YO DUDEZ. It sure has been awhile. Kinda awkward how we have to start the majority of our posts here with that disclaimer :(
BUT HEY GUESS WHAT I found some rad mixes. I know you all probably hear me talk about stuff like Beats in Space and Resident Advisor and think "Shut the fuck up about your gay techno shit Erik." And hey that's ok, but stop being a douche and actually check these out. It's not all 'hella gay techno shit' per se, but y'know sometimes it is so EMBRACE IT. I'm basically using this post as an outlet to list my favorite mixes of the past year or so (as well as an outlet to abuse the use of UPPER CASE TEXT), and maybe I can even almost make up for my recent drought of posting with this flood of goodness.
So FIRST UP- gotta support my broheims, and this mix from my SF dudepal Jason has been on constant rotation in, err, my apartment for months now. Runs the gamut from the pastoral psychedelic organ perfection of Bo Hansson to obscure '70s folky prog gems by Jade Warrior to the pan-global pop fusion of Masami Tsuchiya (featuring the fretless bass stylings of Mr. Mick Karn) to rad cosmic noodly synth shit like Tagerine Dream and Steve Hillage. And it's all tied together with field recordings and spoken word passages and the like, so FUCK beatmatching. At least temporarily.
Robots in Heat - Obscured by Crowds mp3
tracklisting
NEXT- my vote for mix of the year that wasn't made by one of my DJ friends, but rather by a Parisian fellow by the name of Vidal Benjamin. I have been forcefeeding this to pretty much everyone so apologies if this is redundant, but GOOD GOD is this mix awesome. Dude carves out a pretty well-defined vision of oddball balearica, but he wisely avoids being weird-for-the-sake-of-being-weird in favor of selecting tracks that are amazing and just happen to be really weird. No tracklist yet, but you may recognize the Guy Cuevas number here from the 'Funky Nassau' comp that came out last year. Otherwise prepare for some dope 80's reggae-pop, weird loping disco with what sounds like children singing about E.T. atop it, french synth-wave, and other great tracks I wish I knew enough about to say anything meaningful. Oh and this is hosted on the same site as Jason's mix- a mix-blog called Noncollective (no payola honest), definitely worth checking out.
Vidal Benjamin - Balearic Nightmare
OK so now something a little more house-y; Belgian duo Aeroplane have been releasing monthly 'mixed' mixes (not just playlists) of their favorite newer tracks since June, and pretty much everything they've done has been a thoroughly enjoyable blend of populist yet tasteful electro-house dance JAMZ (tho maybe avoid the August one, tbh). Seriously I've discovered some impressive recent tunes and remixes from these and they're actually pretty varied from month to month so check 'em out. (Actually looks like everything before September is no longer hosted by Soundcloud, so grab them while you still can)
Aeroplane - Monthy Mix Chart September 09
Aeroplane - Monthy Mix Chart October 09
Aeroplane - Monthy Mix Chart November 09
ANOTHER fine mix in 2009 came from idiosyncratic producers Ronny and Renzo for one of my fave blogs- Cosmic Disco. It's full of fantastic psychedelic disco edits, tribal drums, deep house, and various other seemingly unrelated ephemera that still wind up sounding pretty seamless side-by-side. And AGAIN no tracklist here, but do you really need one? Don't be pussies guys.
Ronny and Renzo Mix for Cosmic Disco
And here's the part where I risk looking like a dork and talk about PODCASTS. Seriously all of you should subscribe to Beats in Space, it's insane. Tim Sweeney is an amazing DJ, it's been around for 10 years now and he consistently has the best DJs in the world come on each week. And it's just a college radio show at WNYU, so you even get to hear his uncomfortable nerdly voice at the beginning of every mix (...eh?!). My favorites this year are from Tensnake- an amazing house producer whose mix starts out vintage balearic and quickly proceeds to indulge in vintage diva house, Rub- N-Tug- who are gods among disco-house DJ mortals, KZA- a Japanese producer who nicely bridges balearica nu and old, Johnny Nash- another Japanese dude who instead geeks out on new age and a supremely funky Don Cherry cut, and DJ Strangefruit- one of the masterminds of Mungolian Jetset who turns out a fairly epic two-parter. OOOH and don't forget about the Aeroplane (yes more) one from last month which goes kinda all out on the italo front. And that's kinda just the icing on the cake, lately every week has been good folks.
(NOTE: I'm linking to the tracklists here, for convenience purposes. Download and streaming links are on the right)
Aeroplane on Beats in Space
Johnny Nash on Beats in Space
Strangefruit on Beats in Space
KZA on Beats in Space
Tensnake on Beats in Space
Rub-N-Tug on Beats in Space
There are also lots of great Resident Advisor podcasts that are no longer hosted on their site, as well as phenomenal commercial mixes that I can upload in my next post if you guys are interested. Just thought I'd keep it simple and use other people's links tonight. Plus I'm tired. Hope you guys enjoy...
No comments:
Post a Comment