The A side of the B mix posted last week reveals two roughly 15 minutes snatches from the Solid Steel shows two weeks previous. I used to tape my own contributions live from the radio where and when I could, that’s not to say I didn’t want to listen to the others’ contributions, it was more a necessity as I would have been swimming in cassettes otherwise. Kicking off with a short Wagon Christ track from Throbbing Pouch (Luke always has such great titles) into a snatch of ambience that I can’t identify. Paul Schutze’s stunning ‘The Mutant Beautific’ enters, sounding like something from Eno and Byrne’s My Life In The Bush of Ghosts or one of Jon Hassel’s Fourth World albums. Utterly dark and beautiful, this originally appeared on his New Maps of Hell album in 1992 but I would have been playing it from the Assemblage compilation, a collection of tracks from artists on the Australian Extreme label. This was given away with releases around this time as a primer for the label and a lot of the content fitted into my more ambient sets.

Scanner’s ‘Arc’ is still one of my absolute favourites from Robin Rimbaud, nestling at the end of his Spore album, followed my another Wagon Christ selection – ‘Intermission’ from the aforementioned LP – looks like I was playing a largely ambient set this week. A regular artist on the Extreme label was Muslimgauze whose ‘Infidel’ appeared in all manner of variations on an EP and perfectly encapsulates his sound. Sadly he passed away in 1999 but was so prolific during his lifetime (he released ten albums in 1996 alone) that releases have still been forthcoming. We’re rudely interrupted by an edit into the next show and propelled into Bedouin Ascent’s ‘Crouched On Broken Glass’ – a brilliant piece of complex programming that is well worth investigating along with his first two albums on Rising High for some top shelf ambient techno. Yet another artist who appeared on the JDJ mix (not this track but one from the same EP) and who hasn’t released anything for over a decade. The Black Dog’s equally stunning rework of Phenomyna’s ’Into The Other World’ appears from Kirk Degiorgio’s Art Records before a snatch of ‘K/V’ from Ultramarine’s Bel Air album plays us out.

Mix URL:

Track list:
Wagon Christ – Night Owls
Unknown – Unknown
Paul Schutze – The Mutant Beautific
Scanner – Arc
Wagon Christ – Intermission
Muslimgauze – Infidel
Bedouin Ascent – Crouched On Broken Glass
Phenomyna – Into The Other World (Explained by The Black Dog)
Ultramarine – K/V

An early one from 1995 where I’m still referred to as ‘Telepathic Kev’ by Jon but am now fully ensconced in the Solid Steel family, recording most weeks along with Matt, Jon and PC or a combination of, depending who was available. This 45 minute mix runs the gamut of tasty electronica, trip hop, drum n bass (on 33 and 45) and acid electro.

Starting off with the modular bleeps of Death’s ‘The High Cost of Living’ (how relevant), a totally silver 12” with only a sticker to tell you the contents. This was Thomas P. Heckmann’s only release under this name, quite a full on start to the show but always nice to lead off with something weird. Barry Adamson’s excellent ‘Dead Heat’ follows at half time, I’ve never understood why he doesn’t get more props, his solo records in the 90s and through into the 21st century are perfectly observed slices of soundtrack, to the point of pastiche at times but still, I know guys who tried to get those kinds of feels for years and couldn’t do as well as he. Stepping back up to double time is Photek’s ‘The Water Margin’ – then a new release – which then gets switched down from 45 to 33 rpm to play as a laidback 120 bpm breakbeat roller, a trick we’d repeat on the Journey’s By DJ mix later that year.

Zoot Woman were one of the first releases on the fledgling Wall of Sound label at the time and an early alias of Stuart Price’s, ‘A Time That’s Closer’ is a hidden beauty of a track from their debut Sweet To The Wind EP that I still love to this day. If someone were to get me to compile a collection of hidden gems from the trip hop era, this would be one of them. Jon sounds like he needs the soothing tones from the track and I sometimes think I tested his patience with some of my more out there selections. J Saul Kane’s remix of the Sabres’ ‘Tow Truck’ thunders in after what would have been an ad break, few people could do beats as heavy as he could, wish he’d put some more music out. The Rockers Hi-Fi track seems to have beats from Audio Two’s ‘Top Billin’ over it or is that me mixing? There’s also a snatch of a jungle track from Section 47 that doesn’t fully play but I looked it up and now it goes for a fair bit – long gone from my collection though.

Gescom’s amazing ‘Mag’ appears, probably for the first time, this would also crop up on the JDJ mix later and was titled because of an Ultra Magnetic MCs sample that runs throughout. Mixed out before the drop of that oh so hard to judge breakdown and into Tranquility Bass’ classic, ‘Cantamilla’, a huge club tune at the time. Jon mentions ‘the blue label 12”’ as there were two doing the rounds at the time, the other one with a gold label, with different tracks and mixes on it. A change of tempo into Wagon Christ’s ‘Scrapes’ from his Throbbing Pouch album on Rising High, still one of his best in a huge discography for my money. This was were I felt he started to find his voice and it’s an album that works from start to finish. I love the little voices he brings in then reverses, a great late night album which I always think of as a trip hop record but this track disproves. Some killer acid from Link in the form of ‘Antacid’ and then the other side of the Gescom 12” with ‘Snakwitch’ which sounds like they’re cutting up some sort of film soundtrack over electro beats. I designed the labels for said 12” and the sandwich toaster on one side is my old one from the 90’s techno trivia fans.

That’s all for this session, next week there’s the A side of this tape with sections from two previous weeks’ shows dated 17th and 24th March 1995. I’m off to Ramsgate tonight to play at the Music Hall and premier my new Quadraphon show, no idea what will happen, it could be a breath of fresh air, it could be a disastrous folly. All I know is that this is where my head is at in terms of DJing right now and I’m so far out of my comfort zone that it’s got to be a good thing.

Track list:
Death – The High Cost of Living
Barry Adamson – Dead Heat
Photek – The Water Margin (on 33 rpm)
Zoot Woman – A Time That’s Closer
Sabres of Paradise – Tow Truck (J Saul Kane remix)
Rockers Hi-Fi – More & More (Heavy Persuasion Mix)
Section 47 – Drought
Gescom – Mag
Tranquility Bass – Cantamilla
Wagon Christ – Scrapes
Link – Antacid
Gescom – Snakwitch

A mixed bag of then current music and what an embarrassment of riches! From contemporary psyche rock instrumental beats to post electroclash tracks and downtempo sample-fests.
The Giallos Flame first came to my attention via the DC Recordings 12” that the opening track was taken from, of which the mix title is a play on as this set was recorded when I was living in Dulwich. I know the Cdr says ‘Dunwich’ but that’s wrong and so is the date, being when it was recorded, not broadcast. Following swiftly is an early Heliocentrics track from a Jazzman 45 followed my another track from the aforementioned Live From Dunwich 12”. DC Recordings were on a ridiculously good run at this point with releases from The Emperor Machine, Padded Cell, Tom Tyler, The Oscillation and White Line Circus, all wrapped in gorgeous La Boca artwork and the Padded Cell remix of Future Loop Foundation’s ‘The Sea & The Sky’ is still a banger to this day and cheap as chips.

Keeping the tempo high there’s the Ted Nugget-sampling ‘Shake A Fist’ from Hot Chip, an amazing Optimo remix of Prinzhorn Dance School’s ‘Space Invader’ (check the 303 breakdown) and LCD’s ’Sound of Silver’ which I seemed to think sounded like Frankie’s ‘Relax’ in the middle, hence the acappella overdub. Racing through ‘other mystery beats’ as Matt Black always used to call the ones he couldn’t recall – Mr 76ix was a Skam records artist who sounds like he’s sampling a snatch of the Ronnie Corbett ’Sorry’ theme tune in there. The Shocking Pinks remixed by the Glimmers I barely recall but would have been sent on promo, mining that Liquid Liquid percussion sound repopularised by the DFA crew. More spy jazz Giallos Flame with a mystery preacher sermon too low in the mix and then Indoor Life’s ‘Archeology’ which must have been on a compilation as it’s an old 80s track on Celluloid. A quick look on Discogs confirms that it was on a B-Music comp titled after the track itself, dig and dig and dig indeed.

The excellent but sadly none too prolific Mr Chop (these days simply known as Chop) is up next from his Jazz & Milk release, ‘Sounds From The Cave’, he’s go on to get picked up by Now Again Records for a few releases and has also since had a 10” out on the coveted Drumetrics series. I don’t recall the Kid Acne ‘Sliding Beats’ either but what a banging beat, seems it was the instrumental of his ‘Sliding Doors’ release on Lex, co-written with Req One, mixed by Ross Orton and mastered by Rob Gordon no less! Next is a brace of Bullion’s breakthrough mash up of Jay D/Dilla beats and Beach Boys samples. So good I included four in a row, mainly because they were quite short too, he turns an unlikely alliance into something quite magic and forms a third ‘artist’ in the process which is what the best mash ups are all about. I’d been contemplating a Beach Boys sample-fest of my own for some years but he took it further than I ever could, I must revisit that record soon, it still sounds fresh.

For the last section we go deeper into sample territory, starting with what, for my money, is one of the first sample records in pop – Eno and Byrne’s My Life In The Bush of Ghosts and the spooky ‘Come With Us’. I could rhapsodise about this album until the cows come home as it’s one of my favourite records ever but Gescom throw any reverence away, shoving the whole thing into some sample chopping and rearranging programme that expertly reconfigures it from a meandering ramble into an uptempo electro stomp. Add in Murcof’s darkly creeping ambience over the end and you have something quite special as the track contorts and breaks down under its own complexity. ‘Cosmos 1’ is from the fourth of his five album debut run with the Leaf label and what a fine group of albums. This melts into the final track from the sole release by The Dead Soul Brothers, a record I don’t recall ever having but which may have come to me digitally by this point as it’s 2007 and methods of distribution were changing fast every year in the music business and they got hold of the digital realm.

Track list:
The Giallos Flame – Live From Dunwich
Heliocentrics – Dance of the Dogon
The Giallos Flame – Crime Squad
Future Loop Foundation – The Sea & The Sky (Padded Cell remix)
Hot Chip – Shake A Fist
Prinzhorn Dance School – You Are The Space Invader (Optimo remix)
LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver
Mr 76ix – Romanticism
Shocking Pinks – Smoke Screen (12″s & A Bit More by The Glimmers)
The Giallos Flame – Live From Dunwich
Indoor Life – Archeology
Mr Chop – Snob
Kid Acne – Sliding Beats (instrumental)
Bullion – Let’s Be Friends
Bullion – Pet Sounds
Bullion – Sloop Jay D
Bullion – Don’t Talk (Close Your Eyes)
Brian Eno & David Byrne – Come With Us
Gescom – B1
Murcof – Cosmos 1
Dead Soul Brothers – Overtime

The CDr tells me this is a longer edit of the set that finishes the live in Tofino gig I posted part 1 of last week – at 42 minutes I assume only 30 mins was used on the show. While there was a snatch of what I presume was the Dreadlock Holiday mash up 2 Many DJs did with Destiny’s Child creeping in at the end of that set, we blast into Quantic Soul Orchestra’s ’Super 8’ here. I remember Will from Quantic telling me he’d recorded those drums on a mini disc at the time and this was when everyone was trying to put drums down to tape to get that ‘analogue distortion’ – sounds like mini disc worked pretty good too. This was a raucous 45 and the first of many killer cuts Tru Thoughts put out in the 00’s that established the label. Gotta say, that ‘Poppa Large’ acappella sits nicely over the top, some quick cuts between Dennis Coffey and the Mowhawks funk classics and Breakestra retread of ‘Humpty Dance’ and then into a pairing I’d completely forgotten about.

The pairing of Playgroup’s ‘Number One’ with the dub mix of Time Zone’s ‘The Wildstyle’ works amazingly well until the end when things get a bit messy as they’re adding odd spoken word over the top – must revisit that and maybe do a re-edit. Into the bonus beats of Talking Heads’ ‘Once in a Lifetime’ classic before a quick flip over into the vocal and a rather messy mix of ‘Apache’ being cut up by Grandmaster Flash from the BBE sampler. I was rocking the odd country number that breaks down into an amazing break by the name of ‘Saga of the Blue Beaver’ at the time and then we go full on party time with Mr On’s cheeky pairing of ‘Don’t Stop ’Til You Get Enough’ with ‘Breathe & Stop’ – one of the better early mash ups. Then what sounds like an edit brings us to a pumped up electro version of Prince’s ‘Kiss’ – no idea who did this, any ideas? We’re veering into cheese territory before Rufus Thomas’ ‘Itch & Scratch Pt.2’ pulls us back but, oh no – I’d really caught mash up fever around this time and Madison Avenue’s ‘Don’t Call Me Baby’ gets paired with Blur’s ‘Song 2’ and, to be fair, this absolutely tore it up at the time as it was all so new.

Back to the funk with Paul Humphrey & his Cool Aid Chemists with the awesome stop/start of ‘Funky L.A.’, galloping stormer of a 45 before a switch of tempo into a well known pairing of Mr Scruff’s ‘Ug’ with DJ Vadim’s ‘The Terrorist’ from the Now, Listen Solid Steel mix CD a year before. A snatch of Cut Chemist’s ‘Bunky’s Pick’ before Reuben Bell’s ’Superjock’ – given a second outing a year before with Cut and Shadow’s Brainfreeze 45s mix – and then a, frankly, ham-fisted mix into Q-Bert’s amazing scratch cut in the form of ‘Bear Witness’ by Doctor Octagon. I used to do a trick with Pharoah Monch’s ’Simon Says’ where I’d hold the Godzilla sample and scratch it into the Addams Family theme tune and this is what rounds the set out. It was originally created for the aforementioned Now, Listen mix but unfortunately we couldn’t license it (because they’d sampled Godzilla!) so I would do it at gigs and it always went down well once the crowd caught on.

Track list:
Quantic Soul Orchestra – Super 8
Ultramagnetic MCs – Poppa Large (acappella)
Dennis Coffey – Scorpio
The Mohawks – The Champ
Breaksetra – Humpty Dump
Playgroup – Number One
Time Zone – Wildstyle (Original 12″ dub mix)
Talking Heads – Once In A Lifetime/bonus beats
The Incredible Bongo Band – Apache (Grandmaster Flash Rock Steady Mix)
Beaver & Krause – Saga Of The Blue Beaver
Mr. On vs Jungle Brothers – Breathe Don’t Stop
Prince – Kiss (unknown electro mix)
Rufus Thomas – Itch & Scratch Pt.2
Unknown – Don’t Call Me Song 2
Paul Humphrey & his Cool Aid Chemists – Funky L.A.
Mr Scruff’s – Ug
DJ Vadim feat Motion Man – The Terrorist (acappella)
Cut Chemist – Bunky’s Pick
Reuben Bell – Superjock
Doctor Octagon – Bear Witness
Pharoah Monch – Simon Says

An odd assortment from mid 2002 here with a bit of party-style mash up, a bit of funk, some Four Tet and some cut ups thrown in, sounds a bit like I was tidying up some loose ends. The inclusion of ‘Milk’ by The Basic dates it instantly to around the time of DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist’s ‘Product Placement’ mix, of which this was a staple, both musically and visually. It’s also the first time Luke Vibert’s ‘Homewerk’ gets an airing, a track that would be in the record box from most of the decade and still comes out for the Kraftwerk Klassics, Kovers and Kurios set.

‘Yoda’s One Man Band’ sounds more like Kid Koala than he did back then and I’m not entirely sure it was serious. I never knew who the Freelance Hairdresser was, obviously a play on the Freelance Hellraiser and in early on with the mash up craze. Here he/she mixes the BBC Pot Black theme (Winifred Atwell – Black & White Rag) with Eminem to ‘hilarious’ effect, hasn’t dated a bit – but seriously, this is half of what I enjoyed about the bastard pop craze, it was ridiculous and unpretentious fun, mostly made by people who had nothing to lose.

‘Funk’ is, of course, the less famous B side to Meco’s huge disco-fied hit, ’Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band’ although something tells me they needed a filler track quickly for the flip and didn’t stop to think too hard about the title. Here comes Luke with his obvious steal homage to the Dusseldorf Quartet and I have to say, that tempo switch down mix out of it into Paul Kass is inspired. There’s also a link between the two as ‘Underground Agent’ is featured on the Further Nuggets compilation of library music that Luke made for Lo Recordings around this time.

And here’s The Basic with their advertisement for the dairy industry, not 100% sure where the spoken word about cows comes from that I’ve slung over it but it’s probably a Sesame Street sketch. I remember seeing the Product Placement show at, I think, the Scala of all places, in London. Shadow and Cut confounded a few people after the party-tastic ‘Brainfreeze’ set by digging pretty deep to the point where the tracks were cool but more of a head-nod than a get down. Z-Trip ripped it up on that show, pure showmanship with Nirvana cut ups and plenty of mic action.

A couple of Four Tet pieces follow, first, a remix for James Yorkson, and second, something he did for the Domino label which takes a big slabs of John Abercrombie’s ‘Timeless’ and weaves it into something beautiful. It comes as a 7”, split over two sides and features a photo of a young Kieran with his sister on the cover. We play out and turn off the light with Al Dente and Ill Chemist – friends of Steinski’s – and a little track from a CDr I was given I think as I can’t find it anywhere on the web. Nighty Night!

Track list:
DJ Yoda – Yoda’s One Man Band
Freelance Hairdresser – Marshall’s Been Snookered
Meco – Funk
Luke Vibert – Homewerk
Paul Kass – Underground Agent
The Basic – Milk
James Yorkson & the Athletes – The Lang Toun (Four Tet remix)
Four Tet – I’m On Fire (Part 2)
Al Dente and Ill Chemist – Nighty Night

Back for part 2 of the set from last week where Matt Black and I recorded a Solid Steel session in my bedroom as the KISS FM studios were booked out. This hour is a mix of the two of us but it’s hard to determine who played what so I’ve left the thing whole, the tape also started with Cypress Hill’s ’Scooby Doo’ but it was incomplete so I’ve cut it. I kick off with a snatch of the Psychic Warriors Ov Gaia’s majestic ‘Obsidian’ remix before Digital Underground’s ‘Packet Man’ – a tale of a sexual experience sold in a pill. A short snatch of a DJ Spike track precedes the newly released ‘Sound Of The Police’ from KRS 1’s Return Of The Boom Bap LP, a virtual classic as soon as it hit the streets before a ‘pause for the cause’ and into a bit of Matt on the decks. The Tape Beatles had become a spoken word staple on the show since the Orb visited and hipped Matt & Jon to their work and the first two tracks from their Music With Sound album feature here. Steve Reich was also a mainstay of shows, continually popping up over the years in different mixes with his minimalist works, joined here by a spoken word piece, read by Matt’s dad. Out of this comes another ambient classic, ‘Flurescence’ (spelling as on the record) from Jonah Sharp’s debut EP as Spacetime Continuum, another track that got many outings in the early 90s.

A NSFW sketch about vinyl opens the next section with a a near ‘C bomb’ moment quickly cut with a fader. Tournesol’s ‘Holy Cow’ was a bumping trip hop-y moment on their Kokotsu album for R&S, followed by early Chemical Brothers when they were still masquerading under the Dust Brothers’ moniker with ‘If You Kling To Me I’ll Klong To You’. Brian Eno’s ‘Alternative 3’ from Music For Films creeps in with the exorcism from the I Am Lucifer album which I only finally found last year, always a favourite of Matt’s and one he used extensively on the show. The Future Sound of London’s ‘Lifeforms (Path 2)’ was new at the time too, what a time to be alive! I wish I knew what the track following was but it’s gone and Shazam doesn’t know either. Likewise with the burbling acid track after that although I do recognise some bits of David Sylvian & Holger Czukay’s ‘Plight & Premonition’ in there somewhere but it might be as a sample. Ah, here comes Global Communication according to Matt although I can’t identify the track and neither can he (I’m not entirely sure it’s them actually). Matt’s dad crops up again reading a passage about ‘the 9th world’, “How does an eye work? How does a foot work?” – another spoken word favourite. It’s all beginning to blur into one ambient mass around this stage until we get to Attica Blues’ ‘Contemplating Jazz (D’Afro’s Picky Head Dub)’ which plays us out only to be rudely interrupted by the KISS news jingle.

Track list:
Psychic Warriors of Gaia – Obsidian (Organically Decomposed)
Digital Underground – Packet Man
KRS 1 – Sound Of The Police
The Tape Beatles – Beautiful State / Green, Blue Beautiful Place
Steve Reich – Six Pianos
Spacetime Continuum – Flurescence
Monty Python – Vinyl record sketch
Tournesol – Holy Cow
Dust Brothers – If You Kling To Me I’ll Klong To You
Brian Eno – Alternative 3
The Future Sound Of London – Lifeforms (Path 2)
Unknown – Unknown
Unknown – Unknown (Global Communication?)
Attica Blues – Contemplating Jazz (D’Afro’s Picky Head Dub)

Happy New Year for 2023! I hope it was fun for you all, sorry this is late today, I’ve been deep in design and gig mode, opening for The Art of Noise two nights in a row at the Jazz Cafe. On with the show I promised in the last entry.
Matt Black rang up one day in the summer of 1994, there was a problem. KISS FM had been booked out, both studios, for the Friday pre-record so he needed somewhere else to record the show that week. I’m not sure if Jon More was around, maybe away DJing with PC? I’m also not sure the exact turn of events aside from KISS wasn’t available but could he come over and do the show at mine? Wow, this was a turn up for the books, I’d only been a guest on the show for just over a year, had a handful or more under my belt and was becoming part of the crew due to now providing artwork for the label as well as the odd gig away with Coldcut. OK, come over to East Dulwich and set up in my bedroom and record Solid Steel, why don’t you? Holy shit!

At the time I shared a house with Chantal Passamonte (Mira Calix further down the line), David Vallade and Mario Aguera and we had hosted the original Telepathic Fish party in the three story house above a chemists on Goose Green which we’d dubbed 102 Central. Mario had by now started working with Hex as a computer programmer and David and Chantal were working in Ambient Soho, the record shop in Berwick St, Soho, while I was up the road at Books Etc. on Oxford Street. At the time I had three decks set up in my room, a couple of Technics and something else I forget, not sure what the mixer was but it was the same one on the cover of the Funkjazztical Tricknology compilation. I also had a keyboard, a drum machine, CD player and an odd flanger guitar pedal hooked up – see the blurry photo for reference. Matt came down and we took turns playing into a portable DAT player he’d bought along I think. Can’t remember what we used for a mic but it was probably a pair of headphones plugged into the mic. input hence the terrible sound quality. I think the Coldcut jingles were flown in off cassette and this recording was probably taken from the radio broadcast as it has the KISS news jingle added onto the end, probably live by the sound engineer.

Starting off with a then holy trinity of electronica pioneers Autechre, MuZiq and Caustic Windown (Aphex Twin) tells you we’re in the golden age of Artificial Intelligence era electronica. AI only took another 30 years to become part of everyday life. None of the tracks here have aged badly either, I still play the Aphex track out sometimes too. Following ‘On The Romance Tip’ (where did that title originate? It’s not on the record anywhere) there’s an elongated trance-ish acid thing that makes me think it might be European. Shazam gives me nothing and the ears don’t recognise it at all – anyone? Starts about 11 mins in and bubbles away for another four minutes until Global Communication’s ‘Sublime Creation’ races in on 45 instead of 33, sounding not far off Acen’s ‘Trip To The Moon’ in places.

Cut for an ad break and more Glob Comm with the opening track to their classic 76’14 album, ‘4’02’ with the opening of The Orb’s remix of Material’s ‘Praying Mantra’ slurped over, a common DJ tool of mine. Another was the phasing, filtered and panning intro to Mergener / Weisser’s ‘Sunbeam’ from a New Age Music comp on Klaus Schulze’s Innovative Communication label that Mixmaster Morris had hipped me to, I think I found this in Beanos or somewhere along Berwick St. on my lunch break one day in Soho. This can be heard bridging ‘4’02’ and Kraftwerk’s ‘The Man Machine’ classic, which needs no introduction. Out of the other Fab Four into Coldcut’s own ‘Eine Kleine Hed Musik’ – fresh on vinyl from the extra disc that accompanied the Ninja Tune vinyl version of the album and first heard opening the original Coldcut meets The Orb radio show on New Year’s Eve 1991/92. Which brings us full circle, 31 years later… exit Matt Black stating, ‘Openmind in the house, or rather I’m in Openmind’s house!’

Track list:
Autechre – Lost
MuZiq – Nettles & Pralines
Caustic Window – On The Romance Tip
Unknown – unknown
Global Communication – Sublime Creation (on 45)
Global Communication – 4’02
Kraftwerk – The Man Machine
Coldcut – Eine Kleine Hed Musik

A quick half hour from mid 2000 when we first started doing BBC London Live with Solid Steel, hence the title (despite pre-recording it in my studio in SE5). Kicking off with Taskforce from the amazing Voice of the Great Outdoors EP – still one of the defining releases of UK hip hop. Lots of space-themed samples overlaid including bits of Ren & Stimpy’s ‘Space Madness’ episode and then into Icarus’ UL-6 from their single on Output, each cover of which was ripped and torn or defaced in some way. I’d gone a bit overboard with the spoken word as it was an early show on the Beeb and I wanted to make a good impression. Funkstorung’s ‘Grammy Winners’ still sounds fresh 22 years later, featuring an MC called Triple H who appears to have done very little else.

Bowery Electric were a really interesting band who had excellent remixes and their ‘Freedom Fighter’ one is my favourite, made by the band themselves and featuring snatches of Kraftwerk, the combination of vocals, strings and beats just works for me. Cherrystones’ ‘Pressure Cooker’ appeared on the short-lived AP.E. Records, what a fertile time this was, all sorts kicking off. Off to LA for a few tracks with P.U.T.S., Jurassic 5’s incredible ‘Swing Set’ and a swing-based oldie from Fishbone. Nice little nod to the BBC’s Bush house in a sample over Jurassic too, I think the ‘horn master’ answer phone message before Fishbone is actually DJ Vadim playing silly buggers. Morgan put out an album and a number of singles on Source around 2000 but never quite hit. Divine Styler’s ‘Concept Design Deflon’ was from Mo Wax’s again short-lived Vecta label – so futuristic. My friend Tamsin leaves a message that she was going to see the new Star Wars at the very end – this was unfortunately to be The Phantom Menace and we know how that ended.

Tracklist:
Taskforce – Cosmic Gypsies
Icarus – UL-6
Funkstorung – Grammy Winners
Bowery Electric – Freedom Fighter (remix)
Cherrystones – Pressure Cooker (Blues In M.A.)
People Under The Stairs – Live at the Fishbucket
Jurassic 5 – Swing Set
Fishbone – In The Name of Swing
Morgan – Let Me Hear Your music
Divine Styler – Concept Design Deflon

Drunken shenanigans reigned last Friday night at The Book & Record Bar’s Stick It On night where we were all having so much fun no one noticed that it was approaching 2am and Michael, the shop’s owner, only has a license until 1. The monthly night takes place on the first Friday of the month after the shop closes and the idea is to bring your own records, put your name on the board and then play three tunes when your turn comes up. I ran out of records and started pulling stuff from the racks that I wanted to hear. Michael unearthed a huge box set of disco, soul and funk classics and proceeded to make us act like the drunken idiots we were.

Saturday was a site recce in the morning and then Stereolab at EartH in Dalston which was nice but we missed most of the supporting acts due to bad timing and trains not running. After a shaky start they rocked it.

Monday was a visit to Neil Rice out of town for tea, a demonstration of how polarising slides work, a trip up to his packed loft of light show equipment and a lot of chat. He had the Optikinetics FX Cassette featured on the cover of my book too. I came home full of inspiration… the rest of the week has been writing and battling a cold I must have picked up at some point during all that lot. Last night was going to be Warrington Runcorn Town Development Plan (or WRTDP to those too lazy to write it) and Pye Corner Audio at Corsica Studios but I felt too rough to attend. But, as the Mighty Boosh always say, “on with the show”…

The earliest track lists we have in a digital format thankfully reside with Marcus Maack of BTTB – Back To The Basics who maintained the PRS information when he was one of the first to license Solid Steel for German radio station FSK in the late 90s. As a result we have some track lists and sometimes DJ info from early 1997 through to the end of the decade by which time DK had arrived as show producer and things were better organised than us scribbling on huge sheets of paper at KISS FM in between mixes. There are still the usual mistakes and typos, gaps and unknowns but now we have Discogs, Shazam and the Internet to help fill in the blanks.

Using one of Marcus’ play lists I compiled the track order below for this mid 1997 show where I provided two sets in the second hour. Salena Godden aka Salena Saliva was the guest in the studio with Jon More and I and she periodically performed her poetry over passages in the mix. Kicking off with one of my favourite Kirk Degorgio tracks from his Celestial Soul album – an influence on my own track ‘…you’ from ‘Kaleidoscope’. Into this we have Faze Action’s ‘Plans & Designs’ (String Reprise) which still sounds majestic all these years later, I’m sure Simon Lee from the group used to work in a Soho record shop and I’d regularly buy records off him in the 90s. Next, Hardfloor prove that there’s more to them than just acid bangers with some excellent trip hop under their Dadamnphreaknoizphunk? moniker from Volume 2. I don’t know what I’m doing in the mix, it all seems a bit tentative with little drop-ins rather than things really getting going, maybe we were discussing when Salena was going to make an appearance and sorting the tracks out.

I don’t recall ever having this Denise Johnson single but the remix is excellent although I’ve not idea which one it is out of about eight possible contenders, must look for that in the collection. Next up is Salena’s first turn, a tale of walking amongst the wild flowers before things take an unexpected turn, over the Witchman remix of Bowery Electric’s ‘Without Stopping’. Later in the track she drops in with an ode to arse watching, I think I was always a bit weary of Salena as she was so sexually upfront with her material which was not common in 1997, or not in the circles I ran in anyway, but she was always lovely on tour with Coldcut. The Witchman mix rattles on with that submerged Amen sound he did so well before merging into Sukia’s ‘Dream Machine’ which seems completely at odds with the darkcore d’n’b underneath it. I loved Sukia, it was silly, cheesy sampledelia, produced by the Dust Brothers and later licensed to Mo Wax. I always put it in the same box as bands like Tipsy from that era. This track samples a hypnotist called Reveen who made many records on how to quit smoking, gain confidence, stop over-eating etc. I found some in Canada on tour and we deduced that the records were identical aside from the intro’s and outro’s relating to each subject matter.

Part 2 opens with the remix Kid Koala, Ollie Teeba and I did of Coldcut’s ‘More Beats & Pieces’ – collaged together from freeform jams we did at sound checks on tour around North America using specially cut dub plates of the B&P’s parts given to all remixers. It’s a bit of a mess but it was my first remix so go easy. I’m not sure where the spoken word skit comes from directly afterwards, probably one of Coldcut’s Word Treasure jingle compilations, but Kirk’s back was another As One track from Celestial Soul doing exactly what he does best with that soaring, melodic techno of his. I appear to be scratching some stuff over it which adds little to the mix. Out of the extended breakdown comes Hell Interface – a pseudonym of Boards of Canada – with their version of Colonel Abrahams’ ‘Trapped’ over a scratchy roller of a beat from one of the MASK compilation 12”s. Sliding awkwardly out of this is Faze Action’s ‘Plans & Designs’ proper with all its kettle drums and strings intact over the beat, very much in that Rob Dougan ‘Clubbed To Death’ tradition. Someone is playing all sorts of jingles over it with delays which makes me think that this set might have been recorded up at Ahead Of Our Time in Clink St. with Ali Tod on the mix. I think I’m playing some Kid Koala over the end of the track and it’s all a bit of a mess to be honest. Bizarrely we then dip into two random Ken Nordine tracks from the How Are Things In Your Town compilation on Blue Thumb. A very odd selection and collection of sounds.

Track list:
As One – Renaissance
Faze Action – Plans & Designs (String Reprise)
Hardfloor presents Dadamnphreaknoizphunk?- Chillin’ 6 Feet Deep
Denise Johnson – Inner Peace
Salena Saliva – unknown 1
Bowery Electric – Without Stopping (Witchman Mix)
Salena Saliva – unknown 2
Sukia – Dream Machine

Coldcut – Beans ‘n’ Pizzas (Strictly Kid Teeba version)
As One – We No Longer Understand
Hell Interface – Trapped
Faze Action – Plans & Designs
Kid Koala – Goodnight, Drive Safely
Ken Nordine – Outer Space
Ken Nordine – Manned Space Capsule

Exciting times this weekend when I visited the Spark House in Leyton for an AV gig with the Light Surgeons, Blanca Regina & Pierre Bouvier Patron, Generic Human, Julian Hand and Heena Song. The night was put on by Matekoi and featured an experimental set of modular soundtracks, film showings and DJ sets along with a few punters walking in unawares of what was going on. Wheels of Light got featured in the Observer on Sunday and online via the Guardian and we visited the Horror Show exhibition at Somerset House which was a mixed but fascinating bag. I’ve been doing even more promo and writing this week to promote the book as well as writing for Dust & Grooves 2 and swelling the ranks of my underground magazine collection. But enough of that, on to the mix!

Saxondale was a short-lived TV comedy starring Steve Coogan as an embittered ex-roadie with anger management issues who now runs a pest control business. DK was and is a huge Coogan fan so I put the quote about music from it into the end of the mix and we sometimes dropped the theme tune from the show – ‘House of the King’ by Focus – at gigs around the time it was airing. Scanning down the track list before listening to this it looks a bit like one of my live DJ sets around the time, book-ended with a few esoteric inclusions.

Kicking off with yet another entry for the Solid Steel intro competition (these kept us going for years) by S24 and then into a DJ Krush/DJ Shadow/Cut Chemist three-way, in fact Shadow pops up in different configurations all over this mix. Dualling with DJ Krush in a snatch from his Meiso LP on MoWax and then into ‘This Time’ from his own The Outsider album using a found reel to reel tape of an unknown vocal take to build an extraordinary pop song. Cut Chemist’s incredible ‘(My 1st) Big Break’ from his ‘The Audience Is Listening’ LP is one of my favourite things he’s done, from the wrong-footing polyrhythmic breakdown to the amazing 360 video (check it out). Sirconical was always an artist I hoped would release more material but he seemed to crop up more on mastering duties than writing on numerous Twisted Nerve or Finders Keepers releases. ‘Ziggonometry’ is from his only album and the heavy beats sync nicely with the following three tracks that all feature that Bangra-type rhythm so popular around that era. No idea who Blunt Laser was, the Thomilla track came on a neon green 10” promo and the Caveman on the Kelis remix wasn’t the UK hip hop crew from the early 90s but a Ross Orton and Steve Mackey collaboration.

Shadow’s back but this time remixed by Soulwax via a huge chunk of the B-52s, Danny Breaks’ ‘Duck Rock’ takes it back to the old school with the wobbly bass reminiscent of Scruff’s ‘Ug’and his own ‘The Jellyfish’. A snatch of the Mighty Boosh from the radio series bridges into the Nextmen who pump up the party with Dynamite MC. Next is a couplet I used to spin all the time; Cut Chemist’s remix of Shadow’s ‘Number Song’ into ‘Dark Lady’ – always works nicely, especially when pulling the bass line out and teasing it back in again with a replayed melody. But this is an early version where I hadn’t worked out the replay sequence yet or added in the ‘Bug Powder Dust’ dessert for afters. Urgh, Kanye, the less said the better, this was such a huge tune and the Hollertronix version was genuinely exciting at the time but it got overplayed very quickly. Ah, but saved by Zero db’s incredible ‘Bongos, Bleeps & Basslines’ – DK and I played the shit out of this for years in all kinds of combinations, still sounds incredible. I even went so far as to edit together a video made from a Len Lye animation that visually synced to each part for our first 4-deck AV sets.

Z-Trip’s block-rocking ‘Bus Stop’ beats work so well over it, taking it half time and then back again. Yes that’s Christine Aguilera, top tune with the original that it sampled afterwards, ‘Hippy Skippy Moon Strut’ by the Moon People, awkwardly stumbling out of it. We take a turn to Los Angeles for a couple of tunes from Paul Humphrey and his Cool Aid Chemists and The Dragons which preceded our use of the latter in the Solid Steel ‘Now, Listen Again’ mix the year after. I’m glad we didn’t include the embarrassing ‘D-J’ before the chorus in that (or did we? I forget) – RIP Daryl and Dennis Dragon. There’s the Saxondale music rant before Focus and the bit where he mentions ‘the Rascal’ refers to his pet name for his car, ‘oh! New shoes!?’. Recognise that bass line! ‘Yeeeaaah! That’s right!’, Galt McDermot’s ‘Aquarius’ from Hair slides in before Orriel Smith takes us out with ‘Winds of Space’. This would have been taken from the excellent ‘Fuzzy Felt Folk’ compilation by Jonny Trunk and Martin Green on Trunk Records, a highly recommended album of songs for children that bears repeated listens.

Track list:
S24 – Solid Steel intro
DJ Krush vs DJ Shadow – Duality
DJ Shadow – This Time (I’m Gonna Do It My Way)
Cut Chemist – (My 1st) Big Break
Sirconical – Ziggonometry
Zero 7 – You’re My Flame (Blunt Laser mix)
Thomilla – Freaky Girl (Geeky Boy mix)
Kelis – Bossy (Caveman mix)
DJ Shadow – 6 Days (Soulwax mix)
Danny Breaks – Duck Rock (instr)
The Nextmen feat. Dynamite MC – Spin It Round
DJ Shadow – The Number Song (Cut Chemist remix)
DJ Food – Dark Lady
Kanye West – Gold Digger
Hollertronix – Gold Digger (Diplo remix)
Zero db – Bongos, Bleeps & Basslines
Z-Trip – Bus Stop
Christina Aguilera – Ain’t No Other Man
The Moon People – Hippy Skippy Moon Strut
Paul Humphrey and his Cool Aid Chemists – Funky LA
The Dragons – Food For My Soul
Saxondale – Rant
Focus – House of The King
Galt McDermot – Aquarius
Orriel Smith – Winds of Space

Last weekend saw a long-delayed trip out of town to Leicester to get away from the city for a few days, seriously needed when you’ve been living next to a building site for the last 18 months. The Leicester Print Workshop were having their Xmas Bazaar so we dropped in and caught up with friends including Kid Acne, down from Sheffield for the day to hawk his wares. Then off to Nottingham to have a mooch about, saw my book in a shop for the first time and visited brand new record shop, Running Circle.

Monday I was in Birmingham picking up a turntable and sought shelter from the pounding rain in the new Diskery premises now that they’ve moved (well, nearly). The shop is one of the UK’s oldest record emporiums and has recently had to vacate the shop they’d been in for 50 years. Luckily they didn’t have to go far, just 2 minutes round the corner and they now have a large basement stacked to the rafters with 45s, the LPs and 12″s being upstairs.

Back to London for more writing and research on Tuesday, designing The Real Tuesday Weld‘s Xmas card and a couple of bits for De:tuned. My sons were asking about the Telepathic Fish parties I used to do and one of them is running rings around me on the iPad where I’m supposed to be teaching him how to paint with it. Loads more going on as ever but all in good time, let’s get to this week’s archive show…

Following on from last week’s part 1, here’s the rest of the set, kicking off with a snatch of People Like Us’ ‘Bran Mash and Crushed Beans’ that we’d steal a decade later for the intro to our Now, Listen Again live set. The jazzy drum n bass track that follows is one I remember but not by name, the lovely little ‘Shadow’s Creep’ refrain always brings a smile though. Sounds like I attempted to mix Squarepusher’s ‘Vic Acid’ in three times before nailing it, those rolling, stumbling beats took time to get right in the mix. Out into the Plug (Luke Vibert) remix of Meat Beat Manifesto’s ‘Asbestos Lead Asbestos’ which – I think – was only available on the US 12” of this release.

Three Wheels Out was a British ex-pat named Graham who was living in San Francisco when we first toured there in 1996 and we hung out with him as he showed us around Haight Street which was near where he had a place. As far as I know this was his only release under this name, an excellent, tempo-switching number, released on Pussyfoot and sampling the same drums we’d had for ‘Spiral’, always wrong-footed them in the clubs. The Herbaliser’s ‘Theme From Control Centre’ creeps into the mix and, from the sound of it, that could be Ollie Teeba or PC cutting up The Jungle Brothers’ ‘Beyond This World’ a cappella over it. We finish with the sublime ‘Nuane’ by Autechre from their Chiastic Slide LP which reminds me that I must dig it out again.

Track list:
People Like Us – Bran Mash and Crushed Beans
Unknown – Shadows Creep
Squarepusher – Vic Acid
Meat Beat Manifesto – Asbestos Lead Asbestos (Plug Remix)
Three Wheels Out – Rise Up Children
The Herbaliser – Theme From Control Centre
Jungle Brothers – Beyond This World (a cappella)
Autechre – Nuane