Soundtrack of 2009

Doubt there are going to be many more additions to this list (as the year is nearly done). These audio recollections are a varied journey from New York rap heat to a magnificent Soul album of the decade to local Psych Shoe Gaze splendor to a Detroit House monster via Stuttgart and beyond.

The truth was not only in the year just gone, but furthermore for this last decade, I think we (music fiends, DJ’s, journalists, bloggers), all had those moments where we needed some silence from the onslaught of every single type of music imaginable, some amazing, a lot buried and or discarded in the wish that we never wasted those valuable minutes in tune to tracks we didn’t lose ourselves in and to.

However ones insatiable appetite never ends.

Here are tracks, releases that were the backdrop to the year just about gone:

In No Order:
Cormega – Make It Clear (Aura)
Cormega - Rapture (Aura)
M.O.P. - What I Wanna Be featuring Rell (E1)
Lee Fields – My World (Truth and Soul)
Trackademicks – Top Sidin (Instrumental) (Fools Gold)
Dam-Funk - Toeachizown (Stones Throw)
Hudson Mohawke - Butter (Warp)
The Hipstones – Dreamers (The Hipstones)
The Black Ryder – Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride (EMI)
Washed Out – Feel It All Around (Mexican Summer)
Washed Out – Olivia (Mirror Universe)
Beautiful Swimmers - Swimmers Groove (Future Times)
Nufrequency – Fallen Hero featuring Ben Onono (Motor City Drum Ensemble remix) (White)
Lizzy Parkes – This and That (Tru Thoughts)
Floating Points – Vacuum Boogie (Eglo)
Motor City Drum Ensemble – Raw Cuts #5 #6 (MCDE)
Jackpot – Brief Encounter (Rvng Intl)
Bullion – Young Heartache (One Handed)
2000F and J Kamata – You Don’t Know What Love Is (Hyperdub)
Luke Vibert – We Hear You (Planet Mu)
Capracara – King of the Witches (DFA)
Canyons – Fire Eyes (Jacques Renault remix) (DFA)
Knightlife – Knightlife II (Cutters)
Major Lazer – Cash Flow (Classixx Glass Bottom Dub mix)
Phoenix - Fences (Eli Escobar Remix)

What were yours? Let me know.

Just before conjuring up the above, I was over at those Phonica folks Top 100 slices of wax for the double o nine - worth a look indeed.

Random Find

There is something special about looking through racks and racks of releases, pulling a album or single out cause of who produced it, the cover or just due to it sparking interest in you wanting to hear it. I can definitely count the late Roger Troutman founded group The Human Body and their 1984 release “Make You Shake It” on Bearsville as one of those discoveries. Perhaps this next declaration will change over time for me, but right now the title track and the jam below are the stand-outs.

Have not watched television in three days and three may well turn into four. Drinking, listening to tunes, hanging out with good people at my friends joint clothing label launch, more on that shortly. That is what was happening yesterday evening. Now compare that to plumping yourself in front of the box after a day in the office, consuming junk, fast food and brew after brew or drop after drop and then eventually.... Which option wins, you already know the answer, right!

Moving on to some music, a few of you would remember the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy (Michael Franti (Spearhead) was the front man) and their track "Television the Drug of a Nation", released in 1991. I remember catching the clip while still in primary school. It is still one of those videos that make you pay attention, question the point of hours wasted lounging in front of the box.

My knowledge of all the music out there, although never-ending is still limited, so it was definitely interesting to see that the first incarnation of that drug of a nation track was from Franti’s group before DHOH, called the Beat Nigs. Certainly out there, again it is food for –thought, next time you switch on the tube without a plan or any idea what and for how long you will be sitting and watching.

Escape the Noise

It is impossible to keep up with all the music dropping nowdays. To be frank it's better not to.

You begin to notice that there are a million mixes floating round with a lot of the same throwaway crud, everywhere you turn. One can only shudder to think how much bad music is getting played in clubs worldwide nowdays. Instead of chasing all those tunes you're bound to get sick of after a few listens, go here, one of the best blogs I've ever come across, the music is amazing, timeless, filled with soul, honest and built to last.

Shout out to DJ Day, saw this particular site listed over in his link section. You are already checking his great Like A Throttle site, aren't you?

Hip Hop Rocks The Vote - Part 1

Here’s a bunch of artists in the Hip Hop music, film and entertainment industry speaking on the upcoming US election. November the 4th is the big day. Personally I always think about how lucky we are in the West to have freedom of choice when we go to the polling booths. As Murs says here people die to vote in certain countries. Think about that reality for a minute.

Who You Are?

Flashback to the time during your childhood when you proudly wore a t-shirt with your favourite band on it, sought out a pair of kicks that only you and a close circle o like - minded addicts knew about. What about when you first heard a particular genre of music. It may have been uncool to your peers, but it rocked your world. It allowed you to forget all the superfluous directions from teachers, parents, authority-figures, advertisers and so on. Albeit, even if it was for just a few hours allow yourself to be taken over by the soundtrack to the years when you weren’t quite an adult but far from a child.

Gone are the days when your subculture (at least you were convinced it were) was something original, rebellious, distinct, raw, brash. A way of life that you took part in, solely because you could identify with the success of your idols (whether in the street or in the mainstream) and all they and the art form they partook in represented. Take any major teenage subculture, hobby, form of popular music of the past twenty odd years – whether punk, heavy metal, graffiti, hip hop, skateboarding, house music, they have all been exploited to sell goods. The trend watchers take whatever movement has some sort of underlying sense of integrity, strip of it of it’s original meaning and then market as something 'cool', 'exciting', 'daring', when really what that culture that once seemed so pure has just been manipulated, pre-packaged, wrung till it’s last drop of life and then spat out and abandoned, only to have the next so called 'trend' (whatever the cool merchants deemed was so popular amongst the kids these days), go through the same cycle.

To be blunt, sneaker and clothing companies never wanted to be associated with a “ghetto” subculture till they saw how desired their garments were by impoverished kids, and even then a handful of luxury brands want nothing to do with successful rappers who don’t fit the clean-cut stereotypes their brand perpetuates and endorse. That’s just one example, in brief how can you forget when head-bangers were seriously uncool (no signs of the rip off faded, mass marketed, cheaply designed fashion unauthentic retro band homages of today), skateboarding was hated by the metal heads, writers, punks and the homeboys at your local Westfield shopping complex, not to mention the jocks and every authority figure you could think of. As for graffiti, it was the scourge of society, a sign that lawlessness was rampant and that the youth had no respect for anyone, anything, they were a generation whose morals had gone to hell.

Well if you believed what you see on billboards, in magazine advertisements and on television commercials, skateboarding is so cool, graffiti is acceptable and hip hop is summarised by material wealth and it’s all so chic, great, acceptable? Oh, how times have changed? Hardly, the truth is no matter what the culture, the ones that live for it will always be doing what they do, regardless of the stigma attached to it, in the mainstreams consciousness. You can’t identify with something truly if there is no connection between whatever culture you engage in and what it means to you. It’s a free world yes, but really if you think that engaging in a subculture and its affiliated clothing, style that is currently “hot” in the marketers eyes will provide some glint of happiness in your life, you are bound to remain unfulfilled, empty and always craving more.

My point is corporations aren’t interested in culture being a unifying force for its participants. They are interested in money, that’s all. So all the mixed messages your exposed to on a day to day basis in a world where advertising is all around us -on the billboards we walk past, on the television screens we tune out watching when we crash on the couch after work, throughout our email accounts, all over social networking sites and video sharing sites, it is easy to become overwhelmed by how inadequate we are constantly being told we are if we’re not wearing, drinking, driving, engaging in whatever activities featured in the advertisement onslaught we are subjected to during out daily movements. Brand name clothing, obscure trainers, good wines, fast cars…. – we all desire the finer things in life. The trick is realising that no amount of material items can solely define you as a person. It is not what you own but it’s what you make of one life that you have that counts. Far from suggesting laziness, complacency or a nostalgic spaced out hippy lifestyle. It is the determination to succeed at whatever it is that drives you in life through hard work, passion and the buildings of skills relevant to the goals you are working towards There is nothing worse than sacrificing or putting a lid on your interest’s, only to become another sheep in the herd breaking your back to keep up with what’s deemed cool by companies who have their sights set on making a profit and market saturation.

Here is where the punch of this rant comes in, the really cool thing about all the creative, beautiful renegades creating art in whatever shape, way or form currently is that rather than be only sucked in by the culmination of overly, photo-shopped, retouched up, unobtainable images they’re bombarded with on a daily basis, they’ve taken these and through manipulation and their own ideas, opinions and urges they’ve created something original, subversive, often controversial but most of all exciting, lasting and thought provoking. thanks to technology and individuals tired of operating in a corporate dog eat dog hierarchy, the rulebook documenting how we operate as individuals in society, what we consume and the control that multinationals have over us is being torn up and rewritten, one page at a time. We live in an exciting time. A time when for most of us, are only limited by self-doubt, excuses and keeping up with those at the forefront of our celebrity obsessed culture. Keep on grinding, keep on striving, cause if you devote enough energy to what it is you believe in, what you live for, then who knows what may happen.

Strolling & thinking

1988 is a blur to me. Can't remember much about that time.

Years (many years later) I started finding out about all the dope rap tunes from years gone by that I hadn't heard, such as the following classic from Toddy Tee which was originally released on 'Dunk Yer Funk' Records.

Shout to dodt04 for upping a remix to this classic Tee video 'Just Say No', which features Mixmaster Spade (R.I.P.).



Check the 'Fila' sweatshirt in this clip. Whatever happend to that brand? Now you only catch glimpses of label amongst the racks of second hand clothing stores. Way before I connected 'Fila' to Hip Hop, it used to be the staple wear of all the italians i knew growing up. Anyhow.

Next up, came across a fresh new track from The Cunninlynguists ft. Phonte (Little Brother) and Witch Doctor - 'Yellow Lines' over at Hip Hop DX.

Lil Fame (M.O.P.) - Ring Di Alarm is a favourite track of recent times. Produced by Fizzy Womack. You can't front on rap like this. Easily in the top ten list for '07. It's been up on 'zShare' for a while.

Here's an interesting piece (from 'Europe Jazz Network') you may have missed on jazz fusion / psych rock virtuoso John Mc Glaughlin.

You need to check photographer Mark Brecke's upcoming film They Turned Our Desert Into Fire (Official site including Trailer & Director's Statement).

I was not a big fan of Michael Gondry's 'Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind' (fell asleep from memory while watching it). Was going to see 'The Science Of Sleep' but never got around to it. I'm undecided on whether I'll go and check out 'Be Kind Rewind'. The trailer has been posted everywhere on line (now including here, see below).



Stars Mos Def, Jack Black & Miss Melonie Diaz.

'Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten', started in UK cinemas on the 18th May, 2007. I caught the trailer while at the movies yesterday (something i've been doing a lot lately). Can't wait to check this documentary on the lead singer of 'The Clash' out. Screening at the Chauvel in Sydney. Season begins September 20, 2007.

In Motion

Alright so it's going down like this. Randomly going to think of a video, an artist and then post it up here for you to see.

First up, Josie Stingray - 'Doin' My Thing' live (courtesy of Prefix Mag)



Ed.OG & Da Bulldogs - 'Be A Father To Your Child' (Embedding disabled by 'Universal Music Group').

I've gotta speak on this track. Seriously, it's rare that someone makes music as meaningful as this in 2007.

Apart from a few artists, Rap is a cesspool right now. All the record labels, so called dj's, magazines pumping out, supporting garbage and that's what it is. You want to know why music sales are falling (this has been said everywhere ad nauseum, but needs to be said again), it's because honestly the majority of this music released is garbage. It's throw away. Worse for the listener than fast food. Yet the same videos, the same parody's of what white rich men heading these organisations deem popular seem to flood every nook, cranny, airwave, video show out there, over and over again.

In a Cool Eh interview with Hank Shocklee (Bomb Squad / Public Enemy), Shocklee said it best in when he stated that consumers are much more music savvy then they've ever been and that this is reflected in the way that music is bought and the manner in which it is taken in, in 2007.

Who remebers the excitement of going out and copping an album on the day it was released? That energy is dead. The feeling is non - existant. The listening experience, the ripping the shrinkwrap off the cover...those days are a thing of the past. Yo buying a song for a dollar or two off 'iTunes' isn't the same as going to store and knowing that what you're about to cop is dope from the intro to the bonus track. Listening to a classic on vinyl for the first time, particularly a (newly discovered '12, you find great) beats buying an album just because you're bombarded with songs and video's off the album and spending hours looking through old records just to find one you've thirsted for for years or didn't know about....that's (you know the rest). It's a feeling that can never be duplicated by being told what to buy (no matter how convincing the press is).