piece by me on xenomania (with a small x, i.e. the syndrome, not the pop production team!), i.e. the new exoticism and fiending for all things post-geographically far flung... looking amongst other things at the beat-geek early-adopter chase to find the next global ghetto groove (aka woebot's "shanty house" of yore concept)

it's at the website for MTV Iggy (their panglobal station)

http://www.mtviggy.com/articles/xenomania-nothing-is-foreign-in-an-internet-age/

the highest profile of RDJ's anonymous juvenilia

was this almost a hit?

had no idea he went by the alter-ego Gak for this one release on Warp

bought one or two of these as well at the time and not very happy either although listening now there's some wee gems amid the relentless acid

i think i bought this, or is it one of these, not sure-- at any rate, was a dissatisfied punter, to put it mildly

moving on to the just very rare, barely released rdj juvenilia

another alleged aphex unreleased cache, the joyrex tape














track seven unavailable

well i thought i was a proper fan but i never heard of this allegedly unreleased Aphex Twin lp from the mid-nineties until today. in some stories it was made as a gift for friends at rephlex and warp, in others it was demos to be sent out as a calling card to videogame companies...

what do you think? a spoof? a scam?

i could almost believe it for Track 5

james blake on brostep

“I think the dubstep that has come over to the US, and certain producers-- who I can't even be bothered naming-- have definitely hit upon a sort of frat-boy market where there's this macho-ism being reflected http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifin the sounds and the way the music makes you feel. And to me, that is a million miles away from where dubstep started. It's a million miles away from the ethos of it. It's been influenced so much by electro and rave, into who can make the dirtiest, filthiest bass sound, almost like a pissing competition, and that's not really necessary. And I just think that largely that is not going to appeal to women. I find that whole side of things to be pretty frustrating, because that is a direct misrepresentation of the sound as far as I'm concerned.”


brostepper bites back:

“I think the sleepstep that has come over from the UK, and certain producers-- who I can't even be bothered naming because I'm over generalizing-- have definitely hit upon a sort of snoozing market where there's this urge to sleep being reflected in the sounds and the way the music makes you feel makes you drowsy. And to me, that is a million miles away from where the sound started. It's a million miles away from the slumber of it. It's been influenced so much by pillows and cushions, into who can make the softest, poofiest bass sound, almost like a resting competition, and that's not really necessary. And I just think that largely that is not going to appeal to the conscious. I find that whole side of things to be pretty relaxing, because that is a direct representation of the sound as far as I'm concerned.”



versus



surely there's a Third Way?!?

almost sounds like they've been listening to footwork

like an elephant at a roller disco



same album (Mr Gone), worlds apart



vibing

(what may be an intriguing possible-parallel-development to "hipster house")

mnml ssgs's silent partner writes about "post-techno" a/k/a "outsider techno"

http://mnmlssg.blogspot.com/2011/11/ripping-it-up-and-starting-again.html

which seems to refer to people who've gone back - to some extent or other - to techno's less-acknowledged roots in industrial music

while also rejecting digital-tech for (he doesn't quite says this but it's implicit) its insidious promotion of "audio trickle" / addle-daddle / nuance'n'layer-itis

a deliberate going-back to relative lo-tech -- to hardware not software -- ways of making music that are less-wieldy, less-facilitation-oriented

and that therefore produces starker, harder results

music with a spine

a bare-bones structural strength

as opposed to digital's "infinite flexibility"

perhaps they are the Billy Childishes of electronic music, Canute-like figures turning their back on progress

but perhaps they've got the right idea

i couldn't say

i've not heard any of the exemplary exponents he's cited

but i'm wondering if Ekoplekz belongs in that company

or Perc

wotsnot 2 like?

out in the US in the spring of 2012

this is the expanded/updated version of Energy Flash that Picador put out in the UK in 2008 (and now out of print there)and which added 40 thousand words to the book, covering developments between 1998>2008

since the original 1998 Energy Flash was significantly longer than the abridged and streamlined Generation Ecstasy (what came out in the US)

what will soon be available in the US for the first time is about 60 thousand words longer than Generation Ecstasy

IMPLUVIUM (Official Video) - SUN ARAW from Daniel Brantley on Vimeo.

immortal

invincible



rewind and come again



not quite so immortal

not quite so invincible



don't remember this version at all - dirty b-line, amens not smashy enough by half



increasing proof that remixes are 19 times out of 20 a waste of time energy and vinyl







i mean, i'm sure they're all intended with great love and reverence

but you can't improve on perfection

back to the original



and funny thing, i think this was really meant to be the A-side

“I guess producers are looking for something new to do. Something where they have a bit of space to breathe"--Jacob Martin aka Hodge and Outboxx

which is why The Future Sound of Bristol is... house music

“The good thing about taking influences from house music (again)... is that bad house music is most definitely already out there. 4x4 was bastardised a long time ago, so it doesn't even have to be considered that it's going to be ruined by scenester monkeys, as it's already happened a thousand times over. It's not a new thing [to do], it's just more a welcomed resurgence.

Hang on, i thought produces were "looking for something new to do"?

this is confusing

it's like people don't know up from down, left from right, new from old

=

hyperstasis, aka the uni-linearity of music-as-progress goes haywire, topsy turvy

what's it sound like? well if you've managed to retain any long-term memory (and i know it's hard in the endless digi-now recursive churn) it sounds a bit... familiar



s'nice enough spose

not a straight 4/4, a bit of a broken feel in there

reminds me a tiny bit of that Giant Steps NYC dude Viktor Duplaix

a tiny bit, that's all






"right in the middle of you is where i wanna be"

dirty git that Viktor

ardchive fever

yer a dairty wee radge Rustee



a dairty dairty dairty wee radge

forgotten gem of "intelligent big beat"



gtr riff is mekons sample

soundbites from that Radio 4 gardening program

crikey, the Bolshi label

this isn't the Rasmus track i really cared for ("Afro blowin' in the wind" on the Mass Hysteria EP - youtube don't have it), but it will do for now



youtube don't have any of the other wee gems by Beachcomas, like "it's eggyplectic" or Planet Thanet EP, but they do have this



which i don't remember at all, despite trying in those days of madness to pick everything up that Bolshi ever put out (not really a worthwhile enterprise since a lot it weren't 'specially hot, e.g. Laidback)

but defnitly worth picking up the first Donuts comp if you ever see it going cheep, just for "Donuts" and "Eggyplectic"

this is what i wrote about Beachcomas back in 98:

"Black sheep of the Bolshi roster, Beachcomas are even more into mix-and-mismatch. The partnership of programmer Matt Austin and sample-finder/"chaotic influence" Tony Freeman, Beachcomas first scored on the Big Beat scene with their Bolshi debut "It's Eggyplectic", a glorious squelch-funk surge of jazzy keyboard licks, burbling clavinets, and fierce acid stabs. But the duo really started to live up to their scavenger name--inspired by the surreal sight of a bed washed up on the mudbanks of the Thames--with "Donuts," an off-kilter delight that became the title track of the first Bolshi compilation (where you can also find "Eggyplectic"). Its unlikely constituents include quaint, regionally-inflected English voices, taped from a TV gardening program, talking about "peaches, split and juicy", "strawberries," and "nuts and medleys"; the panting of their pet dog, who refused to bark as desired; and a clipped guitar riff stolen from the B-side of the Mekons first single, "Never
Been In A Riot". This influence from an earlier phase of indie-dance crossover--the punk-funk of Delta 5 and Gang of Four--carries through to the Pop Group sample on Beachcomas' latest EP for Bolshi, the disappointingly ungainly "Big Tuddy Session". Although I could swear it's "Where There's A Will There Has Got To Be A Way" (the Pop Group track on the split-single with The Slits's "In The Beginning There Was Rhythm") that gets sampled on "Waiting For The Beach" (from the second Bolshi EP, Planet Thanet; also available on Donuts 2). Beachcomas say it's actually a Diana Ross loop, combined with rooster noises generated from rubbing Styrofoam together. Either way it's a killer tune, if too rhythmically eccentric to do well on the Big Beat circuit. Right now the Beachcomas are the group who could do most with the album format ("Donuts" was one of the most oddly poignant tracks I heard last year, strangely reminding me of A.R. Kane's second album) but the artist least likely to get the chance."

unhipster house






















History, meet Farce

one thing you can say for them hipsters, they sure do their research

succumbing to a strange fascination with this



there's some kind of effect been put on it, a filter or something

something that's making it look even more stilted and gormless than it actually is

unless...

they actually choreographed and rehearsed every single move being made by the dancers

it seems so... studied

are they taking the piss, or feigning taking-the-piss to disguise the real "go back" yearning?

the music is a bit like that outfit that did "7 Ways To Love", Cola Boy, who were Saint Etienne connected...

except more pallid and washed out sounding

but, like, 20 years after doing it would be any kind of timely response

and yet for all that, not utterly devoid of pleasingness

strange days are these

umtimelich days