New two-day old podcast – because I uploaded then proceeded to forget about it.

荒裕美・Yumi Arai – ルージュの伝言・Rouge no dengon

Arthur Verocai – Na Boca Do Sol
Breakestra – Dark clouds rain soul
Alice Russell – Got The Hunger? (J-Boogie Houston Remix)
Mayer Hawthorne – Green Eyed Love (Classixx Remix)
Triorganico – Ginga Carioca
Bülent Ortaçgil – Olmali Mi Olmamali Mi
Gnonnas Pedro & His Dadjes Band – DaDJe Von O Von Non
Cookin On 3 Burners – This Girl ft. Kylie Auldist
Natural Self – My Heart Beats Like A Drum ft. Elodie Rama
Lack of Afro – Closer To Me feat. Roxie Ray
Shawn Lee & Clutchy Hopkins – What More Can I Say (Top Chillin)
Kings of Convenience – Boat Behind

photo credits: “Safe” by Pink Thistle, reworked by me

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It took only two songs for me to realise I was in this kind of much-hailed, seldom-reached territory: the album you want to listen to again and again without skipping tracks or hitting pause because you’re off to grab refreshments.
I didn’t know much of Robert Wyatt’s solo stuff. I do now know his genre is marked as “progressive” on the myspace page not because he enjoys a coma-inducing prog-rock guitar solo, but rather for his progressive predisposition. As a plus, he’s the spitting image of Moses, at least as I picture the dude.

I’m quite glad to be starting with the end, because I feel I know more about Mr. Wyatt’s music now, listening in silent reverie, awash with these beautiful interpretations by a range of diverse yet like-minded artists. Their respective dots are neatly connected by the subdued, almost silent cohesion of the orchestra – which, might I add, actually orchestrates a permeating light that takes both background and foreground, like playing hide and seek.

– only in French

After the sense of squeaky-cleaning my spirit through the power of music -rejoice!, I had to collect myself and light up a fire of recognition around Wyatt’s original work. The process of listening to cover songs and then originals – it’s like playing a piano and then taking it apart bit by bit, chords and keys left adrift in the air around you (photographical evidence coming soon); actually, when both are good- the copied and the “copiee”- it’s all about the interplay, with one song not eclipsing, but shoving light on, the other. And it works both ways.

Alifib (feat. Rokia Traoré) mp3

Shipbuilding (feat. Yael Naïm) mp3

Check out the Orchestre National de Jazz site for live dates

Listen to the WNYC show presenting highlights of the album

Get the album. Wherever you want to.

It sounds like robots spraying the track with flowers and rainbow candy.

That means that I like it.

Au Revoir Simone – Another Likely Story (Neon Indian remix) mp3

Here we go all Norwegian once more, with Nils of Ella Guru marking the weirdest spots on the mellifluous map of Norway. Hurrah. Here’s the podcast feed.
お楽しみに！ Hope you enjoy.. Don’t let that first track scare you off. And do read the explanation for the selections, you get brownie points for that too.

tracklist

Fra Lippo Lippi  is best known for having been famous in the Philippines. But before they started making dreary eighties popmusic (though their hit single ‘Shouldn’t have to be like that’, is quite catchy), they were portrayed as beeing a norwegian Joy Divison…heh…at least it sounds as if they really tried to be, hard.

On this album, ‘in silence’, from 1981, they sound more like New Orders first album ‘Movement’ though. I think they made some EP’s before this (I ain’t got an internet connection at my place, so I can’t check up any facts, unfortunately).

site

Domestic Duck – super cool

Norways best ‘krautrock’ band perhaps…I don’t really know anything about them…this guy up in the fourth floor in my building knows them though, and apparantly they don’t play much…too bad…

myspace

Motorpsycho – wearing your smell

When you go to a indie-rock gig with a local band in trondheim, you can usually classify them by referring to a particular Motorpsycho-album. Their status as Norways greatest indieband is undisputed, at least here in Trondheim. I really can’t think of any others worth mentioning. Choosing one song from their vast and varied back-catalogue is one very ungrateful task…I chose this one…I don’t know why…

myspace

Manna – Vi vil ikke ha mer krig

‘People who don’t like reggae are essentially bad people, I don’t trust them’ – I said that, or so I’m told…I don’t know if I can stand for it though, I know of at least two people I like who don’t like reggae-music…and just recently my dad got into dub, at the age of 54.

myspace

G.O.D.S. – Trondheim

These guys can get anyone from six to sixty and far beyond to dance. masters of crowd control. this song, a hommage to the town we live in; ’sun, summer and snow, that’s trondheim you know’…or something like that.

myspace

Dog & Sky – Hammer

this was the first band I really dug after moving in to town…ah, imagining Matt, singer of D&S, in a slightly oversized suit making a tiny jump clinching his eyes yelling kiss me!, man, I could’ve kissed him right there…but that was another song, at some other gig, some other time… according to the cover booklet the singer of the band ‘det glade vanvidd’ plays hammer in this song, but I’ve not been able to dechipher where. I could watch the drummer for hours, love her style, and she’s so good, I almost find it  provoking(I’m a drummer myself), she must be a jazzer or something, wich reminds me of…

PELbO – the star

…Pelbo, whom someone somehow have given the honour of havin’ made tuba sexy…that’s absurd, when was tuba not sexy? all bass is sexy. If someone who knows the band by any chance hear this mixtape, they might wonder what happened to the final part…well, I’ll tell you what. It sucks. I hate it. So I cut it. I’m sorry guys. Everything you her on the recordings the also do live, looping of vocals, putting on effects and such.

myspace

Chilsmissebarna – Gregor Samsa ain’t dead

heh…me and the percussionist in my band once took initiative for a spontanious rehersal, but noone else were available, and also we didn’t have keys to the bandroom, so we went back to my place, shared one pathetic bottle of bear, and started making sounds with whatever stuff we could find in my room, a vacuum cleaner, a guitar flight case, a recordplayer etc. That was the beginning of Chillsmissebarna. The band who managed to chase just about every participant of a friends birthdayparty arranged at my place, playing on vacuumcleaner, casserolles and guitarfeedback, everyone fleed into the kitchen or to the toilets…at the other of the two gigs of our career we started fighting out of frustration of the fact that none of us knew what we were doing, or maybe because we were bored, rolling around in the dirt, einar tore my shirt…this australian guy with a barbercue said he really liked it…

Babi Jar – Babi Jar

a friend of mine popped in, asked me ‘what are you doing?’, I told him what I was doing, ‘oh’, he said, ‘I’ve got some stuff you could use’, and brought me a usb-stick with music. this one was the only one to sneak through the needle’s eye this time.

120 days – come out (come down, fade out, be gone)

so hip it almost makes you sick, but that doesn’t keep them from being good, does it? I don’t know. I have a disease that makes me unable to listen to music, at least modern music, without immideatly coming up with a bunch of references, whom the band I’m listening to never really can live up to, in my eyes. It sucks really, prevents me of liking a lot of music that’s probably not really to bad, it’s just that this other band from the sixties or seventies or eighties, was better…there’s always some other band…

myspace

123 – Graveyard paradise

but let’s forget all that and enjoy this sixties beauty. Dylanesque you say? Yeah…but please don’t ruin it by reminding me. Actually the sickness is only contaminous for music made after y2000. This is ripped from an original seven inch my aunt gave me, real worn…listen to the scratching…

If you chance upon free music worth that click, these days that means a lot. Doesn’t your heart flutter like a fairy-winged teacup when you do? So that’s why I’m grateful for one sir who goes by the name of Illingsworth, member and producer of Detroit CYDI (Can You Dig It). The album, The Rhyming Dictionary, is a split-production affair, with half of the tracks rounded off by Erik L- who previously worked with Frank N Dank. This really is good, people. Bristling beats, and rhymes to compete with advanced SAT vocab

(Had a hard time picking out) two tracks:

Detroit CYDI – Based On a True Story (p Illingsworth) mp3

Detroit CYDI – Front Back (Ft Neens, p Erik L) mp3

So once more, the breeze of links goes as follows:

http://illingsworks.bandcamp.com

http://detroitcydi.bandcamp.com >> Download the album

It’s like I’m sending y’all a text! But with links and music and stuff.

My Tweets

Check out Curumin’s latest album, “Japan Pop Show”. Straight from Brasil.

Oh and look, Tommy Guerrero’s way up there on his myspace friends list. Says he’s got a “new wrekid” on the way, and as much as I can’t say I can’t wait to check it out, I just know I’ll like it.

I see now I’d uploaded a couple of mp3’s about two months ago (!) and I’m inclined to believe a switch was pulled – either the one to the Internet, or the one in my head. Anyway those who wanted to know, know anyway; for the rest, I’m talking bout Mount Kimbie.

Don’t tell me this is dubstep, it’s better. It’s fresh as larvae. Obviously, artists re-arrange the borders between genres and sub-genres all the time. Kai and Dom of Mount Kimbie have some obvious influences – including “girlfriends” and “stupidity” – says so right on their myspace. Still -  they manage to wipe the slate (almost) clean for the common music purveyor, i.e. not that interested in any particular genre. Therein it’s a delightful listening experience. The barely-there-it-melts-into-your-ears “William” and the only slightly eerie “Taps” are here to make you want more (erm, though the EP has but four tracks):

• Mount Kimbie – William mp3
• Mount Kimbie – Taps mp3

Find out where to buy the EP.

While lately I have been listening and watching a lot of Shiina Ringo performances, I haven’t yet written anything about the Japanese singer who got swept into mainstream music. I will though, because a lot of people might like her but just haven’t been properly exposed. Here’s one of my favourite videos, for ハツコイ娼女.

Choosing a recording location different than the ol’ studio usually makes for a lot of fun.
Rasputina is a band that sets itself apart from the rest of the gothic crowd- simply because I listen to them, and I find it an enjoyable experience.

Their latest album, Melora a la Basilica, recorded in a glue factory with the acoustics of a church, turns lead vocalist Melora’s voice into a receptacle of greater forces. Half covers and half original material, but in the end all Rasputina. Wicked, wicked that Dickie.

Clowns mp3
Wicked Dickie mp3

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Which brings me to the fantastic label of German origin, Melting Pot Music, hence the lyrics in German – one of the foreigner of foreign languages, for me.

So, got an MPM newsletter, saw a pretty girl. And where there’s a pretty girl there’s potential.

I’m trying so hard not to go to Erykah Badu categorisms. My flair was right about Fleur Earth though.
In solo ventures as well as with Fleur Earth Experiment aka FEX, she is nothing but straight-up smooth.

It happens that the internet is pregnant with so much information you find only the crap side of things, but looking up her band, and more specifically Fleur Earth, there’s a few places brimful with content (read: mp3s).

Shame on me for only just discovering iDEOLOGY, the net label where some of Fleur’s previous work still resides (archive here).
Take “In Liebe, Fleur” (mp3). The modulations on that song remind me just enough of recent Cinematic Orchestra to incorporate the rhymes into the general flow. Music is surprisingly more serene when you don’t know what the hell they’re going on about. I can only guess from the title of the track. Back to a mythical age in song then; you have to be reminded once in a while how language can limit – instead of carry – meaning; let’s go beyond that, shall we?

Unbegreiflich The Ins RMX snippet (mp3)

Who could blame you for wanting the vinyl.

Which was a bit disappointing for me, since I couldn’t include The Boredoms’ “Super Roots 9″, otherwise known as three-quarters of an hour of head-spinning noise – from choir to chaos. Not a moment of peace on this live track. So, listen to it for yourself.

About the podcast – I’m not apologising for the Black Kids track. I liked the album, it’s pop and it’s fun.

This year had a lot of good, and a lot of ugly. Apparently dubstep ruled on a whole different level. So much so that all Boomkat newsletters were dripping with the fact. I never got that much into it.

I’ve been listening to some re-releases, like Linda Perhacs‘ “Parallelograms” or David Axelrod’s “Seriously Deep“. Rediscovered a bunch of other artists too. For me – maybe it’s too early to dig 2008, and in 20 years I’ll catch up with what really happened this year.

So.. good albums. The natural choices that are just there, on every list most likely – Portishead’s “Third” and Flying Lotus’ “Los Angeles”, Jamie Lidell’s “Jim”; then my natural choices – Mr Scruff’s “Ninja Tuna”, Erykah Badu’s “New Amerykah Part One (4th World War)” and lastly the rare, precious ones that you need no pause or rewind for – Rockettothesky’s “Medea”, The Present’s “World I See”. That scratches the surface of what follows -

Tracklist

Ruth Theodore – Murray’s Wives (download her whole album from Jamendo)
Rainbow Arabia – Tiny Tiny Man

Crystal Stilts – Crystal Stilts
Buddy Peace - Slow Gang Funeral

Portishead – Hunter

Linda Perhacs – Parallelograms
Flying Lotus – Auntie’s Lock/Infinitum (feat Laura Darlington)
Erykah Badu – Me
Santogold – Lights Out (Diplo’s Panda Bear Mix)

Black Kids – I’m Making Eyes At You

Gang Gang Dance – House Jam

Black Milk - Give The Drummer Sum

Mr. Scruff - Donkey Ride

Deerhunter – Moon Witch Cartridge

Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba – Bassekou

Juana Molina – Quién? (Suite)

Brightblack Morning Light - Oppressions Each

Menahan Street Band - Home Again!

The Bamboos – King Of The Rodeo featuring Megan Washington

The Present - Africanized Beatniks

Animal Collective -No More Runnin

You’ll have to download the track from mediafire until the podcast host is up and running again

if you please – .m4a, 80 MB

And yes, the last track is from Animal Collective’s imminent 2009 release. On the other hand, Bassekou Kouyate is 2007, but since it was 2008 when I heard him first, let me have that one.

One of those artists’ albums – at least – would do any record collection good. Of course there are tracks I haven’t included probably due to their ubiquity, or because they just need to be listened to by themselves or in the context of the album. Closer to that goal – I also made a zip file of the songs which you can download here (part 1) and here (part 2).

Well, that was that. Enjoy.

A couple of weeks ago I stumbled onto Rainbow Arabia, and now they popped in my mail.

Like many before them, they grab onto “the Eastern influence” and.. you know, turn it into something new. I’m not going farther back in time than Madlib, whose Beat Konducta in India should not be missed. If you want to chill, pick up Madlib’s nuggets.

For the more punk-minded, Rainbow Arabia go off the beaten path and frolic with the African, the Eastern, the sadness, the gladness in a dizzy genre-dismantling dance.

Omar K mp3

buy

If I never mentioned Tokumaru… my bad. He was definitely on one of the podcasts. But here he is talking about the possibility of green rain.

Not bad – you get two freebies, the debut album and a mixtape, plus a preview of the new album, Back off Man, I’m a Scientist, on kidkanevil’s myspace. Spicy beats in there I reckon.

Here’s the appetizers, plus the main downloads du jour:

kidkanevil – Ketto Revisited ft Bonobo (mp3) off Back Off Man, I’m a Scientist

kidkanevil – Def Cert feat Jehst & Sir Smurf Lil’ (mp3) off Problems and Solutions

Back off Man, I’m a Mixtape - rapidshare link

Problems & Solutions album – zip file, rapidshare link

Don’t forget to check out his blog. Unsurprisingly, a Reckoner remix in there. A really good one though.