“Matter thus offers an infinitely porous, spongy, or cavernous texture without emptiness, caverns endlessly contained contained in other caverns: no matter how small, each body contains a world of pierced with irregular passages, surrounded and penetrated by an increasingly vaporous fluid, the totality of the universe resembling a pond of matter in which there exist different flows and waves.” Gilles Deleuze, The Fold, (English translation) 1993

1. Make me Stronger - Bei Bei & Shawn Lee feat. Georgia Anne Muldrow (Floating points remix) (Ubiquity, 2009)

2. Fallin’ Down - Julian Dyne feat. Parks (’Pins & Digits’ LP 2009)

3. Lover’s Carvings- Bibio (Leatherette remix) (’Apple & the Tooth’, 2009)

4. Nereci - Djavan (’Djavan’, 1978)

5. Say what? - Aphrodesia (2009)

6. Poye - Issa Bagayogo (2009)

Things are picking up down here in Melbourne. Holidays for students like me, summer, nights walking barefoot in the middle of the road, and similar future nostalgia fodder. Whilst I do like the warmer weather, I’m equally exited to be going to the red bull music academy this coming feb in cold London. The list is a handful of excellent records that I’ve been playing lately - afrobeat, beats, ‘exotic’ percussion, etc.

Pic: If you are thinking that the puppy is cute, keep in mind that it stole one of my thongs and gnawed it to pieces whilst I was in a temple in India.

Photo: Leighton Roberts

Subo hacia el segundo piso y me doy cuenta de que la tiniebla está untada a las paredes, carne de los muros, como si éstas fueran ella misma y yo pudiera transponerlo, como se horada la neblina y, de esa forma, atravesar todos los edificios del Centro, mirando sus vergüenzas y sus orgullos, sus amores y sus melancolias, sus crimenes y sus nacimientos. Necesidad imperiosa de que la tiniebla anciana explique, diga, cuenta cada historia, que resuenen en este silencio los estallidos y las voces poderosas, que se escuche el llanto de una mujer, las canciones de una serenata, la agonia de los viejos. Entonces comprendo que la principal vocación de primera tiniebla es la sugerencia.

-Guillermo Samperio, Algo sobre las tinieblas.

1. La Barranca - Como una sombra
   Tempestad (Fonarte, 1997)
2. The Besnard Lakes - And You Lied To Me
   The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse (Jagjaguwar, 2007)
3. Beirut - La Llorona
   The March Of The Zapotec / Real People Holland   (Pompeii, 2009)
4. Steven Wilson- Harmony Korine
   Insurgentes (Kscope, 2008)
5. Young Galaxy - Lazy Religion
   Young Galaxy (Arts & Craft, 2007)
6. Priestbird - Mandog
   In Your Time (Kemado, 2007)
7. UNKLE - Chemistry
   War Stories (2007)
8. Efterklang And The Danish National Chamber Orchestra - Cutting Ice To Snow
   Perfoming Parades (The Leaf Level, 2009)

The selection contains music from La Barranca (one of my favorite bands from Mexico; Tempestad is a great album, and its artwork is simply: amazing), Priestbird (recently discovered),  Beirut (Dear reader, Mexico is more than Mariachi), Steven Wilson (yes, the member of Porcupine Tree; Insurgentes is one of the best albums of the decade), Young Galaxy and The Besnard Lakes from Canada, UNKLE providing a pounding rock scorcher and finally, the soft and delicate sounds of Efterklang + The Danish Orchestra to end it all in a light note.
The Martians (have kidnapped me) and I say: Enjoy.

The presence of extra structure relates these types of groups with other mathematical disciplines and means that more tools are available in their study. Topological groups form a natural domain for abstract harmonic analysis, whereas Lie groups (frequently realized as transformation groups) are the mainstays of differential geometry and unitary representation theory. Certain classification questions that cannot be solved in general can be approached and resolved for special subclasses of groups. Thus, compact connected Lie groups have been completely classified. - Group theory.

” The Road Of Golden Dust ”

01. ESPERS - The Road Of Golden Dust
III (Drag City, 2009)
02. Hope Sandoval & The Warm Inventions - Sets The Blaze
Through The Devil Softly (Nettwerk Records, 2009)
03. Sufjan Stevens - Movement II: Sleeping Invader
The BQE (Asthmatic Kitty, 2009)
04. Grizzly Bear and Feist - Service Bell
Dark Was The Night (2009)
05. Air - Night Hunter
Love 2 (2009)
06. Walter Meego - Wanna Be A Star
Voyager (Almost Gold, 2008)

Note: a list for internal purpose. I am trying to find different psychological construct from what MdM is normally doing. Usually the process is finding obvious musical connection to give strong coherency then staple a theme onto it. It’s been very fruitful technique but in a way, it’s also gotten a bit mundane. The usual result certainly can strongly emote, but it is static. So I am trying to create a series dedicated to explore aspects beyond the usual method to put list together (relationship between rhythm, melody, mode, etc). I don’t know what yet, this could be a simple directionless exploration. The list above certainly has that feels, compared to other lists it feels different. There is that “something different, but not sure what.” feel. I cheated and put in slower tempo and comfy key progression, but I don’t think it’s a simple random collection of pretty songs. Basically, the softer tone is intentional to help me find out if there is something more to the usual method. Something to do I suppose. Hey, with the way things are going this could end in MdM only needing to do single post for entire next decade that one can play over and over. We are hopelessly lazy, but at least we are trying to do in style. (haa haa, cough cough.)

The music. Espers is from standard mdm psychdelia palette. The latest album by Hope Sandoval, An art album by Sufjan Steven, and a big collective song album containing favorite indie rock artists “Dark Was The Night”. All worth exploring. Walter Meego is a crazy little disco rock album. They are all highly recommended albums. So if this project fails, at the very least we end up knowing bunch of good albums.

image: Ed Yourdon

Photo: Sandboy.

You almost never from a Lynch movie get the sense that the point is to “entertain” you, and never that the point is to get you to fork over money to see it. This is one of the unsettling things about a Lynch movie: You don’t feel like you’re entering into any of the standard unspoken and/or unconscious contracts you normally enter into with other kinds of movies. This is unsettling because in the absence of such an unconscious contract we lose some of the psychic protections we normally (and necessarily) bring to bear on a medium as powerful as film. That is, if we know on some level what a movie wants from us, we can erect certain internal defenses that let us choose how much of ourselves we give away to it. The absence of point or recognizable agenda in Lynch’s films, though, strips these subliminal defenses and lets Lynch get inside your head in a way movies normally don’t. This is why his best films’ effects are often so emotional and nightmarish

- David Foster Wallace, A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again.

1. Marsmobil - Astralbody
   Minx  (Compost, 2006)
2. Nino Rota - O’ Venezia Venaga Venusia
   Il Casanova (CAM, 1976)
3. Bohren & Der Club of Gore - Destroying angels
   Black Earth (Wonder, 2002)
4. Manfred Hübler & Siegfried Schwab - Necronomania
   Vampyros Lesbos (Crippled Dick Hot Wax, 1995)
5. Susanna & the magical orchestra - Sweet devil
   List of Lights and Buoys (Rune Grammofon, 2004)
6. Oleg Kostrow - Elysee theme
   Imago OST (2002)
7. Peter Thomas Sound Orchester - Lancet bossa nova
   Raumpatrouille (1966)
8. Colleen - I’ll read you a story
   The Golden Morning Breaks (Leaf, 2005)

This playlist has been on the motel’s vault for ages. Recently a reader requested a spy-themed playlist and I think this one just might fit the bill, so I’ve decided to rescue it and give it another shot before it gets completely lost into oblivion.
It’s just a humble tribute to David Lynch’s work,  a playlist which could match the aesthetic of most of his films: eerie atmospheres, discreet violence and smokey, erotic overtones. In keeping with the personality of Lynch’s film the songs move in between noir sensibility, delicate siren calls and a little hint of kitsch. I hope you enjoy.

Also see:

- David Foster Wallace on Lost Highway.
- The 10 Best David Lynch Moments.

” OMG, a post ! ”

01. Why? - This Blackest Purse
Eskimo Snow (Anticon, 2009)
02. Grand Archives - Oslo Novelist
Keep In Mind Frankenstein (Sub Pop, 2009)
03. Sonic Youth - Empty Page
Morning Becomes Eclectic, August 26, 2002
04. Trans Am - North East Rising Sun
Sex Change (Thrill Jockey, 2007)
05. Silver Starling - Closer
Silver Starling (Last Gang Records, 2009)
06. Nosaj Thing - Ioio
Mary-Anne Hobbs Presents: Wild Angels (Planet Mu, 2009)

note: The entire MdM members have been kidnapped by the martians. My dog ate the hardrive, and there was no music in later have of 2009… :P OK. I am squeezing a post in between busy time and that never finished decade list. Here are fun recent tracks that I like. Think crisp winter morning edgy dream pop. If there is such thing. One part new wave, one part dream pop, 2 part gentrified IDM synth, and 5 parts cool mint and winter breeze. Large open air. This almost sound like something Canadian TV would play. On serious note, check out Sonic Youth performance from last month at Morning become eclectic (courtesy Aquarium Drunkard) It never cease to amaze me how Sonic Youth has become the sound that can fit everywhere. Maybe finally experimental rock has been tamed and ready for public consumption… They play at NPR radio for pete’s sake. Second album is Mary-Anne Hobbs from planet Mu. Watch how the sound is toned down compared to her other IDM mix. It almost sound like a rock album. The track above is the proof if you don’t believe me. Anyway, everybody’s albums in above list is enjoyable. I think they work out nicely.

see also: Modern Mood

image: HogueLikeWoah

The ugly truth is that economics is a science in the way that medicine was a profession while it still used leeches to balance a person’s vapours. Yes, some are always better than others, and certainly more entertaining, but they all tended to kill their patients.

The most intractable part of the current financial crisis, and the ongoing problem of the US economy is the huge tax which is levied on the American public by its corporations, primarily in the financial and health care sectors, and a political system based on lobbyists and their campaign contributions.

There are hidden taxes and impediments to ‘free trade’ at every turn. The ugly truth is that capitalism-in-practice hates free markets, always seeking to overturn the rules and impose oligopoly if not outright monopoly through barriers to entry, manipulation of the political process, distortion of regulation, predatory pricing, brute force, and the usual slate of anti-trust practices. - Zero Hedge.

Feist - Lovertits (with Gonzales)
Open Season (Arts & Crafts, 2001)

Few songs make a great B-side gems, where it can illicit so many quirks from the 00’s . This seemingly innocent hip-hop remix with Feist and Gonzales is actually a cover of Peaches’ ultra kinky electro punk piece. Not only the song is a decadal self referential, it also captures certain small room gentleness that blossom in the 00’s. I thought a great time capsule list for 00’s rock song should open with this one.

Interpol - NYC
Turn On The Bright Lights (Matador Records, 2002)

A debut album by Interpol with classic matador/Pixie sound. The attempt to glued back NYC after the terror attack is memorable. It also mark the beginning of retro pop punk that swept the entire blog which was the official party sound.

Asobi Seksu - Thursday
Citrus (Friendly Fire, 2006)

Since Moka was so serious about shoegazer, around this album release I actually put meek effort to listen to more shoegazer. Well, if you need a shoegazer album with dream pop slant, and typical fuzzy buzz of the 00’s. This album is a fun one. A legit indie too.

The Go! Team - Feelgood By Numbers
Thunder, Lightning, Strike (Memphis Industries, 2004)

Party Time. I still am not sure what mix the Go Team consist of, but if you want to know what J-PoP made in Southern England would sound like.

Jens Lekman - A Sweet Summer’s Night on Hammer Hill
Oh You’re So Silent Jens (Secretly Canadian, 2005)

There was a brief, mini Swedish invasion around this album release. There must be at least 4 swedish pop track that MdM post, and I can’t remember any of them. Go to swedesplease.net to sort it all out.

Camera Obscura - Teenager
Underachievers Please Try Harder (Merge Records, 2003)

Underachievers Please Try Harder! lol. A fun little retro rock album. Very sweet sounding and Camera Obscura was all the rage in mid 00’s. Camera Obscura and Belle Sebastian for some reason were always come in pair. It’s all in attitude and execution. New idea is overated.

My Morning Jacket - Off the Record
Z (Ato Records, 2005)

Hard to believe this group is from Kentucky. And their wiki entry reads lke hardworking, climb the ladder indie band. They deserves it too. Hope they keep rocking. I particularly like this song trippy end. see wiki.

Bloc Party - Helicopter
Silent Alarm (Vice Records, 2005)

Bloc Party is so representive of retro pop punk of the 00’s. The block party and Arctic Monkey. They are too sleek and cool for regular knuckle dragging blues punk, but not too shiny that Spin magazine can destroy them. I should also mention Franz Ferdinand.

Arctic Monkeys - Riot Van
Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not (Domino, 2006)

The band that breaks the recording industry sign up rule and do promo themselves and crash the chart. Everybody on the net we elated, the new age has arrived! Nobody knows for sure what age, but these lads rock hard and nobody cares.

M. Ward - Fuel For Fire
Transistor Radio (Merge Records, 2005)

M. Ward has that heart breaking quality in all his song. Way too serious for an age where everything was accelerated to stratosphere before anybody can understand how an event work. But check his album anyway. Here is amazon teaser “a collection of songs “about childhood memories of a utopian radio power”, dedicated to “the last of the remaining independent radio stations.” With songs normally associated with the front porches of Louisiana, back when families gathered around the radio instead of the TV, “Transistor Radio” fits somewhere between your great-grandfather’s collection of 78 rpm records and current and timeless artists such as Iron & Wine, Gram Parsons, and Tom Waits. Guests include Jim James (My Morning Jacket), Jenny Lewis (Rilo Kiley), Howe Gelb (Giant Sand), and Jordan Hudson (The Thermals).”

So that’s my little B-side short party list. The 00’s time capsule. second companion list of 00’s best of.

see also: I Remember 00′
image: [Steven Meisel for Vogue Italia July 2007], [The Sun and Doves]

” The classic feel of downtempo ”

01. Flying Lotus - Orbit Brazil
1983 (Plug Research, 2006)
02. Joe Beats - Sleep Or Bust
Diverse Recourse (Bully, 2007)
03. The Truth - Truth Theme
Fila Brazillia Remixes: B2 (Twentythree Records, 2003)
04. Dorian Concept - Trilingual Dance Sexperience
Trilingual Dance Sexperience (Affine Records, 2009)
05. Nosaj Thing - Quest
Drift (Alpha Pup Records, 2009)
06. Cinematic Orchestra - Channel 1 Suite
Motion (1999)
07. Fluke - Bermuda
Risotto (1997)

note: I am not sure where everybody is. I am in mellow, don’t wanna do anything mood. So this list is a bit meandering. Part survey what’s new out there, part old favorite, part random bits that I wanted to post long time ago. Nothing ground breaking, comfy familiar Brooklyn by way of UK electronic sound. Hey speaking of, anybody ever been to Helsinki? Is it really cold in winter?

image: paijailu

The remaining systems within ten light years are the binary red dwarf system Luyten 726-8 (8.7 light years) and the solitary red dwarf Ross 154 (9.7 light years). Our closest solitary sun-like star is Tau Ceti, which lies 11.9 light years away. It has roughly 80 percent the Sun’s mass, but only 60 percent its luminosity. The closest known extrasolar planet to the Sun lies around the star Epsilon Eridani, a star slightly dimmer and redder than the Sun, which lies 10.5 light years away. Its one confirmed planet, Epsilon Eridani b, is roughly 1.5 times Jupiter’s mass and orbits its star every 6.9 years. - wiki

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” As Big as the Solar System ”

01. Luigi Nono - Liebeslied
Wien Modern (1990)
02. Kronos Quartet - Spem in alium “Sing And Glorify”, P. 299 (arr. Kronos Quartet)
Black Angels (1990)
03. Tarentel - Blessed|Cursed
The Order of Things (Neurot Recordings, 2001)
04. Fridge - Harmonics
Happiness (Temporary Residence, 2001)
05. Nels Cline/Greg Bendian - Venus
Interstellar Space Revisited (The Music of John Coltrane) (2005)
06. Slint - Washer
Spiderland (Touch & Go Records, 1991)
07. Rachel’s - Artemisia
Selenography (Touch & Go Records, 1999)
08. The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble - Parallel Corners
The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble (Planet Mu, 2006)
09. Broadcast - Look Outside
Noise made by people (2000)
10. Ralph Towner - Piscean Dreams
Solstice (ECM, 1975)

Note: Wow, posting has been sparse. Here is a big one, try to make it last for a few days :D. It’s really big, I like it. A simple post-rock mix with few string tracks. Random really, I just need an excuse to post the above beautiful solar system exploration map. So, post rock with a tinge of spacey feel is in order. Float around the solar system for a moment. In the meantime, we still trying to sort things out. (no really…really really… )

image: National Geography via Gizmodo