Strange Collaborations

Well I've been noticing in the last few months some strange musical collaborations happening but this one has gotta take the cake - Scott Walker & Sunn O))). I mean I love me Scott Walker and we all know he's a little strange and a little cheeky but what? I think it's as strange as the pairing of Lou Reed & Metallica, no definitely stranger. I must admit I haven't listened to that and some people rated it quite highly? I mean I'm big on Lou and have been known to enjoy Metallica amongst friends ie. I never bought a Metallica LP in my life but my friends did and I didn't hate them. It's a bit like Sunn O))). I enjoy what I've heard on the radio but never bothered to investigate them any further (It's been in the back of my mind to check em out....but....). Maybe not quite as strange but Royksopp & Robyn? Now I can't think of the other ones that I've seen and thought what? Maybe though its a better collaboration if you are stylistically further from one another. Nick Cave & Kylie Minogue was superficially a bit weird but if you think about it they are both pop singers, entertainers, song and dance people. Now Kylie & Stockhausen would have been weird but probably not as weird as Cave & Stockhausen, at least Kylie would be considered electronic rather than rock. Now this all reminds me of French musique concrete composer Pierre Henry collaborating with British proggers Spooky Tooth, a bit weird?. Kate Bush & Peter Gabriel normal. Nirvana & William S Boroughs a bit strange but not really. 

Coldplay & U2, now that'd be fucked up! Only one band would have to turn up. Would you have The Edge from Coldplay or U2's Edge? What about Taylor Swift & Burzum? Pharell & Earth? Evan Dando & Diamanda Galas? That one kinda sounds like it might be alright, it's hard to know. Nickleback & The Wiggles? The Mrs offers Allanis Morrisette & Coldplay. You could play this game all day really and somebody probably already has on Twitter. Then there's the whole alive/dead thing. Nicki Minaj & Ian Curtis anyone up for that? What about Kermit The Frog & Townes Van Zandt? Elvis & Bieber?

More Bike Tunes 90s Stylee

This popped up on me ye olde iphone during a trip back from the doctor today and it sounded so good. I'm not sure I should have actually been riding a bike, now, come to think of it. I made it home in one piece I guess.

This too. That bass is well wicked man!

4 Eva Bloody - Young Thug & Bloody Jay

Hang on a minute....now this could be my favourite trak of the year. It's a demented anthem to god knows what! What a coupla of crackpot legends!

What I'm Diggin!

Antipodean reissue of the year without doubt! The long out of print Derry Legend from 1989. The best band to come out of New Zealand in my book. This was originally released on Flying Nun!? Although they seem to get written out of Flying Nun's history and most histories of NZ music actually. More on this later ie. a full write up, when I've fully convalesced. Check out these previous posts for Axemen genius.

Don't know much about this dude but this is some of 2014s best rap/ratchet. Apparently there's another volume.

King Kev's 2014 By Any Means is not as immediate as his Stranger Than Fiction from last year but I'm startin to really dig this a lot. What a fuckin talent! That voice! What a badass!

Lovin this. What a team Bloody Jay & Young Thug. Bloody Jay has a new solo one out as well, I can't keep up.

My favourite LP to listen to while me and my dog sit by the fire with our feet up. Hey I'm an adult! .......well sometimes.

Not Really Diggin

10s Hardcore continuum soundz. Hey I really enjoy Kid Lib but the rest I dunno?

???

A new Rustie album how excitement! Now, I'm not so sure. It's early doors yet though.

Ratchet & Trap Explained Part 2

"That description of ratchet doesn't really capture the stylistic essence of things like "Rack City" and all that followed it, though does it - "simple rhythms, kicks and claps, squelchy synth bass" - i'm not sure i can do any better, though! Deceptively simple, i think would be the first nuance i'd add. Mustard's tracks are like Dre's classic beats, in way -- not doing anything very flashy or obviously avant, but real groovy. harder than it looks, i'll bet. With Mustard, the signature features are the snare rolls with the paradiddle-like military feel, the HEY!HEY!HEY!HEY! Marine-regiment doing-drill chants, and, more recently, those re purposed and slowed-down 90s house licks and vamps."

This was left on the comments page of Ratchet & Trap Explained by the one and only Simon Reynolds. Now that's an explanation of Mustard & his ratchet. Onya Simon! To tell you the truth I thought Anonymous may have been him or some other such luminary.

DJ Mustard - 10 Summers

How Is He Going To Top This?

With this?

I don't know if he can top 2013's number 1 sonic document, his Ketchup mixtape, with his follow up 10 Summers. Judging by the little radio skits that contain nothing but past Mustard hits toward the end of this album. Where someone keeeps flicking the dial on the radio only to find old Mustard hits, I think he's already feeling his past as a bit of an albotross. Perhaps he's looking for a way forward or just something as classic as My Nigga, Rack City, I'm Different, Show Me, Paranoid, 2 On, Lady Killa, Midnight Run et al.

Part 2 coming up of my appraisal of 10 Summers. Once I've had more than a few listens. Stay tuned for the next episode of DJ Mustard's 10 Summers.

KRAUTROCK

Funnily enough I was listening to Faust and Eroc's Eroc 1 today and hello to make my bad days a little brighter here's David Stubbs and his book Future Days: Krautrock And The Building Of Modern Germany. There have been other good books on this topic of course. Particularly gonzo rock guru Julian Cope's KrautrockSampler, which is long out of print. Then there was The Crack In The Cosmic Egg by Steven & Alan Freeman which has also been out of print for some time but is a fabulous resource for the more obscure side of the genre. A scaled down internet version of this encyclopedia by the Freemans is available here in pdf form. Stubbs is of course a legend from the Melody Maker in the 80s. He wrote an excellent book a few years ago Fear OF Music about how modern music isn't given the same respect critically, culturally and monetarily as modern art is. Simon Reynolds really revs up the book with an astonishing  quote "Future Days does not capture Krautrock so much as unleash it. At long last the definitive book on the ultimate music." Now that's saying something. As I recall a highlight of the 90s Reynolds & Press book The Sex Revolts was a chapter on Can which blew my mind. The best writing on the German group Can ever or any other group for that matter. Maybe there's better to come. Stubbs seems to show up at  times in my life when I'm in bad health. There's a picture of me reading Fear Of Music on a hospital bed from a few years ago. It's like he knows when I need cheering up.

Any reason to play Can is a good reason.
You really need to listen to this LP as a whole.
It's Genius (and I hate that word's over use!).

Lee Gamble - Girl Drop

This could be my favourite track of the year too. This is from Lee Gamble's Kuang EP. It feels like a ghostly cavernous space where the rave action used to be, now there is just reverberation and lost time. I can also sense some hope perhaps, sunlight creeping though the cracks of a past time. Anyway it is beautiful and brilliant. It's up there with anything from his Diversions 94-96 record which made my end of 2012 list. It's probably the best thing he's done so far, stunning!

Florida Water - Young Thug & Bloody Jay

This could be my favourite track of the year. It's like something from a crappy lo-fi experimental art rock band that only put out tapes in like the mid 80s (that's not a bad thing in my book). I dunno if Thug and Jay are just lazy, bored wasted or just fucking funny. Probably all of the above. Florida Water is from Young Thug & Bloody Jay's 2014 gem Black Portland.

Young Thug & Bloody Jay's Florida Water made me wanna listen to this. I dunno if there's a connection or if my brain's just on random. Anyway this is an Ariel Pink classic from Mature Themes, I wish this song would go for an hour. I just can't get enough.

Ratchet & Trap Explained

"Trap = derived from southern "gangsta" rap; particularly mid-2000s stuff like gucci mane, young jeezy, t.i. lots of intricate, rattling 808 percussion & snare sounds along with booming kick drums and bass. a lot of the original producers used a lot of big wall-of-sound, gothic sounding synths and there was a noticeable influence from electronic genres like trance and electro, but filtered through a rap production aesthetic. now a huge influence on rap, r&b and electronic music, and the production is often a lot sleeker and less bombastic."

 "Ratchet = term for the recent production style that draws on hyphy (e-40, keak da sneak, mistah fab etc), jerk music, crunk and g-funk. lots of simple rhythms, kicks and claps, squelchy synth bass. i think the term was originally used by lil boosie in Louisiana but now usually refers to west coast rap and r&b stuff like dj mustard, yg, ty dolla sign etc."

*This was left by an anonymous commenter. Thanks Anonymous I think you know your shit!

They've intermingled and cross-pollinated though haven't they and not just with each other but most other forms of 90s electronic music and some 90s rap ie. 666 Mafia, right?