Music

Beach Boys’ original ‘Smile’ sessions to be released

News filtered out recently that The Beach Boys‘ (or just Brian Wilson if you’re being picky) original ‘Smile’ album sessions are going to get the deluxe box set treatment. If you don’t know what ‘Smile’ was / is then here’s a good place to start: Smile wiki.

A beautiful record that I’ve been fascinated with for over ten years now and never thought I’d hear finished. I was lucky enough to see it performed live by Brian Wilson and his band for the first time in 2004 – absolutely one of the best concert experiences I’ve ever had.

An interesting article with the engineer on the project, Mark Linett, is here which certainly promises the goods later this year. If your interest is not satisfied by the wiki then Dominic Priore‘s ‘Look, Listen, Vibrate, Smile’ book is excellent.

Posted in Event, Music. | No Comments |

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

 

Posted in Film, Gigs, Music. | No Comments |

Six Ton Armour

6 Ton Rem comp
The Six Ton Armour site hosts ‘Psychcasts’ – psychedelic podcasts – alongside artwork by Rimrimrim. They’ve recently started putting out mixes on CD too and I got a couple of them in the post last week. Beautiful they are too, with screen printed covers that recall some of the Twisted Nerve / Finders Keepers sleeves or Canada’s now defunct Bully label. The mixes are very good, sprawling across the psych realm and digging deep. Definitely worth keeping and eye and ear on for future releases and mixes. Buy these two CDs here… but you can also download the Black Olsun ‘Spells’ mix for free from here…
6 Ton Spells comp

BMC Nov 2025 2ACHFRC inACHFRC backACHFRC stickersACHFRC 3D

Posted in Design, Music. | No Comments |

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!

Posted in Gigs, Music, Records. | No Comments |

Amon Tobin – Splinter Cell Remixes

Amon Tobin‘s 2005 Splinter Cell game soundtrack has been remixed to coincide with the release of a new 3D version of the game. Various Ninja Tune artists such as Daedelus, Kid Koala, King Cannibal, The Qemists, Eskmo and Lorn have worked their magic on the tracks alongside a couple of new pieces by Amon himself.

For the artwork I was required to update the original and decided to experiment a little with the 3D analyph technique you can achieve in print. If you have a pair of red and blue 3D glasses to hand, have a look at this from the inner sleeve of the vinyl. The physical LP and CD versions are released in April but you can buy the download version right now from the Ninjashop.

ZEN171 3D cover 650

Posted in Music, Ninja Tune, Openmind designs, Records. | 1 Comment |

Chart Sweep / Time Sweep


This little piece of history has been going viral over the last few weeks after being put up on Soundcloud by a user called mjs538.
*UPDATE: Another user: DJMOOG1 has put up a better quality version which I’ve embedded above.
Although not actually by mjs538, the pieces have a strange and convoluted history in themselves as well as portraying the history of pop music based on all the #1 hits in the US charts since 1958. Both mixes use up to 5 seconds of each and every #1 since the mid fifties, in order, up until 1981 in Part 1 and into the early nineties in Part 2. Whilst a herculean effort, even in this day and age of digital editing and online stores to source the material, it’s all the more impressive that the bulk of Part 1 was made in the late seventies using reel to reel tape and a razor blade.

MARKFO_BThe piece – known as ‘Time Sweep’ – was part of an extensive radio show called ‘The History of Rock n Roll’, made by Drake – Chenault Enterprises for radio in the US which utilized 52 hours to bring the first comprehensive history of rock music to the airwaves. Each year was prefaced with a medley of that year’s #1 hit singles (a ‘Chart Sweep’) and the whole was compiled into a ‘Time Sweep’ to end the mammoth series. The engineer responsible was Mark Ford (above), a veteran of radio jingles and production. He compiled and edited all the selections up until 1977, not only cutting and splicing but also EQing and time stretching sections to make them fit together sonically and selecting and pairing little couplets of lyrics at certain points – Roy Orbison‘s “Pretty woman, walking down the street”, segues into “there she was, just a walking down the street”.

For a little ‘behind the scenes’ info, check out this link on the making of the special

HugoKeesing-743853
But the story doesn’t end there. For those paying attention, just after the Meco version of ‘Star Wars’ in Part 1, the sound quality noticeably changes in both the stereo field, quality and editing. The reason for this is that a teacher from Maryland University called Hugo Keesing extended and updated the concept of the Chart / Time Sweep for his classes as each year finished up until 1991. With all due respect to Keesing, he isn’t a sound engineer and it shows in the application of edits and production. This is where the piece stops being art and turns to documentation and, as such, loses the essence of its greatness. Keesing was using a Wollensack tape recorder to edit with and had no way to clean up or EQ the tracks. So, the majority of Part 1 is Mark Ford’s original (up until 1977) and then Keesing’s extension, which runs the entirety of Part 2.

Five Seconds Of Every #1 Pop Single Part 2 by mjs538

How this piece came into circulation on the web was via a tape with Keesing’s name on it that was passed to the Evolution Control Committee‘s Mark Gunderson in the 90’s and the piece was widely believed to have been by him in it’s entirety by the cut and paste fraternity unfamiliar with the History of Rock n Roll programme. Eventually Keesing was tracked down and you can read an interview with him over at Jon Nelson‘s ‘Some Assembly Required’ blog.

For a comprehensive overview of the whole story check here, there is also an update of the whole concept from 1993 to 2010 if you can’t get enough of this kind of thing.

Posted in Music, Oddities, Radio, Records. | 7 Comments |

‘The Crow’ animation by Tom Webb

DJ Food – The Crow Animated from Tom Webb on Vimeo.

Tom Webb contacted me with this film he made as part of his 3rd year Illustration Minor project. It’s the first half of the DJ Food track ‘The Crow‘, written by PC, from our ‘Kaleidoscope‘ LP. Here are his comments about the making of it;

“I set myself the task of trying to illustrate the DJ Food album Kaleidoscope. Initially, I was trying to produce stand alone images but eventually decided to dive into the world of animation for the first time. I created a sequence for the first half of The Crow. I was hoping to animate to the whole track, I storyboarded a lot of it but the deadline got the better of me.”

TW sketch1TW image4TW image5TW image1

“The images were created as spontaneous responses to the sounds and atmospheres I was hearing inside some of the tracks. I started investigating ‘Full Bleed’, ‘Cookin’, ‘The Riff’, ‘The Crow’ and both the ‘Sleep Dyad‘s’ a lot because of their particular energies.

The idea was to finish making the image before the track finished, so I started painting with my hands to help speed things up and build a small library of personal reactions in texture. I then scanned the images at hi-res and chopped out suitable macro sections which were then imported into the animation. There was a lot of trial and error involved. It’s also the first time I’ve had a go at animating so I had to learn the program from scratch as well.”

I personally love the syncopation he’s got and the movements from dark to light corresponding to the moods of the track. You can see more of Tom’s work on his blog calamridropkick.com

Posted in DJ Food, Film, Music, Ninja Tune. | No Comments |

The Death of Output

DoO1-3 coverL3output logo webBack at the end of 2006, when Trevor Jackson‘s Output Recordings folded, I put together a 3 hour tribute mix of my favourite tracks. This went out as 3 separate mixes on Solid Steel and I even made a very limited number of facsimile Output CDRs of the mixes. I’ve recently had requests to upload it again so, by the miracle that is Soundcloud, it’s available. I’ve also edited it into one piece finally and the track list is embedded in the Lyrics section of the mp3. Being an avid collector of the label I thought I’d show off the screen printed promo releases and a few other choice pieces.

Further reading from early 2007 can be had on Mark E’s ‘ireallylovemusic’ site.

.

The Death of Output by DJ Food

BMC Nov 2025 2ACHFRC inACHFRC backACHFRC stickersACHFRC 3D

[singlepic id=2609 w=640 h=890 float=left] [singlepic id=2620 w=640 h=480 float=left]

Posted in DJ Food, Music, Records, Solid Steel. | 4 Comments |

The Shamen, Synergy live on KISS 100 FM, 1991

I’ve just uploaded this from my archives to my Soundcloud account

Synergy 650

The Shamen doing a Synergy mix live on Colin Faver‘s show on Kiss FM from 1991. It’s essentially DJ Sticker and (I think) Mixmaster Morris /The Irresistible Force with Mr C. MC-ing. Only about 50 minutes long, the only tape I had was a free one from a magazine so the last 10 minutes is cut off. An excellent selection of tracks if you can put up with C’s terrible freestyling and patter/patois :).

A pretty influential set for me in my student days when I first moved to London (as were Colin Dale and Colin Favor’s shows). It indirectly hooked me up with Coldcut and Ninja Tune as I went to a Shamen gig because of this, met Mixmaster Morris there and he put me in touch with Matt Black.

Posted in Music, Radio. | 2 Comments |

ZTT reissues out today minus Frankie…

Back in December I posted about three forthcoming releases on ZTT: Claudia Bruken‘s ‘Combined’ compilation, Frankie Goes To Hollywood‘s ‘Liverpool’ expanded edition and ‘The Art of the 12″‘ overview covering the label’s famed 12″ remixes from the 80’s and beyond. They are released today but only two will be available due to an 11th hour pulling of the ‘Liverpool’ release for reasons yet to be explained by either the record label or members of the band. Speculation is rife on the Alternate ZTT board as to the cause of this last minute recall as copies have been around for a few weeks now in industry circles with a few even turning up for sale on the continent before the release date. The main culprit seems to be (and this is pure speculation based on what has been said online) the appearance of several tracks as bonuses which had both hardened collectors and members of the band scratching their heads in puzzlement as to their origins.

2 +1

In this internet age it’s rare that any scrap of information slips past uber-fans, some known for collecting every known foreign pressing of each release alongside demos, live recordings, session tapes and any scrap of print relating to their favourite bands. For instance it’s well known to the average Frankie fan that the band recorded a demo version of ‘Slave To The Rhythm’ before the song was immortalised by Grace Jones at Trevor Horn‘s hand, but few have ever been lucky enough to hear it. But when a track list for the expanded version of ‘Liverpool’ appeared last December, several tracks were complete unknowns to the legion of online fans, with one member of the band who frequents the boards even asking if anyone knew what they were or had mp3s of them.

Liverpool deluxeI was lucky enough to receive a copy over a week ago from an industry source and the tracks in question sound like demo ideas, jams or basic track building, including a vocal-less cover of the Rolling Stones‘ ‘Satisfaction’. Frankie did many cover versions, both released and unreleased, over the course of their short career. Some were for B-sides, some were simply a way to let off steam and take a break during recording sessions that stretched for months during the making of ‘Liverpool’. Holly Johnson tweeted last week that he had no problem with the release and a statement is promised soon, interesting…

Fortunately we are in the middle of the biggest archive reissue / remaster / repackage period of ZTT’s history at the moment – courtesy of Ian Peel –  and the other two releases can tide us over until any problems get ironed out with Frankie’s second coming (sorry, couldn’t resist). Art of 12"I’ve not received a copy of ‘Combined’ yet but ‘The Art of the 12″‘ 2xCD compilation is one of the best from the label, including several completely new and unreleased gems from the archives that add a few more pieces to the puzzle that fans of the label strive to unravel to this day. Newly unearthed versions of classic’s like Frankie‘s ‘Two Tribes’ and ‘Relax’, Propaganda’s ‘Dr. Mabuse’ or Nasty Rox Inc‘s ’10th Wonder’ sit alongside extended workouts of ‘Moments In Love’ and ‘Close (To the Edit)’ by Art of Noise, ‘Pacific’ and ‘Cubik’ by 808 State and Act‘s vastly underrated ‘Snobbery & Decay’.

A couple of infamous ‘lost’ ZTT groups have tracks presented for the first time too – Instinct, who only had one track appear on the label previously before disappearing into the vaults, have what was to be their first single debuting 25 years later. Also another piece of the Art of Noise puzzle is here for the first time to tantalise us – a glimpse of what Paul Morley and Trevor Horn did next after the rest of the band jumped ship and played the Pop game. The group Art & Act were bandied about in various press releases at the time but nothing was released until an AON box set a few years back yielded a few snippets. Here we get 8 minutes of a group that could have been but wasn’t destined to be until over a decade later with the reformation of three of the Art of Noise proper. Both absolutely essential for any ZTT fan.

Art of 12" inside

Posted in Music. | No Comments |

Steinski WFMU podcast and Dennis Coffey remixes

That old devil Steve Stein aka Steinski – who should need no introduction to readers of this blog – has been hard at work on the musical and spoken word front recently. Firstly, go to his site – Steinski.com – and download the monster of a spoken word podcast he’s made for New York’s WFMU station entitled ‘Walkin’ & Talkin’. It’s a wild and varied ride through all manner of spoken word material whether from the Beats’ hip poetry to Hip Hop or a surprising amount of British Pop from the 80’s. Steinski guides you through the whole thing and, if you’re so inclined, you can follow it up and watch a lot of it via the mammoth post he’s made on his site illustrating most of the content with YouTube clips. It’s a very rewarding 2 hours plus and I suspect the site content will take just as long to hoover up.

dennis_coffey_electric_1uasf_STRUT075CDcoversmall

On the music-making front Stein has just given some new Dennis Coffey material the remix treatment, one track of which will be released as a 7″ on Record Store day. A full album of new material and covers by Coffey is coming on Strut on April 25th featuring contributions from Mayer Hawthorne, Paolo Nutini, Kings Go Forth, Mick Collins of the Dirtbombs and more. Check the cover referencing artwork too.

Posted in Music, Radio, Records. | No Comments |

Reso – War Machine (DJ Food unofficial video)

I got sent the new Reso ‘Valken’ EP yesterday and was so taken with the lead track – ‘War Machine’ –  I decided to make a video for it using animation from Vexille, Appleseed and the end titles of the first Iron Man film. If you like your music heavy, intricate and indestructible and your robots the same then this is for you.
The EP is out on Civil Music on February the 21st and contains four tracks.

http://www.djfood.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Reso-War-Machine-web-DJ-Food-video-edit.mov
Posted in Film, Music, Robots. | 5 Comments |

Fishbone’s ‘Everyday Sunshine’ documentary

FishboneI seem to be on a late 80’s kick at the moment and one of my favourite bands as the the 80’s turned into the 90’s was Fishbone. I saw them at least twice but missed their legendary Astoria gig where Angelo jumped off the balcony because my girlfriend at the time decided to dump me that day. One of life’s big regrets. Seems they’ve been around for 25 years now and, even though their recorded output fell off by the mid 90’s, they still hold a place in my heart.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”480″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChXk4R0mGNw[/youtube]

A new documentary is doing the rounds called ‘Everyday Sunshine’ – named after possibly their biggest hit – and you can see how influential they were at the time by the names cropping up to pay homage. Chuck D, Flea, Ice T, Perry Farrell, George Clinton, Les Claypool and, er… Tim Robbins and Gwen Stefani (!). Fair enough on Gwen, No Doubt were a ska band before they hit the big time. Anyway, the trailer looks very promising, Larry Fishburne narrates (nice touch) and let’s hope they get the dues they deserve after all these years. There’s a full website devoted to the doc and the DVD should be out late summer.

Also, does anyone remember an early 90’s TV show with David Rappaport called ‘Beyond the Groove’? I think it only ran for one series and it was a music show fashioned as a road movie of sorts. David would drive around and meet people or find himself in different situations and bands or artists would appear and do their thing. Fishbone once featured at the end of one episode when David drove into a deserted outdoor film lot, the screen flickers into life and you see the band doing a live version of ‘Behaviour Control Technician’ from their (at that time unreleased) ‘Reality of My Surroundings’ LP. I had it on videotape for years and tried to find it recently but it had been taped over! Nothing on YouTube, in fact very little about the show at all, if someone has a copy of it, I’d love to see it, likewise their performance of ‘Fishbone Is Red Hot’ on the Big World Café programme.

And here’s the ‘Beyond the Groove‘ clip courtesy of Matt Davies (see comments below), thanks so much – the power of the internet!.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”480″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qeYUOf4s8g[/youtube]

Posted in Film, Music. | 13 Comments |