Trevor Jackson presents Metal Dance on Strut

Strut release a 2xCD and 2xLP compilation of 80’s electronic oddities and rarities curated by Trevor Jackson. As ever, he doesn’t go straight for the obvious but we get a unique compilation with a lot of less familiar names or lesser known tracks from the bands you have heard of. The CDs boast 25 tracks with the double vinyl showcasing half of these. The album launch party includes a live performance by 23 Skidoo and a DJ set from Trevor at Electrowerks on March 24th. Check out a little sampling of tracks on his Soundcloud and an interview about the compilation below.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcEMyNeKpQg&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

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A couple of reviews

Sometimes with a release, gig or event, there are reviews that stand out, where the person has delved a little deeper than the first impression or copied the press release. Here are two, one from someone who knows me (Inkymole – reviewing the planetarium album launch) and one from someone who doesn’t (Kris Needs via Data Transmission – reviewing the album). Also here are some photos by Emma Gutteridge of the foyer outside the planetarium during the launch, photography inside was difficult because of the darkness but I’ve just picked up film footage which I’ll be editing into a short next week.

With courtesy of the Royal Observatory Greenwich

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Bastard flashback

[youtube width=”640″ height=”480″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5AINIO4eFc&feature=player_embedded#at=200[/youtube]

A new Facebook group popped up this week reminiscing over the club at the centre of the mash up / bootleg / bastard pop craze of the early 2000’s. This short piece by a Swiss film crew was posted that I make a brief cameo in. The King Of The Boots/Bastard nights at the Asylum are some of my fondest clubbing memories (as a punter and a DJ), genuinely insane, hilarious as well, as each new mash was greeted with a roar of approval. There was a real shock of the new in some ways, you could hear the scene unfolding month after month, incredibly exciting as well as being some of the silliest, dance-on-the-table-shit-faced nights out.

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The Stepkids in the UK

[youtube width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwbR8ubfHtY&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

The ever reliable Stones Throw label have their new signing – The Stepkids – coming to the UK this week for the first time. Lots of people including Gilles Peterson and The Guardian have been raving about them and they live up to the hype. If you like Rotary Connection, Charles Stepney productions and psychedelic soul then this band is for you. They play Cargo in Shoreditch, London on Wednesday the 3rd August, tickets are £5 in advance and £8 on the door and they play around 8.30pm. They’re also playing the Big Chill Festival Friday 5th but I’m not sure the exact stage and time yet.

 

The song everyone is raving about is ‘La La’, available on the B-side of this gorgeous splatter vinyl 12″, but everything I’ve heard so far has been great (check the ‘Wonderfox’ video I posted earlier)
The Stepkids – La La by stonesthrow

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Food & DK in Bastille, Grenoble, France

Sometimes all the elements just fall into place with a gig and last night was one of those times. The perfect balance of great weather, people and food in a stunning location – Bastille, on top of the mountain in Grenoble, France. The quickest way to the top was by cable car and the five bubble cars that descended from the sky were like something out of a 60’s World Expo fair. Once on top of the mountain, our stage was perched on the edge of a courtyard with a stunning view of the city and surrounding countryside below, including Europe’s longest street which you can see carved into the landscape in a couple of shots here.

The gig was to be three hours long between DK and myself but we loved it so much we decided to play the warm up hour whilst people arrived by cable car as well. By midnight the place was packed with more people than expected but at 1.30am the promoters got a call from the city mayor. The music was too loud and the bass could be heard across the city so the sound had to be turned down, much to the annoyance of the crowd. 40 minutes later we ramped things up with some drum n bass and people started surging forward and pushing over barriers, a fight broke out after much moshing and we had to stop the music a couple of times. We decided to curtail the harshness of the music after requests from the promoters as there wasn’t enough security and it all ended well at 3am. It’s unlikely there will be another gig up there again after this and there was talk of us being banned from playing again :). Gig of the year so far for both of us though, thanks to everyone who came and made it so great and thanks to Alban, the promoter who put us up for it.

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Crazy scenes at the last ever Mixed Bizness

I played in Glasgow last night as the special guest at Boom Monk Ben‘s last ever Mixed Bizness night at the School of Art. After my 90 minute AV set Ben played the final hour and the crowd went progressively crazier until he ended with Beck’s ‘Mixed Bizness’ (what else?) and a full on stage invasion. Predictably ‘one more song’ was requested to which he responded with Chaka Khan’s ‘Ain’t Nobody’ at which point there was full on crowd surfing! Another stage invasion occurred and demands for one more ‘one more song’ were granted by Roots Manuva’s ‘Witness’ and the place erupted. I think Ben feared the whole table and laptop were going to be pushed over at one point from the amount of people on the front of the stage and behind the decks.

It was a great end to years of regular nights Ben has been doing at the Art School, which is due for renovation and will be closed for at least 2 years while they rip everything out. The week before, I did a phone interview with Shaun Murphy for Mixed Bizness about the forthcoming show and my forthcoming album, which you can listen to here

I stayed in the lovely Citizen M hotel when I was there which is full of great designer furniture by the likes of Panton and Eames with compact rooms that resembled Japanese pod hotels.

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Amon Tobin ‘ISAM’ exhibition & live show

[youtube width=”640″ height=”385″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0GRxu0oIEA&feature=player_embedded#at=22[/youtube]

I went to the opening of Amon Tobin and Tessa Farma‘s exhibition last night, showing original sculptures from the ‘ISAM’ album artwork at the Crypt Gallery in St. Pancras, London. It’s on between the 26th May and the 5th June 2011 and is free, before being taken to Paris (Galery Art Roch) between the 13th and 23rd June. Dates are also being confirmed for Brussels, Berlin, and North America later in the year.


Also very much looking forward to seeing Amon’s live set when it comes to town, it debuts at Mutek next week.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”385″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Umf0C0WCsr8&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

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Belbury Poly Youth Night, Brighton

Gutted I can’t go to this as I’m out of the country, lots of my favourite artists on one bill.

Live sets from Moon Wiring Club and Pye Corner Audio, Ghost Box & Outer Church DJs a screening of Julian House‘s short film Winter Sun Wavelength, Public Information Films, lost television and other odd visuals.

Thursday 14th April 7.30pm – 12.00 midnight
Komedia
Brighton

Tickets £7
www.komedia.co.uk
Box Office: 0845 293 8480
Resident Records: 01273 606 312

 

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Vinyl Veterans, Classic Material and The Boom Bap

Two upcoming events for your diary, both on the same weekend, featuring two friends of mine in similar settings. First up on, Friday March 18th, is The Vinyl Veterans at the Black Dove in Brighton with Jonny Cuba (ex-Dynamic Syncopation / Soundsci).

The day after it’s the turn of Classic Material at C.A.M.P. in Hoxton, London with Ollie Teeba (The Herbaliser / Soundsci).

Both events share a similar theme: a love of Old School Hip Hop, funk and breakbeats and a fondness for vinyl as the preferred medium to DJ with (Vinyl Veterans is Vinyl ONLY!). Readers of this blog with be familiar with Classic Material’s monthly theme of a different year as the basis for each session and this month it’s the turn of 1991.

Also check out their excellent themed mix, shirt and stickers sets in their store, there’s a new one each month featuring a re-rendering of a classic Hip Hop label logo – Classic Material store.

Also, both events are FREE so there’s no excuse about door prices, if you love what Rap used to be about and not what its sadly become, then these nights are for you. There seem to be more and more cropping up too, Rap History in Berlin and the Boom Bap in London, which I played at last night and is a weekly concern!

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Videocrash Solid Steel AV XXmas party this Saturday

snub-hexstatic-dj-food-dk

A bit of a special one this: Videocrash and Solid Steel team up for a XXmas knees-up at the Electrowerkz in an Audio Visual rave up this Saturday. Hexstatic will be presenting a ‘Trailer Trax’ special, Cheeba will no doubt be previewing some tidy new pieces and DK and I will round out the year with a final showcase of our own Ninja Tune XX AV mix before packing it up and putting it to bed. Joining us will be Digitonal showing their new ‘Deep Space’ a/v set – an hour long set constructed around a voyage that starts with Earth. moves past the Moon and planets, and into the infinite…

Not only that but Graffiti artist, stenciller and sticker-er (?) supreme, SNUB23 from Brighton will be joining us and painting an original piece live from 11pm. This will later be auctioned off in aid of the MacMillan Cancer Support charity after being signed by all present. He might also bring some stencils for custom T shirts too (see below). It all starts at 8pm and will probably end messily at 4am, this is a final farewell to a great year for Ninja and the 20th celebrations before we break for Xmas.

SNUB-brugal-tee-001

December gigs

Lots of gigs coming up in December (see full listing over on the right) The Ninja Tune XX celebrations travel to Brighton, London and Prague, Belgrade and Beinne this month.
Brighton 10th flyerKINGFLY(2)-2A2.indd First off is the big Bonobo gig after party in Brighton at the Concorde 2, the day after is King Cannibal’s ‘Way of the Ninja’ mix CD launch at the Rhythm Factory with free entry all night and goody bags for the first 100 in.

The next week sees me in Prague at the Palac Akropolois with Grasscut for a Ninja 20th AV set and then Belgrade the next day at the Tube.

Saturday 18th I have not one but two gigs in London, a Videocrash Solid Steel XXmas party with Hexstatic, DK, Cheeba and more down at the refurbished Electrowerkz. Before that though I’ll be spinning a guest slot down at Classic Material at C.A.M.P. in Old Street, with a vinyl only set of classic Hip Hop from the year 1989. in case you’ve not heard about this night, this is the third installment and each month sees a year celebrated from Hip Hop’s golden periods. DJ Format and Andy Smith have both stepped up and it’s my turn this time. Only records from ’89 will be played, special box sets will be available on the night of CD mixes and T shirts and Chris Read and co. (who run the night) will be in support.

New Years Eve sees DK and I see the year out in fine fashion in Bienne, Switzerland with a special 4 deck AV set.

SS Xmas videocrash flyerCLASSIC_MATERIAL_20112010_eFlyer

Hong Kong Clockenflap festival last weekend

Many thanks to all the people I met last weekend in Hong Kong for the Clockenflap festival (Craig, Jay, Mike, Kumiko, Clive, Justin, Andy, Phil etc…). Hong Kong is a long way to go for a 1 hour set and, luckily, they let me play longer. I was playing after some local bands and the also the Charlatans, who had flown in from Singapore I think, as part of their tour and the space was the 15th floor of a large warehouse-type building on one side of the island. (Picure of me playing above by Chris Lusher)

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I’ve only been to Hong Kong once before, 15 years previously, and other parts of China only one other time so it’s still new to me. The food is great, the architecture too and it has obvious elements of Eastern charm in the same way that Japan does but on a much more subdued level. I had some time off before the gig so I took the ferry from the Central part I was staying in over to Tsim Sha Tsui (TST) which seems to be much more flavoured towards your traditional tourist than the part I was in. As soon as you dock you seem to be bombarded with people trying to sell you Rolex watches, suits or weed on the streets next to massive department stores for all the top fashion houses. In the streets behind these though you’ll find smaller stores selling all sorts of knock offs and little indoor markets crammed with bootleg goods.

I wish I had more time there but it’s never the case these days, on the way back to the hotel I passed a tiny store crammed with robot toys, a street away from my hotel. If you’d have run across the equivalent in the US it would have been called a ‘mom & pop’ store. The couple inside were idly watching some sort of game show on a big TV on the wall while I persused the wall of Gundam, Ultraman, Macross and more figures and kits, some of which looked like they had been there for decades and had a layer of dust to match. I ended up buying this lovely kit which looks straight out of the 70’s, box dents and all, as well as a few bits for my boys, all for less than £10.

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