licks with the woodblock and the base rim and everything.
I played George Lewis and Johnny Dodd style clarinet, and we started off a little band called the Smog City Six. We couldn’t find any place to rehearse, because my parents were using the garage for other things, and they didn’t like the noise and stuff, so we started rehearsing on peoples lawns. That was my idea. I said 'lets just go and set up on somebody’s grass and lets keep playing till the cops come and then run to another place'. Actually the cops only came once, and they came to praise us, they loved it. So they came and threatened to handcuff us, they said play Saints or we’re taking you down the station and they held up some handcuffs.
So it became a big thing, every neighbourhood we’d go to, they were looking forward to it. We’d show up in certain places on a certain day, all these fancy neighbourhoods in chic Glendale, and it became like a roving band that everyone was waiting to hear. We played New Orleans stuff. We had a trumpet player and a trombone, and a clarinet, Spence on drums, and once in a while we’d get a guitar or a banjo. So that’s how we started out, and later on I saw Spence, we made a pact never to go modern. Well we both kind of double crossed each other. He became a be-bopper, I learned how to do it, but I still play the New Orleans style all the time, any time I get a chance and I play it exactly how it was on the Bunk Johnson album without adding an idea or anything. So I stuck with it but he gave it up. So he went modern on me, one day I saw him in a Zoot Suit .
In fact I’ll send you this information. I’ve got some stuff you’ll probably get a kick out of here. What’s your email address? I tell Lloyd my address at Round Trip Mars –oh ok you guys are into the weirdness, sounds like you’re going some place!
I’ll send you the original Oriental Jazz LP on CD (and he did, and more, what a gent!) unfortunately I can’t send you the LP as they are too expensive and I’ve hardly got any myself. This is the original LP that sells for around $600, and I’ve got it on CD from the original tapes. Well I thought now that we’ve run out of the LP’s almost, I sometimes come across one and I put it online to sell, not to get the money but just so people can have it and I include 20 more of my CDs and DVDs so they’re actually only paying $10 for it, if you think about it that way, but that’s what they want so I sell them that for $200/$250 they’re willing to pay, and I send them about $250 worth of LPs/CDs so they’re actually almost getting it free.
Well I think the music matters and if anybody just wants it to collect and to make money off it, well tough luck for them. I can’t get it they’re trying to outbid each other fighting like rats in a cage against some guy from Japan, some guy from Germany and they’re all (makes snarling noise) and they won’t take a 2nd chance offer because they don’t want to have something they didn’t win.

It’s supposed to be about music not ownership!
I don’t get it either.

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Can you tell me about how you first got into Persian music etc, that was through traveling with your family right?
Sort of, yeah. I don’t know.... people who believe in religion can understand this. People who don’t, will just laugh and think its crazy but then they’ll think what a stroke of luck. I was about 17 or 18, playing jazz in the famous spots in LA the Red Feather, the Purple Onion and The Digger, were the 3, and also two places in the black section of town, which was South Central. One was the Downbeat, and the other was Painted Word. I was the only white guy that ever went there, and everybody thought I was going to get killed or knifed. They treated me better than the white kids, even more than I was in Glendale where sometimes bullies would beat me up on the street. Everybody was so friendly and kind, and this stuff about back people being scary it depends on your attitude towards them.
Same thing in New Orleans when I went to visit George Lewis over in Algiers, they said you’re going over to Algiers, you wont come back alive. Well... not only was I not stabbed or anything, but people led me by the hand, chatting friendly, to the guys house. That was all a bunch of baloney and I felt black people were my people, since I was persecuted by the general public too. I guess I felt like I was part of it, and they treated me like I was part of it. It’s all in your mind you know.

I heartily agree having been told similar horror stories about places I’ve pursued music, producers and artists and received the best hospitality in Jamaica, New York etc!
Well we’re going to start a group, you and that other bloke I just spoke to (Trevor Reekie) you guys will be part of my gang. I mean not with the crazy knee length pants and the tattoos and everything but a bunch of people who get together and enjoy life.

Sounds good!
Well that’s the whole thing, it’s the barriers that people want to put up so that they can have an excuse to can kill the other guy and take his stuff. Like ‘see what they did? Look at the terrorists over there!’, ‘What terrorists?’ They’re probably 90% of them CIA guys in drag putting on their turbans crooked, long nose and stuff, shouting kill the Americans and so on.
Then creating incidents that the US creates, and then points at someone else like ‘look at the Twin Towers! Look at what those dirty arabs did to the Twin Towers’. As if they could figure out how to find the right airport, nothing against Arabs, but they’re just basic. I mean c’mon, they couldn’t do something that technically astute, even Germans would have a hard time pulling that one off. Poof poof poof in every floor of the building, as it poofs down like a perfect demolition, you know when you see those old buildings go down. I mean you know one guy tried to run his little plane into the IRS building and just sort of punched into the window – you know you cant do that sort of stuff, that’s ridiculous. Anyway that’s another subject.
All this hatred that is being spewed out, is so some people can make other people into bad people, so they can go and kill them and take their stuff, and no-one will say ‘hey you did something wrong’.

It’s all oil slavery really isn’t it?
We’re all slaves to the stuff. We were much better off with the Titanic, sure an iceberg smashed it, but if there was no iceberg it would have gone all the way back, easily. The Titanic was run by what? A few Irish blokes shoveling coal into the furnace, so they could make steam and steam was the best thing we ever had. We had trains, the whole country of America ran on steam for decades and was doing just fine. In fact the steam that I remember out in Idaho in the wilds was just pond water, just junk water. They’d suck it up and put it in there, no-one wanted that water, it was all yucky. And then they’d take old logs that had been eaten by termites that was just laying there, fallen trees from decades ago, and they would pile ‘em up there shovel them in and off they’d go. They didn’t have to pay anything. We could have done that with solar, some solar help on the trains along with a little drop of logs and some rotten water, not a drop of oil and we could have still run this country perfect.
Two lines that we’re told all the time, especially in America, is progress and freedom. They call this a free country, free to do what? You’re free to work from 8 till 7 or more, to make money to pay taxes, to pay interest, to pay the insurance companies, pay off your credit card and pay pay pay pay pay pay. The Roman slaves were freer, at least at 6 o clock after they’ve been whipped and done some hard labour, at least they got some time off. We never get any time off because we’re always trying to make those credit card payments. We’re the real slaves.

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When you were doing your TV show in Tehran during the Shah’s time did you have to deal with many restrictions? Was it a free society?
Oh I’ll tell you, under the Shah, and probably under the mullahs, you would have 20 times the freedom you have right here in America thinking you have it. They don’t talk about it, they don’t have to, they already have it. I wrote for a newspaper. I wrote the most insulting degrading stuff about different artists who were modernizing, pop artists. I said 'this is garbage, this is trash this guy should go back to school', and then what they do is made the person go back to school. That’s what the Government did, when they published this article under different names, because I had about 10 different names that I would use so I could write for 10 different publications, all the same kind of stuff. So the Shah and the Queen would read that every morning, and they thought 'we’d better do something about this'. So they ordered the Ministry of Culture to make him go back to school, and stop doing this stuff he was doing.
I mean, I could never kind of do that kind of thing in America, you don’t have the freedom to say that kind of stuff, you’d be sued for slander. I would have been sued for slander a thousand times, I would have been sued for being politically incorrect a hundred, I’d have been a walking lawsuit waiting for jail. The freedoms I had there.... the freedom of speech, the freedom to do any old thing you want to do – which I didn’t want to do much. Actually they have freedom from sin, and in America we have freedom TO sin.
They don’t have to be alcoholics and try to get that next drink, or drug addicts and try to get that next fix. Girls don’t have to go out there and be little hookers on skateboards, wiggling their butts trying to get guys to marry them. Because it’s all figured out, they end up with a cousin they like. Their families get together and plan it so they’re happy and they’ll never divorce. They’re usually pretty happy, it’s usually a good marriage, so you don’t have to dress like a hooker, act like a hooker. You can spend your time getting a PHD, which 20 year olds are getting in Iran, because that’s all they are doing is studying and improving themselves, not out there on the streets shaking their goodies for the guys. So that’s freedom, we think we have the freedom. The only way you can get free is through music right?

It works for me!
The only time I think people really can get free is when they put on some real gentle, not that thumping junk because that just makes you slave to another thing, but real gentle like Debussy or maybe some quite Bach, or maybe some Indian sitar music like wooowwoooowooowo. And you just lay back in your chair and nobody is telling you, 'you have to do this' or 'you have to do that', for a moment you’re free from the whole rat race. That’s why all my music I try to be beautiful and gentle, although this last collaboration we call it, with the rock and hip hop guys didn’t quite work out the way I was hoping .

Really?
Yeah but the sequel to it is really good, the stuff they didn’t put on that CD is the stuff that’s going to be mostly on the sequel.

Was that a record company decision?
Yeah in fact, you know the record company would have gone along with me, but the two guys who were the hip hop rock freaks, the bass player and the drummer, really sweet guys I love them, they’re very talented. It was the first time the bass player had ever played a walking bass was at our first recording session. They’re into kind of jumpy, kind of electronic freaky sounds, I guess that’s what they think jazz is. For me jazz was all the way up to Miles Davis with Kind of Blue album and then there was no more jazz.
Then The Beatles came along, as much as everybody loves ‘em, I think they were the four apostles of the devil that destroyed music forever. They might not have been as bad themselves, but what came after them was horrible. And I think even they would listen to some of this horrible rap and say what is that garbage? What have they done? We should have gone to classical music and had people learn Bach or we should have stuck with the sitar and forgot the backbeat.

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So all electronic music is out for you?!
Yeah you’re right. It was totally against everything that I’m for, because my theory is that you can’t write the 6/8 very easily that’s the (demonstrates beat) that came from Africa. All good music, modern/traditional, everyone has the 6/8 feel, that makes it swing. Well it doesn’t swing anymore, now its ratatatatat, 8/8 instead of 6/8. So that’s when music went to the devil I say, because he took over the 8/8 thing and forced it on us. Because it’s hard to write 8/8 on the computer.
I once tried to do some computerized music, but it turned out stupid, so I gave up on the idea, because I had to sit for hours to do one drum part, because you can’t write that without writing triplets. Triplets are hard to write, its hard to make them sound right.
It's more easy to write the 8/8 stuff, and make it electronically, so people don’t have to think, and since people are so stupid anyway they just take one chord and a lot of screaming and distorted sound and think that’s music. So they just think 'oh we’ll just give em 6/8 we wont even swing it', and everybody will accept the garbage we feed em because we’re in control. Whoever 'they' are. The ‘they’ that are in control of this are probably the worst, worse than the tobacco or arms industry, because I think they are doing more damage to the world than people who make atomic bombs and those other horrible things. The ones who make this music and foist it on people, that destroys cultures, it eradicates them, it’s like genocide. Musical genocide is worse than anything that Hitler did, or Stalin did, or Mao did or Ghengis Khan or anything any Roman emperor could dream of doing.
If you destroy a bunch of people there’s always one or two left, but when you destroy a whole culture, there’s nothing left. What’s left of the Native Americans and their life? A lot of those languages have disappeared for ever. What’s going to be left of music in 10 years in this world ? Nothing but doom chaka doom, and nobody will ever know that there was a doom dacka doo or a Frank Sintra or a Patti Page, those people. No one will have ever heard of them, it will be Miles who? And Dizzy what? They almost say that now, if they haven’t texted it or heard it in their text, Dizzy who?

That’s pretty extreme stuff Lloyd!
Even all the Beatles that are left if you sat them down and said 'what do you think of today’s music' they’d say 'its’ horrible'. It’s the same stuff we were saying about them when they started. They were an English version of Elvis, who was a white mans version of black mans music. This has gone a whole awful direction but why don’t they just step up and say 'hey you guys we’re sorry, we were wrong . We’re going back to the sitar, back to the sirangi, no more of this pop stuff.' If they were really penitent about that, then I would cross them off my list of the four apostles of the devil.

That must be quite a list?
Well (laughs) theres about 3 more. There’s Madonna, and theres Britney Spears and Michael Jackson. That’s the 7 that I know. I’m not sure about Mao he might have been, I’m not sure about Hitler he might have been doing something else that we don’t understand. Stalin probably is, but we don’t know - those guys might have thought in their hearts that they were doing it for the benefit of my people. But these other people, the Beatles and all, they were doing it for the benefit of themselves. They just duplicate, not appreciate.

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So with the TV shows in Iran the idea was upholding traditional instruments and maintaining the tradition?
Yeah actually you’ve got me back to answering the first question which I never got a chance to (not that anyone was stopping him apart from his own lovely meandering trail of discourse). The last time I saw Spencer Dryden was just before I left America. He invited me, he came in a zoot suit on with a pie pan hat, and he was packing a gun in his pocket, he looked really great, a really hip hipster, and he had several joints rolled up in his pocket and he was saying ‘man you want to try some!’ and I was like ‘no! I’m not interested’. He took me to a Charlie Lloyd concert, and he did make me smoke a joint beforehand. If you want to have something to laugh about.... We couldn’t stop laughing and screaming and giggling till 3 or 4 big huge ugly bouncers, in this fancy place in Hollywood, were coming in our direction. So we giggled all the way to the back door, and ran out to the car, where we dropped our keys three or four times trying to get in.
Then wanted a pizza and a a bunch of candy bars, and couldn’t find any, and then we giggled and drove all the way back to Glendale, and went to sleep giggling. We thought that was the funniest, freakiest non-music we’d ever heard. That was the last time I saw him. Then he went and became a rocker and I emailed him once, didn’t cuss him out for it because he was dying from all the drugs and things, so I didn’t want to rub it in, and he did die a few months later. He emailed me back and said 'well man it was good to hear from you' and that was it.
About that same time I was upset because the main jazz club the Red Feather, The Purple Onion and The Digger I could hardly get a chance to play because all of these really good musicians were wanting to go and sit in there too, so I was really discouraged. So not being very religious, and being on drugs and booze and chasing chicks and everything, I still thought there was some kind of a God somewhere, so I prayed to be shown the way, how can I succeed in music? And just a few weeks after that my Dad got offered this job in Tehran, and I left the jazz scene.
If this God has answered, he’s taking me away from where I had almost made it, playing at the Purple Onion with big names like Brooke Myers. Maybe Brooke Myers might ask me to play a gig sometime, and maybe I might make it, and I was taken away from the whole thing and there wasn’t one drop of jazz in Iran, not a thing, and there I was plunked in the middle of a desert with camels and donkeys clomping by the hotel and I turned on the radio and heard this music and I was like Huh, that’s beyond be-bop.
So that was the answer to my prayer and ever since then I’ve kind of been led by this divine guidance, until I changed my lifestyle completely and cut out smoking, girls, coffee tea cigarettes, junk food, meat, animal products…everything. I quit everything and became kinda like a sufi ascetic. And after doing that I met a sufi ascetic master, who was one step beyond me, and he became my personal music teacher.
That was in Paris later on, after I’d bought the instrument and loved the music but didn’t know anything about it, so I finally got a chance to learn it. So this divine hand has been guiding me everywhere, expect for on my way to grave having not done anything, except maybe one CD with a garage band of cockneys from London. That’s what I love, they’re the sweetest guys. I just love those kids, that why I did it, they’re such nice guys I went along with it even though I couldn’t stand some of the stuff we were doing.

So you’re really not into the material on this album?
You know they learned really fast, and the musicians in the group, the flutist, the harpist, the multi instrumentalist guy are musical geniuses. In 5 minutes they totally understood everything, but Jake and Malc had a rough time getting away from the duh-da-dak-dak, all that kind of jittery stuff. It’s not jittery man its got be smooth.
The best two pieces on that new LP are ones that they were doing the recording on, and concentrating on getting a good sound, instead of actually playing. They did a little something, but they didn’t throw their hip hop stuff into it, and that was the one that ends with the Indonesian thing, Sunda Serenity or something (Sunda Sunset). The Balinese thing Malcolm was playing vibes on that, just doing some simple stuff that I showed him. So they could do it, they learned quick but they forgot slow. Hard for them to forget the hip hop beat and just go into another room. If I’m going to play with a Chinese band I’m not going to try and bring a jazz band into it, I’m just going to sit there and play nyum nyum nyeaeeer, just like the rest of the guys. I’m not going to try and mess it up for them.
It’s kinda like I felt- Tiger Woods who’s really good as a golf guy, who is really good as an athlete ‘oh you’re an athelete ok were going to put you in a cage with this great big huge 300 pound monster guy with muscles, fight to the death in the cage. We’re going to lock you in and bet on you'. So like a fight club or something, if Tiger Woods was thrown in to a fight club he wouldn’t fit, he wouldn’t do very good and that kind of how I felt. I don’t do this fighting to the death, I just do golf.

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Clock Lloyd on 38 different instruments!!



Full Lloyd Miller youtube channel here, you'll lose a morning at the very least!

Buy OST from Conch (more links in Malcolm Catto interview post just downstairs from here), they also have the excellent Lifetime In Oriental Jazz collection on Jazzman, that is a very serious record indeed - highly recommended.
Go to cdbaby to check the original Oriental Jazz album, it's a stunner!
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More of Lloyd's wit wisdom and possibly slanderous chat in Part Two.....soon come!

Malcolm Catto Interview....

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This interview was a bit last minute and so was done by email. That initially bummed me out, I've been keeping my vinyl greedy eye on Mr Catto for quite some time, at least since he flummoxed me with his breaks (breakbeats that is not the turgid music style so beloved by our trans-Tasman cousins) album on Mo Wax, if not before. Thankfully he was generous with his answers via the interweb, I don't bother posting some of the email interviews up here but this'un is well worth it.
Hanyways his name in the credits and on the pots and pans, is invariably a portent of a soon come, fiscal exchange and happy challenging listening in my book.. what more can I say. Read on, links and stinks at the t'other end.

How did the project come about?
The project came about after a session, which myself, Jake and Lloyd recorded about a year ago for Gerald .The session was subsequently released on the Jazzman label, although me and Jake felt at the time a little cornered into playing straight Swing / Jazz, which by our own admission was something we had neither really played before or expressed an interest in. However Lloyd was encouraging enough and seemed genuinely pleased with our efforts. Two things were apparent to us on that first meeting with Lloyd, firstly his undoubted musical abilities and secondly the ease in which he could overdub various exotic Eastern instruments over the top of each other. We had several hours of recorded material that was not wholly representative of the Heliocentrics collective, but material we knew would both benefit greatly from and compliment Lloyd’s musical style. We selected and sent Lloyd 10 backing tracks which were mainly Jazz or World orientated as a starting point and he initially seemed quite excited by the project though not without certain reservations.

How was the experience of working with Lloyd, he seems a singular man!
Lloyd, Jake and myself are all fairly pig headed and there were times when the clash of musical ideologies left us all feeling a tad compromised and mentally drained. However, there is know doubt a great deal of common fertile ground between us, particularly in our appreciation of Modal Jazz and World music which was easily enough to get us through. Lloyd was a lot happier when we moved onto creating music from scratch having got the backing tracks out of the way as a kind of musical security if needed. We definitely learnt a lot from Lloyd during those sessions and went along with most of his ideas even to the point of attempting some New Orleans Jazz. Lloyd on the other hand has stronger moral issues with music than us and when we get off into our thing like say “Lloyds diatribe”, we would at the end of the track find that if Lloyd had not indeed left the building, he had certainly left the room.

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Was it very different to working with Mulatu? (we went to Australia to see him play with your saxophonist James Arben, and it was excellent btw)
Very different, Mulatu is perhaps Lloyds’ nemesis in that he is very open to experimenting and electronics etc, and except for a few of his own compositions he gave us carte blanche with complete freedom to produce the LP as we saw fit. With “OST” however there was very little production but a lot of editing as Lloyd is opposed to all things electronic and on the whole we tried to capture the sessions with a sort of Blue note transparency and purity, this comes across better on the CD.

Did the project stretch the Heliocentrics?
Yes, it made us think in different terms about music and our process in creating it. We have ended up perhaps with something more traditional and easier on the ears than we would have done with fewer restrictions, but by the same token there is a subtlety and certain beauty that pervades the release that we must attribute to Lloyds’ guidance.
Overall “OST” encompasses much of both musical parties, creating, as is the point of collaborative projects, something that neither of us could or would have done alone. It’s a bit like a mutually good deal where both parties feel slightly cheated: if one of us felt we had got totally the record we wanted it might have been one sided.

Lloyd was really enthusiastic about the other material that wasn't released yet, how did the selection process work out?
Quinton who jointly runs Strut records had the very last say on what went on or off, though Lloyd and ourselves fought our corners for tracks we wanted on till the last. From our perspective there is a lot of heavier and darker material that Lloyd would not allow on that we wanted to include and some more traditional acoustic numbers he wanted on that we didn’t, for example the ‘New Orleans Jazz abomination’.

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Lloyd was very complimentary about you all, especially you and Jake, but he said 'you learned quick, but forgot slow' referring to what he calls 'jittering hip hop and rock' -I thought it was a beautiful turn of phrase but what's your feelings on that statement? (it's all exceedingly smooth to my ears)
We were certainly not Lloyds’ ideal band, Jazz chops being pretty thin on the ground and what with our heavy use of electronics etc, though I guess he can do exactly the thing he wants with his guys in Salt Lake. There are quite a few of us and influences start from the 1930’s blues through to Drum and Bass. Lloyd music stopped on 1960, he is a living historical musical snapshot, a bit like the cars in Cuba. But because of that, unlike many of his more seasoned counterparts, he evaded the horrors of late 70’s & 80’s fusion and the likes of slap bass, gated drums etc, and consequently has an integrity rarely seen in musicians who consistently feel the need to be ‘modern’.

What else do you have coming up for yourself and the Heliocentrics?
We are working on our own album, experimenting with different sounds and home-made instruments. There are many musicians we would love to collaborate with in the future including possible further work with Mulatu, and Lloyd if he is up for it!



Heliocentrics are
Malcolm Catto – drums & piano
Jake Ferguson – bass & Thai guitar
Mike Burnham – modular synth & effects
Jack Yglesias – flutes, percussion & santur
Adrian Owusu – guitars, oud & percussion
James Arben – clarinet, tenor & baritone sax
Ray Carless – alto, tenor & baritone sax
Max Weissenfeldt – vibes & percussion
Khadijatou Doyneh(K2 Wordplay) – vocals
Neil Yates - Trumpet
Byron Wallen - Trumpet
Ollie Parfitt - Keyboards
James Allsopp - Saxes, Bass Clarinet
Shabaka Hutchings - Saxes, Clarinet

Still rate this album big time, check Conch.
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This is what we're talking about upstairs.
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BUY LLOYD MILLER & THE HELIOCENTRICS 'O.S.T.' locallly, hinternationally, digitally.......NOWWWWWWWWWW!

Heliocentrics on the web at Now Again
Heliocentrics myspace

Check the next post (Lloyd MIller interview Part One) to hear a track from the album.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Stinky Grooves 12.10.10 and $.99 Dreams cos nothing is really free

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THAT'S RIGHT!!! CLUB SANDWICH THIS SATURDAY AT THE GINGER MINX FROM 9PM. GEEZER GUY, CIAN & YOURS TRULY SLANGING THE TUNES AND SLINGING THE RHYTHMS.. ABSOLUTELY FREEEEEEEEEEE... LOVE TO SEE YOU THERE (AND AROMATHERAPY AS EVER THIS THURSDAY FROM 8.30-ISH)

As Mi Forward - Busy Signal, Etana, Netna etc (Necessary Mayhem)
Breeze (Goldplate) - General Levy (Necessary Mayhem)
Dash It Better - Joey Fever (Necessary Mayhem)
Done Brutality - Glmma Kid (Necessary Mayhem)
Sess Weh Yu Want - Top Cat (Necessary Mayhem)
Jam - Da Grynch (Necessary Mayhem)
Shaolin Temple (Ugly Dub) - Da Grynch (Necessary Mayhem)
Keep It Real - Cocoa Tea ( J Rod)
Get Real - Capleton (J Rod)
Under Fire - Konshens & Tifa (Fat Eyes)
Anything - Natalie Storm (Fat Eyes)
Like A Gypsy - Kenyatta Fire (Kenyatta Fire)
Hush (Iggy Iggy) (Douster Rmx) - Tim Turbo ft Spoek Mathambo/Gnucci Banana (Big-N-Hairy)
Pengeleng - Busy Signal (Loud Disturbance)
Matty Belly - Kimanda (Loud Disturbance)
Oye Pappi - Mercci (Loud Disturbance)
Yengeh Riddim - Mafia McKoy (Loud Disturbance)
Gaeton - Collateral Soundtrack (soundcloud)
Stanley & Stuff (Copia Doble Rmx) - System (Rump Recordings)
Cumbia Kikuchi - Greenwood Rhythm Coalition (Names You Can Trust)
Capricorn One (Mixterpan Rmx) Anti-Pop Consortium (soundcloud)
Not Paid Enough (DJ Kentaro Rmx) - Coldcut (Ninja Tune)
Only You - Dam Native (Heart)
Shapeshift (Instrumental) - The Dells (Big Dada)
Archipeligo - Teebs (All City)
One Question Remains - $.99 Dreams ($.99 Dreams)
Broken Fingers (Original Version) - Ronny & Renzo (King Kung Foo)
Hearts - oOoOO (Tri Angle)
Kadermin Oyunu - Adja Pekkan (Bazouki Joe)
Dokus Sekiz - Okay Temiz (Bazouki Joe)
Bardo Thodol - Demdike Stare (Modern Love)
Deliver The Weird (Dorian Concept Rmx) - Clifford Gilberto (Ninja Tune)
Bozak - Frisvold & Lindbaek (Full Pupp)
Spak & Spenning - Frisvold & Lindbaek (Full Pupp)
Electric To Me Turn - Bruce Haack (Stones Throw)
Meteorite - $.99 Dreams ($.99 Dreams)
Neko - Rustie (Warp)
The King - Bruce Haack (Stones Throw)
Don't You Think I Do - James Blake (R&S)
Golden Moments - Kyle Hall (Ninja Tune)
Hang On (Kinky Electric Noise Chicha Rmx) - Unitone HiFi (Round Trip Mars)
Hang On (Unitone Remix of K.E.N. Chicha Rmx) - Unitone HiFi (Round Trip Mars)
Ofterschwang - Juergen Paape (Kompakt)
Like A Chicken - The Witch (Now Again)
Cumbia y Guitarra - Los Mirlos (INS)
El Hueleguiso - Manzanita y su Comjunto (Barbes)
El Platanito - Los Dinamicos Del Ritmo (Safari)
Free To Funk - Sub Version (Soul Jazz)


Had hoped to have Lloyd Miller and Malcolm Catto interview stuff up here by now, not to mention an Aloe Blacc natter that was scheduled for Real Groove (RIP) - but life has a habit of getting in the way. I vow that I'll have at least a chunk of one of them up tomorrow come rain or shine (not that weather has anything to do with my promiscuity on the procrastinatory tip).

To keep you nourished in the meantime here's something that ties in rather nicely to the Malcolm Catto biz, as the nearest thing I can think of to compare $.99 Dreams to is the stunning and elusive 10" project MRR-ADM he was involved in a year or two back. This Brooklyn duo, Matt Crane and Adam Diller, are similarly al fresco when it comes to song structure and seismic synth squiggles over terrifyingly tasty drums, and there's just a relaxed (not to mention space bound) vibe to their gear that frankly... me gusto mucho. As you might guess from their name and the stratospheric slice below, there's also a touch of the op shop and dusty digulatory doings in their sonic stew, and that's as welcome as a proper oper, no clauses, summer's day round these parts right now. As in very.

They have a few releases which you can find through their bandcamp or website or even their myspace, so you know the M.O., dip your toe in with the treat below then fully submerge ...avec le wallet...and support the bleeding artists dem.

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METEORITE - $.99 DREAMS


Hopefully see you Saturday for a crust-free, crucial cracker with Cian and Geezer Guy, or Thursday for the regular administration of Aromatherapy- or failing that, back here for a dose of Lloyd Miller/Heliocentrics hoo-ha, chattery and stuff on Wednesday (which it already is).

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Heartcial housekeeping - new Unitone HiFi Rmx and upcoming Lloyd Miller

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Ahoy.. coupla things that deserve mention.
Our Floridian feller on the keys, K.E.N. (Kinky Electric Noise) has whanged up his remix of our Unitone HiFi track 'Hang On' on his soundcloud page. The timing couldn't be better with interest in chicha running high with Vampisoul's recent comp and the release of Roots Of Chicha Vol2 imminent on Barbes (and it's very good btw, more on that soon). You know the story there's a hundred downloads, so don't ....erm...Hang On, if you want to get your hands on it. It's embedded below and soon we'll also unleash our remix of Kinky Electric Noise's remix of us, does that sound confusing? As K.E.N. points out it's kind of turned into a hinternational collaboration and that is a fine thing in this day and age.. A grand job was done on this by Ken, Tom Hernandez and Caballo (thanks!) so please have a graze and leave a comment on soundcloud should you feel driven to do so

Unitone HiFi - Hang On (Kinky Electric Noise Chicha Remix) by Kinky Electric Noise

Also the latest and last ever Real Groove is out and includes my chat with Wrongtom about his album with Roots Manuva, Duppy Writer, the usual Mixed Messages malarkey (covering CIAfrica, Aardvark and the Ninja Tune XX Anniversary releases) and the fascinating and throughly outlandish interview I had with Oriental Jazz supremo Lloyd Miller and his unlikely collaborator Malcolm Catto. As promised I will be running the bulk of the transcript up here and there's some great stuff from Malcolm and Lloyd, I'll endeavour to have that (or at least part 1, Lloyds interview was looooooong and involved) on these very pages by the end of the week, even later today if things don't get too manic..
So hold tight and don't come running to me if you miss out on Kinky Electric Noise's chicha rub of our humble NZ cumbia because it's just a click away.
Consider yourself PSA'd.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Stinky Grooves 05.10.10 and a tip top Turkish tipple

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Boogieman (King Jammy Dub) - Coldcut (Ninja Tune)
Skanky Panky (Wrongtom Rmx) - Kid Koala (Ninja Tune)
Man In The Garage (King Jammy Vocal) - Coldcut (Ninja Tune)
Tune In (Version) - The Bug (Ninja Tune)
Stanley & Stuff (Copia Doble Remix) - System (Rump Recordings)
Dancehallette - Frikstailers (ZZK)
Cumbia Kikuchi - Greenwood Rhythm Coalition (Names We Can Trust)
Paraiso - Sonora (bandcamp)
Fuego (Frikstailers Rmx) - Bomba Estereo (Nacional)
Cumbia De La 45th - DJ Dice (soundcloud)
La Grimas (Future Feelings remix)- Carla Morrison (soundcloud)
Ofterschwang - Juergen Paape (Kompakt)
The Falling (Doomed Rmx) - Roots Manuva (Ninja Tune)
The Majestic - Dam Native (Heart)
The Son Part II - Dam Native (Heart)
Weak Bladder - Afrikan Boy
Merry Go Round ft Chezelle Bingham - Mystro (Self Destruct Music)
Fates Say - Daedelus (All City)
Set The Phazers To Stun (Richard Norris Rmx) - The Time & Space Machine (Tirk)
Iciyorum - Ajda Pekkan (Bazouki Joe)
Karni Buyuk Koca Dunya - Onder Bali (Bazouki Joe)
Emafini - Spokes Mashiyane (Gallotone New Sound)
Pico Pico - Los Pico
Vietnam - Los Pankis (Do Re Mi)
La Muerte Del Lobo - Los Vagos De Paramonga (Decibel)
Klavierwerke - James Blake (R&S)
Frequencies - King Midas Sound (Hyperdub)
Air - Black Chow (Soul Jazz)
Caged In Stammheim - Demdike Stare (Modern Love)
Golden Moments - Kyle Hall (Ninja Tune)
Round And Round - Offshore (Big Dada)
Capone - George Lenton (soundcloud)
Forward - George Lenton (soundcloud)
Broken Fingers - Ronny & Renzo (King Kung Foo)
Dark Lady (Alix Perz Rmx) - DJ Food (Ninja Tune)
Strange Days - Daedelus (All City)
Tropenkoller - SF (Not On Label)
Heart - 0O0OO (Tri Angle)
Before And After Light - CFCF (RVNG)
A Bold World (Scott Detail Rmx) - Medictune (Bassweight)
Sound Mirrors (Grasscut Dub) - Coldcut (Ninja Tune)

There isn't a great deal I can tell you about Onder Bali and his clarinet, apart from I be rating 'em. I can however tell you that Bali is still dishing out the damage with his reedy top ranking rhythms, as he is involved in the 25 piece Istanbul Clarinet Choir, which is something I would like to behold or behear or however you do that. I read about that in the excellently named journal Today's Zaman, if I had more time I wouldn't mind spending it knocking around places like that..
This track, originally released on the Boncuk label in 1973 is from the mighty fine Turkish Freakout comp on Bazouki Joe which may not have the cachet of a Finders Keepers etc release, but has the tunes nonetheless. In fact I'd say in consistency terms this is a personal best on the ancient anatolian audio tip. Get to it..... (and a magnanimatory ta to KH on this'un)

Buy the Turkish Freakout comp on CD don't think it's digital fileyfacted thus far..

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KARNI BUYUK KOCA DUNYA - ONDER BALI

Aromatherapy will be on this Thursday, apologies to anyone who showed up expecting me last week, though frankly being left in the safe hands of Snr Scratch 22 you were probably better off.
Club Sandwich with Geezer Guy and Cian is coming up on Saturday October 16th, I will (somewhat unwillingly) be pinging the flyer up for that when someone sends one to me.....

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Tomorrow at the KA, a right old reggae conference

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Hopefully regular runnings will be resumed next week. In the meantime I will be joining nigh on everyone tomorrow at the KA to spin a quick set. It's a fast and furious bill so action packed half hour sets is the go, I'll be under starters orders from 3.30 and in the stables by 4.
Only a fiver on the door; spring is in the air, see you there etc etc