Hampden represent courtesy of zombie37 Young Reginald McCullough from East Bmore drops wisdom + knowledge regarding a proposed local ban on the sweet smoke, where small single-sale cigars would soon be outlawed. What? No wet mango-flavored EZ Roll Royal Bluntz? How I'm supposed to split n' dip my White Owl blacks son?
Dan Deacon sits on the e-couch with Pitchfork Masterblog to discuss the way his music/scene has been potrayed in media + blogz, and more importantly, how he's taking it up a notch for DD 2.0 (titled Bromst and slated for this fall) with reduced woody woodpeckers and enhanced live instrumentation. This is a relief; homey's a classically-trained musician and we all know he has many, many more tricks up in those sweaty sleeves. Taste some of the new juice tomorrow night when he and Diplo hit Sonar. This night will be full of ridiculous, senseless shenanigans, and you might be going for free (contest is over).
Ever wonder what the young tykes from future Daft Punk watched on Saturday mornings? Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo was born in 1974 and Thomas Bangalter a year later, so lil' homeys were posted up front and center on the shag carpet when Leiji Matsumoto, world famous space opera mangaka (Japanese cartoon artist) released Space Pirate Captain Harlock, also known as Albator in France around 1980. It scrambled their young, impressionable wigs forever; they in turn scrambled ours.
Years later when the boyz met at secondary school in Paris, they formed a guitar-based group called Darlin' named after a Beach Boys song. Bangalter and de Homem-Christo played bass and guitar, respectively, but the group disbanded only months later after a local paper called their sound "a bunch of daft punk." Something was missing; the electro heat was not yet being brought.
After building up a worldwide house following with 1997 debut Homework, the duo reconnected with a playful, open-minded attitude associated with the discovery phase of childhood.
Then they brought things full circle under the supervision of Leiji Matsumoto with Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem...the definitive animated space house musical of our time. The rest is history bitches.
I'll never forget first seeing the video for Digital Love on a hostel cafeteria TV in Paris, and my face melted off. I didn't know if it was a new worldwide sensation or just standard French programming, turns out it was both.
Did you ever wonder what life would have been like without Daft Punk? (see below) What famous cartoons would you like to reanimate? Should The Go! Team score the 2K9 G.I. Joe movie? Have you uncovered the top secret Count Duckula/Danger Mouse conspiracy?
The Fully Fitted crew of Chris Devlin, Ronnie Darko, Pase Rock, and XXXchange puts on their gold-plated diapers in the morning just like everyone else, and when you go to work, they go to work. Here's something filthy from Mr. Devlin with tracklist and commentary after the bump.
PPS Holy Ghost! just posted a rmx of "Hearts on Fire" - check it.
Tracklist:
1)Make it Good radio intro – Devlin samples put together for a simulated “indecisive radio listener”
2) Get out my life woman – Solomon Burke classic break.great lyrics.
3) Mixintro – Devlin The above track chopped up and edited into a new drum pattern, with a little synth bass line and the begining of the A side of the 7” Wonder Woman, the return of Brunhilde ( who happens to be some kind of crazy German trying to install the 4th riech)…of of of.
4)The Boules Experiment – Alan Parsons This little fucked up track is amazing. There is a game in France where you bang these balls together and apparently Eric Wolfson of The APP liked the sound of this. They ended up putting this weird outtake on the Album…
5) I wouldn’t want to be like you – Alan Parsons Project Single off “I Robot” which was a favorite of mine last summer. I think this song is pretty funky and the gentle “fuck you” chorus is nice. Alan Parsons engineered Dark Side of The Moon, The making of that album is out on DVD and for a novice in production like me, it is amazing. I robotaint bad either! .. There is a sprinkle of Draculas Wedding by Andre 3000 at the guitar break of the above song. The love Below (2003) was so cool. Andre just airing himself out and it was so good. This track was awesome and when alexxx Change heard it for the first time this year he said, “oh he was doin that bloghouse bass back then”
6) Shake it to the Ground(chinco sonido psych cumbia beat)- blackstar&RyeRye So The guy who did the first installment of this mix jacked this song from me, and the sonny Pitchbull too. After this betrayal, I promised I would sprinkle these songs throughout, with out actually playing them. …Alan Parsons and David Gilmour dialouge from The Making of Dark Side of the moon
7)Pass the Calabash – Margaret Singana Phil had this to say…“Her surname’s spelt Mcingana by the way, although everyone says Singana. She did the title track for the Shaka Zulu movie (‘we are rising’ or something – stirring shit seeing Zulus kill tons of Brits with that song playing), and back in our bad old racially segregated apartheid days she was the first black person to feature on Radio 5’s top 10 (supposed to be whites only station pre-1994). She’s a legend” ….Thanks Phil! ..I edited the arrangement of the track and added a bunch of sound bytes that are about work. I watched the Dave Chapel where he was on Donahue while I was doing this too.
8) Blind (Devlin Remix) – Hercules and Love affair So is it an edit or a remix?..I don’t know. This is along the same lines as the intro with the reconfiguration of a drum pattern and the addition of a bass line. I like this little sloppy mix and, I thought it fit the idea of building / construction/ making. The lyrics are far out too. — a piece of audio called click- Ipi ‘N Tombi is layed over the begining as well its on the compalation, Zulu Indestructable beats.
9) Shake it – Fully Fitted This track was is on the upcoming Fully Fitted EP due out really soon. Production Credits go to XXXcHangE, Darko, and myself. It samples Rye Rye’s vocals, It’s pretty cool I think. I sent it over to the Bladerunners, Razor chopped it up, and they did a sick little edit. I put that in here as well… Sorry dudes! time was tight and i couldnt find MY razor!!!
10) Shake it (Bladerunners edit) – Fully Fitted
11) I want your Love (Todd Terje edit) – Chic Groovy ass song. Either you want to play all 6 mins of it or you want to play it with the Moody Man. Zack, Neight100… What time is it?
12) 300,000,000 Synths (Devlin roktapause edit) – Chaz Jankel Went to the record store with some guys that know records recently. I grabbed this 12” and was like wow, great title. Beyondah then told me that it was good too. So i bought it, its awesome. I did this litlte scratch/rocktapause edit and threw in some drums as well.
13) Breakfast – Le Le hola,hola,hola…..
14) Roll The Joint (Joey Negro edit) – Master Dance and Boogie This is what we should be dancing to
15) Pass The Joint – Rick James When I first let Pase and Naeem hear this song they were as hooked as i was. Funky as hell, it sounds like Dave Chapelle on the vocals. Rick James was apparently funny and amazing.
16) Brothers on the Slide (ruffy tuffy mix) – Cymande I am a sucker for this song and always blend it with the next one..
17) 100 million – XXXchange We had been working on a lot of stuff for this Ep and when we all went home Alexxx Change made this..What a jerk.
18) New Day – Fully Fitted also on the forthcoming Fully Fitted EP, featuring Tyler Pope on Guitar.
19) Beautiful Nightmare (Devlin’s brunhilde Edit) – Beyonce Tired of mixing uptempo crazy records in my living room i decided it was time for a return to the psychedelic. the ambient recordings are from a mic i hooked up and sat on my kitchen window. 3 floors up.
20) Plane Ride – Devlin I made most of this track and then listened to the new Animal collective EP. I changed the track a bit , and then used Seal Eyeing and Cobwebs for sample material..I lso used This record from the 70s about Virgos…. ..In the end when it sounds like two people having sex, its really two pieces by the Language Removal Services. One is Marcel Duchamp (language removal), and the other is Marilyn Monroe (language removal),
21) A Day in The Life -The Beatles … 22) Buenos Matrimonios Ahi Afuera -El Guincho This guy is awesome. Google and buy.
Whereas most six-year-old's birthday parties are lame and/or take place at McDonalds, the TaxLo team has been on a month-long celebratory bender with the likes of Cut Copy, Bonde do Role, Death Set, Diplo, Blaqstarr, XXXchange, Dan Deacon and more.
Now they're not only inviting you to join the jam (XXXchange played Talking Head last night, Diplo and Dan Deacon are at Sonar this Friday), they've got an impressive, bulging b-day package with your name on it. It might look bigger than it really is because the gift bag is fashionably small, but still. The TaxLo Stimulus Package includes: 2 tickets to DIPLO and DAN DEACON at Sonar on 5/30 DAN DEACON t-shirt (clean and washed) CUT COPY tote bag and 3-D glasses DIPLO AEIOU CD TAXLO buttons and 6-Year Anniversary Screenprinted Poster by Kevin Sherry BONDE DO ROLE sticker PONYTAIL Kamehameha CD BLAQSTARR "Shake It to the Ground" 12" and remix CD single
To enter, just email us by Thursday night if you'd care to get nice (as they say over at Brahsome). Bonus points if you're willing to dress up like a mustachioed little league coach at the show on Friday.
In 1962 Jack Kerouac released Big Sur, a story about retreating from society's vices and appreciating simple pleasures from a creaky cabin along the fog-banked coastline of Northern California's Bixby Canyon. Battling isolation, alcoholism, and the threat of a complete mental breakdown, he was writing from the end of the road. Last year Ben Gibbard locked himself in the same spot to pen songs for Death Cab's newest effort, Narrow Stairs, and the resulting work also looms with the darker aspects of extended introspection (in the opener "Bixby, Canyon Bridge" Gibbard notes "here is where it all ends.") Well into in their thirties and noticing friends settle down, both artists begin to realize their freedom from societal norms and obligations has its own cost on the back end. Work hard enough to find yourself, and you might lose everyone else.
Baltimore-based Small Sur's debut album We Live in Houses Made of Wood, out this August via Portland's Tender Loving Empire, manages to stand just above the Pacific's green and blue wake without carrying its weight. It's a meditative soundtrack for aspiring mountaintop lookouts and steamship stowaways.
Recorded/mastered locally and backed by a handful of Bmore talents including Andy Abelow, Austin Stahl (Private Eleanor) and Wye Oak's Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack, frontman Bob Keal has patiently assembled an organic, textured collection of handcrafted folk nautica celebrating our perfectly imperfect surroundings.
Kevin Nottingham and DJ Big Texas dropped an original sample mixtape with essentials from the Eazy-E catalogue (perfect for all outdoor Memorial Day activities or just Tuesday morning stoop action). Enjoy a few selections below or download the whole thing here.
Alternative bros with orange tongues ruled the scene, but regardless, cutters still dipped some chicken in it. My favorite part of the experience was the sweaty, underaged girl in front of me with a backless shirt, bouncing against everyone like an old guy at the Y. But then she initiated a reverse grind into the married alternative bro next to me for a few songs, who didn't mind, and the universe was calm. View the full set from Josh Sisk.
Tracklist: Fleetwood Mac - Tell Me Lies The Presets - Truth and Lies Daft Punk - Around the World Cut Copy - Future The Pixies - Gouge Away A Touch of Class- The Bullett (Silvercity-Bob Remix ) Billy Idol - Hot in the City (Dub) Soulwax - E-Talking (Tiga's Disco Drama Remix) The Faint - Your Retro Career Melted (Ursula 1000 Remix) Les Rhythmes Digitales - Hey You (12" Remix) Linus Loves - Stand Back (Mylo Pastel Bronco Remix) New Order - The Perfect Kiss Explorer - Yellow Power Seelenluft - I Can See Clearly Now (Tiga Remix) Chinkiki - Tell Me Something More The Stills - Still in Love Song (12" Extended Mix) Alan Braxe & Fred Falke - Chrystal Guided By Voices - The Flying Party Roxy Music - Virginia Plain Cut Copy - Going Nowhere Franz Ferdinand - Matinee (Headman Vocal Remix) Vitallic - Dance Like a Machine Chromeo - Me and My Man (Whitey Remix) Hybrid Funk - Everybody (Headman Remix) Cut Copy - Saturdays
Activate...interlock. Dynatherms...connected. Megathrusters...are go son! With the help of a few select outsiders, Baltimore bands will form a powerfully (scented) Voltron-like indie cluster from July 17-20 for Wham City'sWhartscape 2K8. Initial lineup includes: Black Dice, Matmos Celebration, Beach House, Dan Deacon, Parts and Labor, Bird Names, Jana Hunter, The Death Set, The Mae Shi, Skate Dog (Gregg Gillis), Killer Whales, Double Dagger, Thank You, Ponytail, Cex, Teeth Mountain, WZT Hearts, Lexi Mountain Boys, Ecstatic Sunshine, Video Hippos, Leprechaun Catering, The Creepers and like 50 more TBA.
Side note, I'm renting my flat out that weeked for the very reasonable/attractive price of $2800, so if anyone from Rolling Stone, Dateline or 20/20 wants to come down, bring it. In addition to my company, amenities will include walking distance to most shenanigans and a chilled supply of purple stuff/Sunny D.
More updates soon - meantime see our massive six-part series of coverage from last year's Whartscape here.
It’s with a mixture of jealousy, pride and general malaise that we send our friends Holy Ghost! up to underground indie heaven. Even though they've technically only released one song, a few months of steady blog foam and top-tier DJ blessings have left our friends at Hipster Runoff grimly predicting the DFA disciples will follow the path of Justice and others before them towards quasi-widespread recognition, acclaim, and the eventual hater backlash. Of course during this process we'll do our best to drag them back down, like we do with any artist that manages to rise above the freeloading portion of their fan base to reach a larger group of consumers who are still willing to pay for music. Because liking the next newest band first reflects our self-perception of being ahead of everyone else, and our ultimate goal - completely lapping the innovation curve all the way back to irony (you like what I liked six hours ago, and C+C Music Factory will be cool again to me soon) - forces us to lose the passion well before our previous pet project hits pop.
No dice, it's Lowell Sostom from trendie Toronto cohorts Great Bloomers. Their debut EP (out May 27th on iTunes) earns a BT honorable mention, and the pace of "Catching Up" explains the band name perfectly. Your inner monologue: "My next ten seconds are very important - should I click, or just keep scanning for a remixes of popular artists? Do I trust Butter Team's recommendations? Do penguins have knees?"
The blogosphere already has plenty of Sheff fanatics in OR scrubs so we'll pass on the foam party, but you really need to hear this. Last week the team shared a few pared-down classics along with a new track, "Lost Coastlines", part of an appendix for The Stage Names to be released later this year. Hear a few more at The Futurist.
After months of keeping mum, last night Butter Team threw its support behind the mythical NY-based wizardry of Golden Ghost and almost appeared unexpectedly at a gathering in Baltimore's Floristree. Both Butter Team and Golden Ghost praised other artists for their work and vowed to continue working together in support of the party. “They are, in my judgment, made of steel, and are leaders in this country, not because of their labels or crafty MySpace bulletins, but because of what they have done,” a source close to the BT camp said.
We've been trying to keep our pants on about this Saturday's Cut Copy show at Sonar but it'sjustnotpossible. This will be the show of the year in Rolling Stone's top scenester city of the year with the cutters performing the album of the year.
Who has two thumbs, no pants and will be in the front row? This guy:
Daedelus offers a series of tribal jump kicks to the slithery stick of your sandpaper teeth after a curry n' spinach sangwich. Courtesy of Ninja Tune, of course.
Cut Copy comes to Baltimore in less than a week - how are you supposed to get any sleep with a show like this just around the corner? Try listening to this specially-prepared Butter Team sampler fusing various intro/outro sequences together from In Ghost Colours. We can't offer this for download so just move the computer next to your head/the bed. Add seagulls and paprika for a soothing seaside effect.
"Imagine that you've spent the past ten years of your life playing in unremarkable bands. One day, you awake to find you are no longer unremarkable. Pundits and bloggers hail you as remarkably awesome or remarkably shit. You just go with it. Along the way, someone asks if you want to 'co-headline' a tour with a group you admire. This is a joke - this pretense of co-headlining (because they are awesome and you are not) - but you eagerly say, 'Yes, PLEASE.' Shortly after you've agreed to tour with these guys, they release In Ghost Colours. You realize that this is the record of the year and that you will get to witness it live EVERY NIGHT. You - helplessly, appropriately - wig out."
Videographer/new wave documentarian Romain Garvas and his Kourtrajmé crew are expanding our grasp of France's often overlooked socioeconomic struggles. A largely African artist collective bent on expressing the French minority experience via film, Kourtrajmé was a solid choice to raise pulses and questions with Justice's "Stress."
Punk Photo schooled us on where this filming style - a combination of cinéma-vérité, post war neoitalian realism, Clockwork Orange and The Warriors - was born.
Including mixes and what not from The Teenagers, M83, Shout Out Louds, Black Ghosts, Dave P and our new favorite James Pants. Then get your pineapple and go lay down somewhere outside.
SoSB is a promising joint effort from Ben Curtis (formerly of Secret Machines) and hottie twins Alejandra and Claudia Deheza (formerly of On! Air! Library!). Photo courtesy of grantthai.
The Presets drop their sophomore collection of pagan space bangers titled Apocalypso in just a week. You have until then (5/13) to win a special prize pack courtesy of the stylish/fetching folks from Modular.
A special Butter Team reader will win: 1 Apocalypso CD 1 autographed poster 1 t-shirt (M or W in S, M, L) Stickers for your locker/Dawson's Creek trapper keeper
To enter send us an email with your city/sate (US residents only) AND/OR sign up for updates on the right to be automatically entered in this contest and future ones too. This summer we'll likely have gear from The Virgins, Bumblebeez, Kings of Convenience and more, so.
Amazing how many filthy jamz are just floating about the internets, in this case tucked inside a proper mixtape from the wonder twin powers of Ghostly International and Adult Swim (which you should definitely dl).
Closing the whole joint out is a track by Minnesota's Mux Mool, new to us, new to you, but I'd go so far as to say this could be a b-side from Daft Punk's Discovery as the team wakes from alien dreams and drudges back towards robot slavery/urban wastelands.
We're usually not strong advocates of pants, but this is different. This is likely the first of several posts about James Pants.
A long time ago, James Pants started playing drums and marching in bands. After hitting cymbals for a while, James Pants bought cheap turntables and learned to scratch with Steppenwolf. James Pants' turntables skipped so much that he lost many battles and was never a good DJ. Then James Pants started playing Cameo and his drums again and people danced a little.
Now James Pants plays his new album and a few girls like it. "Mystical and enchanting," is what people in Spokane say about it. Teenagers at the park like to dance and make out to the new James Pants sound. "What a kaleidoscope," said one lady with her dog. "I can feel the universe pulse."
Know this - if James Pants comes to Bmore we will break it down on the mike at Never on Sunday, the employees will let us. Watch this video for free awesome lessons.
Pre-order his debut album Welcome via Stones Throw.
MGMT have been popular for so long now (several months) that you might think it's no longer cool to discuss them, or Judge Reinhold. However this video for "Time to Pretend" is incredibly wig scrambling as it includes pixelated rainbow zebras, Lord of the Flies shenanigans, campfire chants, hipsters riding owls and cats et al. YouTube can't do it justice so check it hi def here.
K. Dexter over at Broken Bike hipped us onto a potential summer blockbuster debuting at this weekend's Maryland Film Festival called I Think We're Alone Now (trailer below). The basic premise is that 80s teen sensation Tiffany had, ah, exceptionally loyal and devoted fans, and that at the age of 18 she bought a mansion formerly owned by Chuck Norris (dare you to fact check that).
At this point there are two summer camps - one for those that love the The Teenagers' brand of nostalgic, 80s-movie referencing teen pop, and one for those that hate fun/making out. As senior counselors at the former, we're excited to welcome homies to the Ottobar next Tuesday along with Team Robespierre and Smart Growth.
If the video for TR's 88th Precinct makes you feel sweaty or uncomfortable, it's because Allen Cordell (Dan Deacon, Future Islands, Jimmy Joe Roche) put it together using crowd shots taken from Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant area. They even borrowed the lucky green hype machine skull.
Do Bmore kids always think there's a video being filmed? Which buzz bin single below best encapsulates your awkward years?
Coldplay is ideal for work road trips because almost everyone in the car will know them, yet it also creates a platform for you to jointly ridicule the one person in the car who still doesn't. From there the convo can segway to more obscure indie music like The Shins or pivotal alternative films like Garden State. At the end of the ride, the old people will feel cool and more connected to the younger people, and that's what Coldplay's all about anyway, right? Viva la Vida is out June 17th.
Before CSS punches our backsides with Donkey on July 22 via Sub Pop we all get to sample "Rat Is Dead (Rage)" which is just as lovely as it sounds. Hope Lovefoxx gets drunk and films more videos dancing to the Bloodhound Gang soon.
Trax: 01 Jåger Yoga 02 Rat Is Dead (Rage) 03 Reggae All Night 04 Give Up 05 Left Behind 06 Beautiful Song 07 How I Became Paranoid 08 Move 09 I Fly 10 Believe Achieve 11 Air Painter
