Techno/House (and what have you) Bobbins 2011

And so...

I needed an appropriate place to post that samples of "Thora Vukk" by Robag Whrume, (as can be heard here [be sure to at least listen to the 2nd half of the clip]], sounds really lovely, and makes me curious about the forthcoming album this is on, on Pampa (along with a new Koze album in March, and the new Isolee, which I will hopefully hear when it comes out).

Like, if samples are anything to go by, I, six days into January, already have something to put aside for end of 2011 lists.

I'd love it if MMM had more on the way this year, I don't think they're ones to rush though. I just got the Kassem Mosse tape in the post from Trilogy Tapes its all kinds of ace. I really looking forward to hearing what Bakey Ustl has up his sleeve as well.

i don't know about more MMM ... i'd settle for more smith'n'hack, or just hack, actually ... a little fiedel goes a long way. "nous sommes" was great, "doors to manual" not so much. have you checked out fiedel's mixes? he's got really obnoxious taste!

i need to D/L those kassem mosse tapes. he's going to be big in 2011.

can we talk about new dubstep on this thread, too, since it's the new techno?

I wasn't keen on most of that Funf comp so the doors to manual track didn't really do it for me either. Bok Bok plays it in his recent Fact mix and it sounds pretty sweet next to that grimy techno hybrid stuff, so maybe I just need more time with it. Fiedel is quality anyway. I kinda like the Nick Hoppner stuff on Funf he's alright, I realy dig his remix of Airhead on BRAiNMATH as well. Lol I would be happy to talk dubstep related bussines here but I think it would only be respectable top the thread if it would also fit the techno bobbins remit. I'm pretty hyped that T++, Mordant Music and Shackleton have been up to something for Honest Johns...

i thought T++ had hung it up?

I thought that too! Fact said othehrwise today: http://www.factmag.com/2011/01/05/new-music-from-shackleton-t-king-midas-sound-and-more-on-honest-jons/ So I'm happy

can we talk about new dubstep on this thread, too, since it's the new techno?

I wrote "what have you" for a reason! (Though I assume there's going to be another iteration of the partisans thread).

they're going to fill it up talking about night slugs and james blake tho

Yeah, I know. :(

so ... anyone got an mp3 of kassem mosse's ttt mixtape?

Its alright I'll make a thread as a newbie with a load of shit puns and ilxor will love it Rolling dance partisans 2011

Well, Can you tell your Roska from your Mosca? made me smile.

Well its been brewing for a while, the old dubstep related backlash due the hype and cross genre invasions so we may as well roll with it and take the piss while tying to find the gems hiding in the shite.

It's about two steps removed so it's definitely "what have you," but did anyone ever mention Brandt Brauer Frick on ILM? I kind of lump them in with MvO Trio and such...

they're going to fill it up talking about night slugs and james blake tho

james blake can keep to his own damn thread tbh

for this thread, i'm really feeling steffi's forthcoming album on ostgut ton - just really gorgeous, tactile deep house, couple of nice vocal numbers too

The Chaim record that just came out on Bpitch Control is pretty solid

Also really liking the Martyn/Mike Slott collab single on All City, as well as the Morgan Zarate single on Hyperdub

steffu!

?

steffi!

steffu

on sammy dee's new label

http://soundcloud.com/ultrastretch/smallwinnersneakprev

Ooh, I like-- need to seek that out when that becomes available

Okay the Butch album is actually AMAZING! Best straight house album since Dennis Ferrer's perhaps?

did you hear the san soda lp last year, tim?

No, give me details.

i like the new Bethany Skirt record on Horizontal Ground. brum techno but a touch softer and more sensual than you'd usually expect from that kinda thing

Really feeling this dude Night Plane:

http://soundcloud.com/williamrauscher/

Restless dense balearic-tinged psychedelic pop-house I guess you'd call it. Check "Parallel Lines" and "A Face In The Moon" and "Str8 2 Ur Heart".

like Dead Can Dance reverb trails over lightly swung drum machine pulses

xp

seems like everyone is tuning in on live stream from dommune featuring sandwell district. http://www.ustream.tv/channel/dommune

Jesus Christ, the Ame mix for Fact is brilliant!

Best use of a Charanjit Singh track I've ever heard in a mix.

This is hair raising on the back of your neck, Dixon quality, mixing right here.

OMG this mix - just got to (what i assume was) the charanjit singh track O_O

why do people keep underrate ame? it's clear that they're serious business, not just "the guys who made rej".

lol who underrates âme? afaik everyone thinks they're pretty amazing

ok, not people. i just remembered this review: http://www.residentadvisor.net/review-view.aspx?id=6641

This is an auspicious start to the new year!

Is this is an appropriate place to ask if someone can explain why "Pill Collins" by Tricksi and "Feelin" by Pitto sound so similar?

Love "Pill Collins" so that's gonna send me straight to Pitto.

According to RA Âme's FACT mix is going to be their new mix cd Primary Structures.

Why are they giving it away free through FACT then? That doesn't make sense.

Yeah that's what confuses me a bit as well. FACT mixes are downloadable for a limited period of time only, but still. Probably an RA misinterpretation I guess.

it said that on fact as well - i don't really get it either. i mean even after fact mixes officially come down they get reupped all over the shop too.

Tim F, the similarity was pointed out to me by someone [here.](http://www.reddit.com/r/futurefunkairlines/comments/exjow/trickski_pill_collins/c1br93g) Actually, listening to both songs again they aren't quite as close as I thought. I guess it's just a case of lots of Northern Europeans digging through their dad's prog rock collections at the same time, and whatever song they both sample having a great piano hook and a superb vocal sample too. I could probably just dig it up to find out, but I don't really like Phil Collins enough to do that.

I would post the Pitto song here but I don't know if you all want this thread cluttered up with YouTube videos. Basically, it's a progressive house remix of the Phil Collins song. You can find it here:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=e789tmVuhtY

Ahh! Reddit formatting doesn't work on ILM. Just shoot me now.

rrose sselavy got some love on this thread last year afaicr

and deservedly so!

Âme - It is a giveaway to all our supporters over the last years plus we put a lot of love in the production of the final cd that we think everyone who likes it might buy this nice little thing.its coming out next week via our new webstore which will be launched too.here is the link to download the mix on the great fact mag ...site:

i guess that means they're not exactly the same but still seems a bit odd.

ok so i agree about this ame mix... kinda like an indie-r grandfather paradox but in the best possible way. makes sense that they're giving it an official release because they re-edited so much of the material on there, it sorta deserves to not be given away

and not sure if i like the trickski or pitto better, but i think i still prefer the fairly hands-off idjut boys mix of "i'm not moving" because i have no problems w/more phil

this fact mix is p. sweet btw

Yeah really like the Ame mix although it could do with having most of the vocals expunged. That XX remix is lush.

Seriously, what it is with the Germans and the painful vocal choices? It's an incredible mix musically, do they just feel the need to make it "difficult" or something?

I don't like the main vocal on the Knife track, but the others are OK by me

^ ha, that's probably my favorite vocal on there, along with the ndf

the best moment on the âme mix comes with the charanjit singh vocals!

the new frivolous album on cadenza, meteorology, is kind of blowing my mind. there's a track based on a russian waltz which is just O_O - i'd really recommend it to anyone disappointed by the non-dancefloor focus of the nicolas jaar album

What do you guys think of the Sandwell District album?

I have dl'ed some SD stuff in the past and it reads like I should really love it but still can't quite get into it. Any similar stuff to check out with just a 5% more er, funk?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQg1EhB0Yzg

This one is seriously cool

feel really late on this but feelin it deep nonetheless
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGSWOYb9pNs

benoit & sergio - walk & talk

Not feeling the Sandwell District album, starts strong but peters out really quickly-- Demdike seem to do better w/r/t what I expect from that sound

I have dl'ed some SD stuff in the past and it reads like I should really love it but still can't quite get into it.

this has been my experience also, though i did love female's "regis edit".

i love SD album

I'm not sure about SD yet. They have always felt a bit stiff to me. I tryed tuning into that live stream the other day and it was so dull. I like the odd record though. But as some peeps have said up thread they lack a bit of funk. I'd recomend what missingNO said further up thread and check out Bethany Skirt her last one is too good. Its got a quality dubby raw, atmospheric thing going on like SD but its way more loose and way more fun.

what's you guys' take on area's "tangled in"? RA gave it 4.5 but I find the track unlistenable.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-ucfujDpG4

Kowton - She Dont Jack / Drunk On Sunday out on friday on Idle Hands, sounds sweet as.

http://soundcloud.com/kowton/kowton-she-dont-jack

http://soundcloud.com/kowton/kowton-drunk-on-sunday-clip

Tim I knew you'd like Night Plane, it's got that Studio/Tough Alliance combination of Balearic sounds and slightly thuggish vocals, except glossier and more dancefloor oriented than either. We tried to see him/them play in London a few months ago but the set was ridiculously early.

Funnily enough the track which hooked me onto him was "A Face In The Moon" which is pretty instrumental/tracky... But then I guess that's often true of Studio as well.

Nothing wrong with that Area track, nice and trippy and very functional if you want that kind of thing - reasonable DJ tool but I wouldn't say it was a 4.5 though.

Sandwell District has been getting a lot of plays at home, but it's very overhyped for what it is. Toby Frith's review probably one of the more considered: http://www.bleep43.com/bleep43/2011/1/13/sandwell-district-feed-forward.html

these mixes have been grooving me to no end.

http://soundcloud.com/r_co/steffi-dummy-mix-january-2011
http://soundcloud.com/pieandpeas/rg3

Is it a coincidence that those mixes have a similar vibe and made by women? I mean, can you tell if a mix is done by a woman? I get this kind groovy vibe from mixes by steffi, tama sumo, cassy, julietta, etc.

ciaran is a dude's name, though.

oops yeah you're right. i just checked his myspace.

this: http://www.residentadvisor.net/review-view.aspx?id=8540

...is kind of incredible. Reminds me a bit of Ost & Kjex "Kjexterminate", but spookier, harder, and well, gayer. vocalist reminds me of a chiller chelonis jones

the new release on story (005) by audio werner is very nice. i agree with the LWE review, he's such and underrated producer.

anyone else totally underwhelmed by dj sneak 'delta trippin'' b/w villalobos remix? my hopes weren't that high to begin with, but it's pretty poor.

xp I can't find the Freak Seven anywhere online...not as a high quality stream, purchasable mp3 or anything. I will seek anything with a Kjexterminate tag..

Okay it's here http://www.deejay.de/freak_seven__59853, but you can't purchase an HQ mp3..

2562 Wax Treatment podcast: http://waxtreatment.de/podcast/018/

21.01.2011 - Tracklist:

* 01. Nu Era: The Moon Water Question - Twisted Funk 1203
* 02. Psyan: Tha Norm - Bitasweet 1007
* 03. Shake: Psychotic Tango - Frictional 015
* 04. Kenny Larkin: Third State (Carl Craig Mix) - R&S 94058
* 05. Wax: Elemental Mix - Wax 20202
* 06. A Made Up Sound: Rear Window (Shattered) - Delsin 083
* 07. WK7: The Avalanche - Power House 202
* 08. 2562: Aquatic Family Affair - When In Doubt 000
* 09. Mike Dehnert: Meck - Fachwerk 014
* 10. A Made Up Sound: Crisis - A Made Up Sound 003
* 11. Seldom Felt: Untitled - Seldom Felt 5
* 12. Point Blank: Meng’s Theme - Brave New World 003
* 13. As One: Undefeated - Ubiquity 10083

say no more

have to say that Hunting Lodge, from the Sandwell District disc sounds great at 5:50 am

agreed. wonder if its a reference to these guys

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45UKIqBWCgA

The Soul Clap comp that's coming out soon is really good

Late to this but that Ame mix is unbelievable, they really know how to nail it there, don't they?

just getting round to that steffi mix danzig posted, SO GOOD

Interviewing Derrick Carter in half an hour...anyone got any questions for him?

...is kind of incredible. Reminds me a bit of Ost & Kjex "Kjexterminate", but spookier, harder, and well, gayer. vocalist reminds me of a chiller chelonis jones

― Dominique, Thursday, January 20, 2011 9:38 PM (3 days ago)

ugh yr killin me w/ this descrip

ok?

Derrick bailed on me!

Chatting to him now, get yr questions in!

hey derrick - where u at?

tomorrow! steffi live stream from dommune. http://www.ustream.tv/channel/dommune

she's killing it so far (about 15 minutes)

absolutely loving this new lauer 12" on live at robert johnson - sunny melodic italo-flecked house, kind of permanent vacation-y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TL2HHIBM97M

i think this came out at the end of last year but it's brilliant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQc_bucF3Bk

Heh, I was actually planning on mentioning that House of Jezebel track, but only in order to post this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCBvOqpQTbo

house of jezebel is legowelt

so yeah, it took me this long to give Tevo Howard a proper listen. his new one on buzzin fly sounds great!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z7NCgZbbfc

Love love love the Steffi full-length, so lush

new legowelt remix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vv76OSd-Sy8

whats the steffi album called i wanna hear it i like her i think?

its called yours & mine, this is the only track i've heard:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e79DLyAgWiA

very nice, def makes me wanna hear the album

Isn't that a fantastic cover, too?

recent jams:

altered natives - heavenly bodies
freak seven - nano
Oni Ayhun - 004
faltydl - hip love (jamie xx mix)
alice smith - love endeavor (maurice fulton mix) <-- this is old, but wow
blawan - fram
pangea - ep (last two not exactly "techno/house bobbins" but oh well)

alice smith - love endeavor (maurice fulton mix) <-- this is old, but wow

haha, yes! i'm always coming back to this track

love that track so much!

god thanks for reminding me about "love endeavor" <3 <3 when the vox get fierce!

feeling the lauer and tevo howard joints

the recent gatekeeper ep giza is really strong too - same doomy/dramatic/b-movie feel as optimus maximus, thx to omar little on the ilm poll threads for bringing it to my attention

Wouldn't mind getting that Steffi record, I have the recent Underground Quality 12" on the way its well nice.

You lot seen the 100% Silk dance offshoot label for Not Not Fun yet? Looks kinda interesting. Its a bit to nu-disco for my taste in the first release Ital but its pretty good and prob worth keeping an eye on: http://boomkat.com/vinyl/378395-ital-ital-s-theme

I'm enjoying the Future Times mix just posted up at RA.

Kinda hippie-ish electro-funk in parts.

No surprise, but the newest Kassem Mosse is truly awesome: http://www.discogs.com/Kassem-Mosse-2D/release/2585294

Also, I know it was mentioned elsewhere (and is a 2010 bobbin) but that Chasing Voices "Acidbathory" 12" (http://www.discogs.com/Chasing-Voices-Acidbathory/release/2333327) is just fucking incredible. Any recommendations of other recent releases along those lines?

feeling all of motivado's 'bobby fischer' ep, from chile

http://discodeviant.blogspot.com/2011/01/incoming-from-chile-motivado-bobby.html

also just now checking out this chasing voices stuff and it's killer! hope this dude(?) comes strong in 2011

the 100% Silk dance offshoot label for Not Not Fun

whaaaa? samples sound pretty cool, but hearing stuff like this and knowing what type of stuff not not fun normally puts out is sort of a headtrip

also- thanks for the heads up on the future times ra feature/mix. such a great label, "big coast" and the maxmillion dunbar album from last year are both great

I <3 Maxmillion Dunbar, I wrote this about his Ramp release: http://www.sonicrouter.com/2010/10/recommended-maxmillion-dunbar-cool.html

100% Silk is well worth keeping an ear on the ground with. I loave a load of the Not Not Fun stuff.

Peter Visti's remix of RotaryDisco76's "Aasi" is pretty amazing. I'd say it's very mid-to-late 90s Carl Craig except it's so expansive and touches on so many ideas that that description is a bit misleading.

The forthcoming Omar-S track 'Here's Your Trance Now Dance' is very nice indeed: http://www.omarsdetroit.us/eps.html#trance

I don't seem to be able to get enough of Underground Quality releases right now either.

http://iheartau.com/articles/in-depth-derrick-carter/

^ pretty interesting interview there

thought it was cool to see an RA feature on erdbeerschnitzel, i've been enjoying his output lately (esp "to an end")

yah love it but it ended up w/ me spending hours on mario paint composer

'^ pretty interesting interview there'

Thanks, Derrick sure can talk!

the new frivolous album on cadenza, meteorology, is kind of blowing my mind. there's a track based on a russian waltz which is just O_O - i'd really recommend it to anyone disappointed by the non-dancefloor focus of the nicolas jaar album

― lex diamonds (lex pretend), Thursday, 13 January 2011 07:58 (1 month ago)

I only just got round to listening to this album and it's really good, meaty techno with enough idiosyncracies to make it stand out a bit. The track lex is referring to, "Ostalgia", really shouldn't work but does so well - like an unironic take on Vitalic's "Polkamatic" fleshed out to a decent length with help from Age Of Love's "Age Of Love".

holy fucking fuck

oliverwho factory "galactic transit"

--half-step rhodes flecked floaty intro: check
--sexy spoken voice: check
--monstrous tribal tom drums: check
--korg m1 Morel-ian organ stabs: check
--sweaty sumptuous swathes of ecstasy come up synth chords: check
--psychedelic space diva ruminations: check
--about a thousand million years ahead of deep house dullard throwback 90s wannabe tshirt house: double check

Also, I know it was mentioned elsewhere (and is a 2010 bobbin) but that Chasing Voices "Acidbathory" 12" (http://www.discogs.com/Chasing-Voices-Acidbathory/release/2333327) is just fucking incredible. Any recommendations of other recent releases along those lines?

― matt2, Friday, February 4, 2011 11:48 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark

this was one of my fav records last year

actually i meant the other Chasing Voices thing, "Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit" which is kinda different and in a utopian techno style. that one is also very good. you should check out some Ekoplekz maybe if you like "Acidbathory". maybe some Mordant Music as well

man just listened to the new oliverwho factory record about 5 times in a row. mindblowing. cannot wait to hear this out and loud on some rigorous 4am bizniz

New Frivolous is amazing - great fun, very tuneful, proper house but also very poppy.

Just heard the new Art Department last night as well. Sounds like 2011 is going to be HUGE for bobbins!!

thought it was cool to see an RA feature on erdbeerschnitzel, i've been enjoying his output lately (esp "to an end")

Tuff City Kids remix is essential.

--about a thousand million years ahead of deep house dullard throwback 90s wannabe tshirt house: double check

top-shelf multivalent strawmanning here.

tshirt house?

as opposed to formal wear house

Xpost: yeah, I was wondering, too... (didn't the bobbins thread have a discussion about this in 08, but w/r/t capes rather than t-shirts?)

I loved that Erdbeerschnitzel track, yesterday is today is tomorrow (or whatever it was called), on the RA feature for its great use of live concert recordings, specifically the way its snares are taken from what sounds like a live clap-along).

that acidbathory thing reminds me a bit of gavin russom. in a good way.

Tuff City Kids remix is essential

gerd janson is pretty awesome, that remix was how i came across the erdbeerschnitzel in the first place. i think i may like the og more at this point tho

that oliverwho factory thing sounds pretty nice but "about a thousand million years ahead of deep house dullards etc etc" is the type of hyperbole that makes me want to hate stuff

I was at a party in a fucked up converted pub in Dalston a couple of weeks ago. When they dropped the Erdbeerschnitzel track, I was right down the front being a nerd and peering over the decks.

Not keen on the Oliverwho Factory thang but the Erdbeerschnitzel stuff is rad.

heh, ilx tshirt crew getting defensive

http://www.cutthemidrange.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/i_heart_deep_house_tshirt-p235316682236518837s564_400.jpg

does oliverwho factory wear tuxedos or something idgi

lol woops looks like someone already made that joke

ftr i would never be caught dead in a *tshirt*

i mean

Okay, the Art Department album is on constant rotation right now. Actually tempted to start a thread, but I don't know who else has heard it?

If it's that good, start a thread. Too many good releases get stuck in rolling threads.

yeah, i'm kind of against them in a way, for exactly those reasons. I mean, I like psych and noise, but not so much that I want to go delving through a mega-thread discussing every obscure 7" ever released by Hisham Bharoocha or whatever.

The album's not out until late April I thought...

New SP-X EP on Komisch is out now. You can check out clips of the 'Field Lines Never End' EP on the Rubadub website www.rubadub.co.uk/?node_id=1.3&id=27741

Absolutely brilliant review of the new Marco Carola on A_nus: http://www.bleep43.com/bleep43/2011/2/22/marco-carola-play-it-loud.html

that oliverwho factory thing sounds pretty nice but "about a thousand million years ahead of deep house dullards etc etc" is the type of hyperbole that makes me want to hate stuff

sorta doubt the quality of something if it is cited via someone telling me what it isn't...

is that a tshirt ur wearing?

it's funny because 't-shirt house' as a descriptor is actually kind of evocative even if it means absolutely nothing. ppl building better, more abstract strawmen in the 2011

ok so finally found an mp3 of this freak seven thing and it is pretty huge, have a feeling i'll be hearing a lot of it this year

Siriusmo LP arrived today from Monkeytown ... a really inventive fun electronic pop record, sounds wonderful too

http://soundcloud.com/siriusmo

Andrew Weatherall played Freak Seven - Nano when I saw him a couple of weeks ago. Big track! I'm loving some new French deep house at the moment. The "My Love Is Underground" 12s - kinda mid 90s house-styling, The Terpsiton label's Dionne and the new RVDS 2x12.

'French deep house' might be misleading - MLIU and Terpsiton are labels based in France I think. RVDS & Dionne not French though I think..

loving this fabrizio maurizi track - whole EP is nice too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34vVvDtuUkQ

motivado EP mentioned upthread is a keeper too, sounds a bit homemade but i love the amount of ideas in it

oh yeah and this henrik schwarz/jesse rose collab under the name black rose - HUGE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zy7chO4WRjM

ARGH! Schwarz played this live when I saw him about a month ago. AMAZING.

lolz at the bleep43 review. minus continues to be a whipping boy for reviewers even in 2011.

bicep's beats in space mix = A+++

his ep on throne of blood is great too

er, theirs. only one of them made it to the BiS gig tho

i love the new omar-s single!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l8SYfPMknpQ

also just found a couple of his remixes of gunnar wendel's "578" from, i think, last year, that are superb too.

anybody heard this? Audiofly - "Fela (Davide Squillace Simple Chaos Remix)"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wd_hek0na_E

jaysis. i wish it was available on vinyl!

You're not wrong about the new Omar-S Lex its brilliant innit.

http://blog.alwayseverything.co.uk/post/3684125295/omar-s-heres-your-trance-now-dance

I grabbed the Luv Jam 12" on Phonica the other day too, really enjoying it. The slow-mo acid house Cottam mix is a treat.

yea i've been listening to that omar-s track a lot too. good stuff, that style is a nice fit for him

also, this deniz kurtel album holding up very well to multiple plays. so many good basslines in there, plus those sorta detached and haunting vocals- surprised it wasn't recommended on the art department thread

davide squillace is something else.

i had no idea about him til i heard that audiofly remix i just posted. between then and now i've got ahold of his "what about the vice" EP on desolat and it is..... just.... gahhhh so good. just my ideal music these days. so much percussion. something like "cubism" has such weird beats yet is so hypnotic and so locked into a groove. so warm yet cold. god my vocab for this stuff is awful. it doesn't help that i've been out of the loop for so long i have no handy names to drop as reference points.

oh and thank you lex for the frivolous tip. it is a GREAT album. i heard a single of theirs a few months ago and loved it but didn't know anything this impressive was coming along.

haha i just looked on discogs and squillace has been producing for like 13 years

Hmmmn. I've always associated Davide Squillace with boring Ibiza fodder house. Less so from actually having heard his music, more with the type of events he's booked at/the way he's presented in flyers, etc.

by which I mean to say, please, prove me wrong.

Love this new Todd Terje track "Snooze 4 love"

http://running-back-records.tumblr.com/

not up on youtube yet, Tim Sweeney played it on this weeks excellent BIS episode.

EDB well there's that audiofly remix i posted up there. and if youtube is to be believed he likes playing vallee de larmes by rene et gaston, which is like <3

listening to a bunch of his old stuff on youtube makes me understand why he might be on ibiza-ish bills but even in the straighter songs the noises and squiggles he puts in there can be truly weird.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZuIkiZgI_M

that todd terje thing on running back sounds damn good

some sweet new stuff coming out of the wolf + lamp/soul clap camp. anyone heard the dj kicks? i haven't yet, but if the individually released tracks are anything to go by it should be really fuckin good.

no regular play - "takin u back" in particular is killin me right now.

and yes that todd terje track sounds great

I've always associated Davide Squillace with boring Ibiza fodder house.

i had the same idea until i heard his "Tutti Frutti" 12" last year. good stuff!

New Mi Ami and Ital stuff is oh so nice and both very house-y: http://vimeo.com/20521084 (don't actually watch this video...blech) and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUbNXO7_CGA

i had like consciously not checked out the omar s thing bc of a positive review i read that made it sound straight up terrible. p sweet to find out its p sweet.

That Black Rose thing reminded me of this other awesome collaboration between Schwarz and Rose. The album version is actually like 14 minutes and worth every second:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhjsKJv0uJs

idk i only listen to wolf and lamb things now. recommend me things that sound like w+l that arent w+l. you know housey post minimal w/ diva vocals and like techy also maybe

that like arent w+l

Why don't you tell me some w+l stuff to check out?

uh, get the two dj-kicks exclusives eps or w/e

its the non-mixed stuff from the wolf + lamb v soul clap dj kicks mix

what has omar-s done that has been straight up terrible? idk why any review would deter you from checking out his new stuff

only just heard omar-s's remixes of gunnar wendel's "578" from last year - those too are p sweet

Anyone heard the new kraak & smaak album? Thought it was a bit euro in a corny way at first but there are some transcendental tracks on this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0iFrioEaXI

what has omar-s done that has been straight up terrible? idk why any review would deter you from checking out his new stuff

― karl...arlk...rlka...lkar..., Saturday, March 12, 2011 8:37 AM (12 hours ago)

yah i guess it just made it sound kindof ascetic or something? this is not what im looking for. just got invited to some party that no regular play are djing in like a couple weeks. i been listening to the soul clap and nico jaar remixes like a lot but idk what they sound like by themselves tho their BIS podcast was kinda sweet i think?

Their "Slide Away" and (to a lesser extent) "Serious Heat" are great and have quite an original sound, their smoove R&B-influenced house being much less less disco or deep house than most others, I'm tempted to say it's more techno but it doesn't signify detroit in any typical sense. More pointillist and uptight certainly.

the youtube karl posted is a great track, all these wolf + lamb ppl are def hitting their stride this year. i listened to that dj kicks mix like 5 times yesterday

Best techno set I've heard this year has to be from Blawan

http://www.factmag.com/2011/03/14/fact-mix-230-blawan/

I mean feel that energy

that blawan mix is amazing

I didn't expct to hear so much techno from him, he kills it. Brings a ton of energy to it, I can't remember the last time I heard a techno DJ bring that much energy to the tracks they play. Random DJs playing techno >>>>>> techno DJs lol He played a mad one at the boiler room last night too.

ok this is totally sick

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TER6gixuRFU

oh wow, yeah.

Love this tune so much:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_I5RkApQW1s&feature=player_embedded#at=242

Yeesh, Jesse Rose didn't like the lackluster review of that Black Rose tune on RA. I always cringe a little when artists get defensive and say things like this about negative reviews:

"i guess the fact that this review comes out two months after the releases says a lot about how current you are! the release sold 7000 in two weeks and has been tune of the month in near enough every magazine it's been reviewed in. it received 5/5 from luciano to sneak, diplo & a-track. maybe check the reactions at festivals around the world on youtube to get an idea of how the track works in real clubs & festivals rather than your bedroom! maybe what really comes together here is how much of a failure you are as a writer. we have no problem with bad reviews but you want to go out on an all out assault, maybe check yourself before doing shit like this."

tbf, It isn't the greatest review and the track deserves higher than a 2/5 when you consider what gets a 4 on that site.

Any stink raised over RA reviews is just agonizing, but when you're appealing to DJ promo-ratings and sales figures, then it's just come on... (also, equations of writing ability with ability to assign a numerical value you agree with is all the more nagl).

I also think it's interesting that a lot of the people who post comments about reviews seem to be adopting the rhetoric of DJ promo feedback. I mean, you see people essentially rehashing the sort of meaningless "B-side is the one for me" or "I'd totally play it out" nonsense that's affixed to promos.

Ha, i seem to remember the "b-side is the one for me" types getting a bashing in ilm dance threads of yore.

Yes, but that was with DJ's used to sell records, that this is becoming a standard of discourse for anonymous consumers is kind of curious.

The line between fan and dj is a lot thinner thna it used to be. Probably a lot of these people, while not necessarily "professional", create dj mixes at home, might dj the odd party etc. Their adoption of dj language is basically aspirational. And like any kind of aspirationalism, people identify with a code of behaviour (in this case the phrasing of press release endorsements) without necessarily appreciating its specific functional purpose - i.e. they assume this is how DJs talk in everyday life.

http://comps.fotosearch.com/comp/RBL/RBL008/dj-headphones-spinning_~b13335.jpg

wikka wikka

full support!

full support!

― pshrbrn, Friday, March 18, 2011 3:04 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I'd play this out!

xpost to Tim: well I'd sort of figured that out already, i just think it's kind of interesting.

maybe check the reactions at festivals around the world on youtube to get an idea of how the track works in real clubs

I wish people would stop using this a proof of quality, eccied gurners in a field will love anything after all

mmmmm i think you're wrong

does anyone know the track at 5-6 mins in on this maayan nidam mix?

http://soundcloud.com/deep-inside-athens/maayan-nidam-deep-inside

somebody posted deniz kurtel the l word somewhere right i'm sure i saw it? anyway it is unbelievable i think i would flip out if i heard it while i was dancing what am i talking about i was dancing in my kitchen just there

awesome synths in that one.

whoa deniz kurtel is... a woman!

"the l word" is amazing - her whole album is def p good

there have been some really quality bobbins releases this year! the audiofly album is good too.

that should be out really soon right?

i think it was out last week

crosstown rebels doesnt list it yet tho?

it's on itunes!

lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33NB10b0mwc

^ impressive! that's a total jam

the vocal sample at 1:30 (and throughout the track really) is really familiar... anyone recognize it?

blondie ... get it?

gah so fuckin obvious

i am the worst trainspotter ever

still a jam tho

Quite like the new dinky on ostgut ton

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCdbjZ-chz0

Siriusmo's Mosaik is really interesting. It goes through too many styles for my liking and kind of pales in comparison to Diskoding but is still a pretty sweet album.

Glad to see producer Jaime Read is doing so new stuff. Like this a bit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNZKRxlQSgw

West Norwood Cassette Library did a mix for us a while back: http://www.sonicrouter.com/2010/05/interview-west-norwood-cassette-library-wncl-recordings/ a while before Blond on Blond came out, you might enjoy it if you're feeling that.

I'm really enjoying Cottam's recent bits

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bggP08vs-8

and the remix he did of Luv Jam which is on a simular tip.

DJ Qu's album is sounding ace from these clips: http://soundcloud.com/djqu-strength-music/dj-qu-gymnastics I've got the 12" samplers on the way can't get enough of the Underground Quality people at the moment.

This is well nice...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4VWXvd7FZM

this is the wrong thread but what the hell. the new todd terje is sick:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGvcdr1A0p0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxpqkdL1R14

I'm very confused by this, it appears to be on...boyznoize?

right now, i'm feeling pretty much everything I here by Chaos In The CBD, two insanely young dudes from New Zealand.

especially: Out Ma House (http://www.mediafire.com/?xzucojiynmz) , bootleg remix of Moodyman's Freaky Motherfucker (http://www.mediafire.com/?zu2zi3jum5o) and Bong Song (their edit of Thong Song)

they all came out last year, so i'm late but ilxor search shows no mentions here yet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQCNb4oZZXE

new terje probably does belong here, it's not quite balearic or beardo or edits or anything imo. i have p much been listening to it nonstop

Summer jam of the year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQx5EAfirhc

*this year

this is realllll nice

yeah that todd terje single is fab

tom trago! i hadn't really heard of him until a dj i follow (alice moxie) tweeted that his new stuff on rush hour was really nice, and guess what it really is

ok steffi "yours" is a total banger

The last Marcellus Pittman 12" is soo good. I'm not that familuar with him though so have any of you guys got any more suggestins of where to look next with him?

<3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UWa6gsGZT4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jIlDMzNFk0

Get your ears around Outboxx too: http://www.sonicrouter.com/2011/04/sr-mix-76-outboxx-immerse/

That mix is pure vibes.

Is this the right place to talk about that brilliantly twitchy, haunted new single from Invisible Conga People? Forthcoming on DFA, it's called "Can't Feel My Knees" and is further evidence that these guys are just consistently fantastic, even if it is completely unsurprising in how it sounds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtwz1N9Xma4

best album of the 10s so far?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ds957ANbTw

Thats a record I've got on my wishlist all the clips I've heard sound ace.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-BSbE3fPI8

oh snap, this is good!

Morphosis is pretty great! sounds like some long lost Irdial album or something

did anybody check out the Lucy album?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTyMlAFvrAs

Album's a bit euro-sounding (not in a good way) but this track with Romanthony on vocals is very nice imo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OREHNdYiu2M

lead track from the new we play house is proper 'ouse

a bit of a different direction for Levon Vincent, but i like it..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwfqqt0CudM&

despite having maybe the worst name in techno, i'm quite digging the Tommy Four Seven album

impossibly bleak, satisfyingly crunchy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5L0Jd3nUwM

holy shiiii new Âme is quite the tune

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uKIgCKHX6M

techno mums! <3 http://www.residentadvisor.net/feature.aspx?1315

Ah man that Ame track!

so so good. i guess it's kind of an homage to "Angola"? but totally slays on its own terms

hmm, weird, i just am not feeling that atm.

Yay new MMM!

http://hardwax.com/63207/

sick

That MMM is great, the A-side is on one of Fiedel's Wax Treatment podcasts. Love it.

The Hot Natured with Ali Love track is one of my favourites of the year so far

i dunno about the new MMM. maybe belongs in the PARTISANS thread rather than this one?

also: fiedel's wax treatment podcasts are super-obnoxious.

Not to make a big deal of it, but frankly I'm at a loss to why anyone likes that kind of stuff (i.e. the MMM single). To me, it doesn't sound well produced or interesting, just kind of irritating. But that's just me.

Hot Creations is easily one of my favourite labels right now.

xp

no i'm with you. i like MMM04, MMM01 and just "donna" off MMM02. OK, that's five "all time" tracks right there, but the rest of the MMM tracks sound like grating noise to me, as does most everything else MMM-related that's not soundstream.

I love the frantic raw energy of a lot of MMM stuff. It just brings a smile to my face, yeah its obnoxious and noisy I wouldn't want only that vibe the whole time but a slab of it here and there creates some killer moments. It'd fit in the partisan thread for sure I just thought more techno heads would know him.

wow even Smith N Hack? i agree the Errorsmith stuff is pretty wack tho

xp

i like that MMM record because it sounds like Musical Mobb "Pulse X" mixed over a funky track with big laser noises. i like MMM's stuff because it's unpretentious and sounds amazing on large dance floors. yeah it might not be "well produced" but there's an undeniable joyousness about their use and placement of certain sounds that gets me every time. i don't really get why MMM is so widely revered either but I guess its a combination of "Donna", one of the best tracks ever, and the Hardwax factor

i like that MMM record because it sounds like Musical Mobb "Pulse X" mixed over a funky track with big laser noises.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxUNhGET974

lol

re: steffi's 'yours', deniz kurtel's 'the l word', and even art department's 'without you'. all proper, massive hits, which i tremendously enjoy - but something about their hitness, and the overwhelming desperation of the crowd for a hit to save it (i guess the pressure we put onto it. like the uber-hungry german berghain/panorama bar crowd), kind of makes them instantly old, overused, 'too' classic (perhaps because the sound isn't really innovative but subtly refers to older chicago real classics, but i don't think it's just that).

like, 'without you' only merited a couple of repeats before it got completely old. is it listenable now? isn't it too familiar in a way? what i'm thinking is, and this is pretty wild, maybe dance culture is maturing into a post-hit period (which some current areas of dubstep faithfully represent). i know hits, in particular the ephemeral ones, have always been the epicenter of dance culture, but maybe there's a new way to *dance* that doesn't necessarily have that gravity center. just a thought.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAEb202B3OE

I don't often hang out here but This Beltam Mix is worth pointing out

http://soundcloud.com/r_co/joey-beltram-live-awakenings

like, 'without you' only merited a couple of repeats before it got completely old. is it listenable now? isn't it too familiar in a way? what i'm thinking is, and this is pretty wild, maybe dance culture is maturing into a post-hit period (which some current areas of dubstep faithfully represent). i know hits, in particular the ephemeral ones, have always been the epicenter of dance culture, but maybe there's a new way to *dance* that doesn't necessarily have that gravity center. just a thought.

http://www.linnnk.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/have-you-ever-been-so-high.jpg

http://www.linnnk.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/have-you-ever-been-so-high.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsJbVMQ9dHw

Tim?

i think what tim is trying to say is that there are problems with every statement in that paragraph

what didn't you agree with?

- probably lots of people would disagree re: art department

but more importantly

- dance culture has always been maturing. all culture is always maturing. someone, somewhere, is always claiming that we're maturing into a "post something era" when talking about culture. it's basically a tautological claim anyway, w/r/t culture.

- dance culture has always been a continuum (a dialectic?) between old and new forms, just like every other form of culture.

- the "epicentre" of "dance culture" has always been oscillating along that continuum, just like every other form of culture.

to sum up, your claims are the sort of overly-broad, hard-to-evaluate, grand philosophizing that people do when they're high

that's not to say your ideas are totally meritless

i do wonder why you think any part of dubstep is "post-hit"

i love all the house & techno hits at the moment! looking forward to the summer so much. i kinda love this:

http://youtu.be/xvcb0S6fvWY

What Vahid said!

And in line with it I think you'd find any moment in dance music culture could be characterised both as hit-obsessed and "post-hit", and people are always getting bored of anthems.

Tim, i don't think i was bored of anthems of 3 years ago.

vahid, interesting, but you don't really address what i'm saying. i'll try to rephrase it in a less pompous way: don't you guys feel that sometimes with these hits they become old before they managed to manifest as hits? maybe it's our new digital literacy that enables us to recognize them as hits that prematurely destroys them in a way, doesn't give them the fertilizing underground soil/time they need.

i heard all the tunes i mentioned in clubs, and as much as normal me would lose his mind to them, they didn't do much for me. on the other hand, benoit & sergio's 'walk & talk' - which is a less obvious hit - worked wonderfully.

i'm not trying to philosophize anything and i'm sorry if that's how i come across, i'm just sharing a feeling to see if anyone else can sympathize a bit.

about dubstep - i think its experimental w/r/t to how the anthem is formed, and how it relates to other less classicist tunes. there's less pressure on the one tune to dominate the scene, its more about their interplay. is that why there's less agreement over the 'anthems' or even what dubstep even is or where it's going.

this kinda makes me think about one of dfa's taglines: "too old to be new, too new to be classic"

cuteforce, for what it's worth, I don't know if you saw this thread based loosely on something you said along these lines elsewhere: "Difficult first albums" etc

hey dog latin, not seen this yet! thanks. still figuring out how to navigate this place now that i'm posting. gonna dig right in.

maybe it's our new digital literacy that enables us to recognize them as hits that prematurely destroys them in a way,

Isn't it essentially this? i.e. a condition of increasingly compressed instantaneity and hence turnover times in music consumption (cf. the new four tet/burial/thom yorke song went from a radio premiere to youtube in hours, and so on)(whereas 3 years ago I guess you'd get wait to find a YSI link on some blog, which would catch on over weeks?). I feel like a lot of UK bass music is a lot more concerned with newness (and I'd also say trendiness), such that room for hype/gestation is more limited? Maybe that doesn't make sense, though.

best art department

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMvoB2H62Ec

not sure if how i feel abt some of their stuff w/ those weird vocals though the way they use them is a bit inrusive, like vampire night club single, some of the jokes are kind of funny (how do i know? cause everyones into rick owens) but mostly its so annoying & dumb (street gangstah! this some vampire nightclub shit right here) shut up imo

btw i started listening to techno/house like ten days ago so my opinions are p boring/uninformed

flopson, it's seth troxler's humor. i guess you can love him or hate him. personally i think his energy is funny. as seen in this semi-classic youtube vid (which nicolas jaar later sampled in his great RA mix):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjxew1xf8XE

current favorite art department tune (one of this year's best imo):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Wed69VmFWU

yeah, that track is dope

'UK bass music is a lot more concerned with newness (and I'd also say trendiness), such that room for hype/gestation is more limited?'

Kinda, butyou get diffrent degrees of hype and anthem. Some tracks take off right away and get dropped just as quick others take longer paths or even come and go again in waves. You'll hear Hyph Mngo go massive and take on all kinds fo scenes while the root of it moves on. Then you'll hear Claptrap by Joe be pretty big in dubstep, die down then re-appear in UK funky and house circles a year after. Same with Breach Fatherless it was around for ages in the bass scene then dropped off and came back in electro/techno circles and now UK funky circles. Footcrab hit a few after dieing down in one circle. Its like there are pockets of anthems always generating and some move on, some dont. They spead and take on a life of there own more than ever really.

haha, never seen that seth troxler vid. been watching Fear And Loathing one too many times.

but you contradict yourself, cuteforce. you say they fail to manifest as hits, yet you describe them as hits.

if we can "recognize them as hits", then what further need do they have for a "fertilizing underground soil/time"? in what are they "prematurely destroyed"?

there's less agreement over the 'anthems' or even what dubstep even is or where it's going

compared to ... ?

i heard all the tunes i mentioned in clubs, and as much as normal me would lose his mind to them, they didn't do much for me.

this has less to do with the scene / general audience / mode of distribution and reception and much more to do with your personal relationship to the music. when i experience these feelings i generally assume it means i'm changing or the music changing ... i can usually tease that out with some reflection, but figuring out what that says about the scene in general requires major psychologizing of others on my part ...

EDB your post is reminding me about when people talk about the difference in how people related to music pre- and post-MTV, or in the radio era vs the vinyl era. but to really make any kind of reliable conclusions it's not good enough just to look at consumption, you have to look at reception, and there's nothing in turnover times in music consumption that necessarily implies the overwhelming desperation of the crowd for a hit to save it. that's just projecting, isn't it? i suppose you could show that UK bass music is a lot more concerned with newness than, say, the stray cats or r kelly, though i'm not sure you could say that if you compared it to "acid trax" and even if you, would you be able to draw any conclusions about how those audiences received the music. did the crowd listening to "old chicago real classics" know they were listening to that?

in my imagination i can hear frankie knuckles lecturing ron hardy as he sweats over a reel to reel: because in the new tape edit era the "room for hype/gestation is more limited!" ... this uber-hungry music box crowd is starved for real music ... this re-editing shit ... makes them instantly old, overused, 'too' classic ... why in my day, we had to wait three years for the 12" of hit and run to come out! and then we'd have to buy it from europe!

I see.

i should stick to lurking

It's very easy to transpose one's own feelings ("I'm a bit over hits at the mo") onto a generalised zeitgeist but all attempts to do so inevitably posit the writer's experience of one sub-genre or a small number of them at a particular point in time as somehow standing in for dance music in general.

i'll try to rephrase it in a less pompous way: don't you guys feel that sometimes with these hits they become old before they managed to manifest as hits? maybe it's our new digital literacy that enables us to recognize them as hits that prematurely destroys them in a way, doesn't give them the fertilizing underground soil/time they need.

Like, for the above to be true in general, all dancefloor participants would need to be obsessively trawling beatport, resident advisor, blogs etc to be aware of these tunes before they hit the dancefloor.

Although nominally I'm in the above category, because I focused my obsessive tendencies on uk funky last year I heard "Without You" while out many many times (and had started to recognise it as an "anthem" of sorts, needless to say esp. after people started cheering its arrival) before I actually found out what it was.

This doesn't make me right and the above quote wrong, it just means that both of our ideas of how/why/when/where something "manifests" as a hit will be pretty shaped by our particular experience.

I am not per se opposed to the notion of a given piece of music's "ideal listener" whose experience can stand in for the experience of that music generally, but I think that making a central feature of that listener an obsessive-compulsive awareness of new developments is kinda condemning the music in question to be judged underwhelming.

At any rate one would think any ideal listener is posited at the level of the scene - i.e. the kind of musical and extra-musical (clubs, DJs playing, social networks attending) context in which "Without You" will be heard. And those contexts are as post-hit as any other - for such populist acts/DJs, Art Department/Soul Clap/Wolf + Lamb play a lot of pretty anonymous music!

i think one reason UK music might appear to be overly concerned with "newness" is that it is largely a dubplate culture -- a tightly knit network of labels and producers who share exclusive/unreleased music with each other

on the other hand, you have people like Night Slugs, Marcus Nasty, the Autonomic dudes, the "dubbage" dudes, who are as much about the new as they are recontextualising older records as hits with their audience, until the past becomes a vast playlist from which they can draw potential hits. this might be easier now than five years ago since so many records contain sounds and ideas from the past, so it becomes less about paying respect to the legacy of house and more about "hey check out this record from 94 with this sick bassline". like, that Lil Silva tune I posted upthread, "Pulse X" was what 8 years old when that came out? Lil Silva does a masterful job of reclaiming it for the funky crowd, and I can't imagine many people in the dance being like "nah fuck this, this is shit, not new enough" or whatever

i don't think there is currently a lack of hits, rather, a dearth of event records -- big tunes that get played by djs across the board regardless of the sub-genre they operate in. Carl Craig's 00s remixes were a good example of this, they got picked up on by house people, techno people, minimal people, electro people etcetc. this doesn't happen as much at the moment because house and techno are much more fragmented than maybe 5 years ago. I can't think of many djs who are playing bits of everything across the board in the same way like Michael Mayer or Luciano or whoever were during the height of minimal. maybe some of the Berghain/Panorama dudes -- Steffi, Tama Sumo et al?

i guess "Hyph Mngo" is maybe a good example of a recent "event tune"?

yeah, even caspa played that one.

It's very easy to transpose one's own feelings ("I'm a bit over hits at the mo") onto a generalised zeitgeist but all attempts to do so inevitably posit the writer's experience of one sub-genre or a small number of them at a particular point in time as somehow standing in for dance music in general.

otm x a milli - really wish people would have the self-awareness to realise this instead of trying to cack-handedly trying to turn their limited experiences into a non-existent "trend" (often allied to some duhhh-level self-evident non-insight about how Things Are Different Now To Ten Years Ago)

My fav things of the year so far seem to have all come out in 2009 oh well maybe i go to that thread

this is a 2011 tune i like, haven't heard it out yet though, think its one for laaaate

http://soundcloud.com/ultrastretch/smallwinnersneakprev

really wish people would have the self-awareness to realise this instead of trying to cack-handedly trying to turn their limited experiences into a non-existent "trend" (often allied to some duhhh-level self-evident non-insight about how Things Are Different Now To Ten Years Ago)

― lex pretend, Friday, May 13, 2011 6:18 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

yes you're so right, everybody except for you and Tim F is chatting breeze itt, thank you for reminding me to stop posting about dance music on ilm

Ugh, Maybe I should just start lurking.

Not that I was at any point arguing that we are in some sort of post-hit culture, just that the life of hits is shorter now (which is, yes, a "duhhh-level self-evident non-insight"), my experience has been that the distinctions between consumption and reception have become less stable, and yes, this may mean our relation to hits is different. But, given that I've never been to the box, and these days get out maybe a dozen or so times a year, this is mostly me extrapolating.

If my "chatting breeze" has inspired anyone to stop posting here, I'm glad to have helped.

oh yeah just rememembered that manik nyc track i like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sVSAmzr5wk

don't feel bad, lex used to get the same crap for coming from a place of ignorance iirc

that was a xx-post to Snámh dá Én

ignorance is bliss iirc

(familiarity breeds contempt)

there was an old new yorker comic where a guy is getting back from a vacation, suitcase in hand, wearing an "absence makes the heart grow fonder" t-shirt. his wife is opening the door wearing a t-shirt that says that ^^^

Having flashbacks to the pipecock/Ronan clusterfuck where pc kept bashing on about how he was the only non-ignorant man alive

i hate to be ignorant, but almost none of the youtubes that people have posted here excite me at all. i admit that i stopped really following things around this time last year as my interests moved more towards industrial and punk, but i still listen to a lot of techno and house...and i am underwhelmed. that new-ish Levon Vincent tune is great, and so is the Theo tune upthread, but those dudes have been pumping it for a while. some of this is probably just me being more *into* certain sounds and scenes more than anything, but i have to admit: i really, really have no love for Seth Troxler or anything Crosstown Rebels has put out since 2005. need to go back and clarify my aural reasoning, but i'm just not there.

all that said, i've been jamming on the new Robag Wruhme record, which really is one of the prettiest (if not the most banging) full-length i've heard in a while.

i really, really have no love for Seth Troxler or anything Crosstown Rebels has put out since 2005.

I'm with you there. The whole troxler/visionquest guys sound is, in my opinion, really boring and kind of sterile. The humour behind it doesn't appeal to me either.

(Truism alert) I think it's a sound that can go both ways - the familiarity of its bumping deepness makes it either super-comforting or contempt-breeding. I reckon "Vampire Nightclub" is great (but isn't it "straight gangster"?) but a lot of other Troxler falls flat for me.

But the space between Troxler and, say, Benoit & Sergio, is pretty thin sonically (and non-existent scene-wise).

Oh, by visionquest I meant troxler/curtiss/crosson, not the label.

oh gawd just to clarify w/my comment i wasn't actually specifically referring to people on this thread, certainly not missingno or EDB

oh fuck this is sick

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQWlZqIdHOM

new cassy mix on her site is pretty sweet - http://www.cassybritton.com/listen.html

would love to know what the last two tracks are, if anyone has any ideas

oh wow 'forward motion' is ace.

Looking forward to listening to that Cassy mix, thanks. I've heard the second to last one but I can't recall right now. The last one is an edit of Stevie Wonder's Love Light In Flight, I think it was done by Soul Clap.

not listened to the Cassy mix yet but is it this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vysaw-vZPCQ

It is. Not so keen on their edits really but great song. Heard it on a Gerry Rooney mix a couple of years ago. Floods of teenage memories of Kelly LeBrock in Woman In Red came to me. I guess that's the art of good DJ, spotting tunes from dodgy film soundtracks and creating anthems.

durr durr durr, now that Hot Natured tune is more of the sort of thing i can dig.

loving this so much right now

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCt69zDpZg8&feature=related

durr durr durr, now that Hot Natured tune is more of the sort of thing i can dig.

― whenever the vein was to throb (the table is the table), Sunday, May 15, 2011 9:08 PM (Yesterday)

Well I find that statement quite surprising since you mentioned that you dislike the current crosstown rebels/seth troxler. This track IMO is perfectly in the same vein of theirs. Just listen to "The L Word", "Without You". They have those dark, sexy basslines and vocals. Same vibe, really. This track is also one of Seth's weapons in his sets.

I have a nascent theory that a lot of people who dislike Wolf + Lamb / Soul Clap / Seth Troxler / Art Department / Crosstown Rebels et. al. tracks would feel differently if they were Rush Hour releases.

But I'm not thinking of table is the table, more other people i've read.

those guys really know how to create a party vibe. I'd go orgasmic if I attend their gig.

hmm tim i *really* like most of the stuff on rush hour ... i particularly enjoy the direct current series (cosmin trg, bnjmn, ) and the throwback chicago stuff (virgo, gene hunt) is what i like the least on rush hour. but i don't really see the connection between w+l, soul clap, seth troxler, etc and rush hour. and i will admit to liking art department and being about 50/50 on recent crosstown rebels.

i don't like wolf & lamb and soul clap very much but that's more a matter of not being "wowed" yet (not in the least)a rather than finding anything to actively dislike.

crosstown rebels was quite rubbish till that art department lp and saved them. they could release it on wolf+lamb though

i like seth troxler but could see how people might find him obnoxious. been listening to his boogybytes cd quite a bit recently. couple of years old but i love love love this deniz kurtel remix (which is on that mix) so much:

http://youtu.be/7VLrpKJYEzA

Xpost: Disagree. In 2007/2008, for instance, they released Shackleton - Next To Nothing, Chich Miniature - Escalando (my #1 12" of 2007), Luke Solomon - Demons, and Seth Troxler - Love Never Sleeps.

A man with more chutzpah and a slightly lesser opinion of CR than I might even say that as soon as they released that Art Dept. record they resigned to releasing fashionable chart filler material.

To reiterate: I don't dislike CR, but, i guess you could say, I'm yet to be wowed by it, as they move more into a territory that has consistently failed to wow me.

(sorry, I'm just talking shit to avoid doing real work).

i've actually gone from not being wowed by the art dept album to actively disliking it. worst vocals ever

I think only the first two tracks really suffer from that but god do they run on forever.

Best tracks are "living the life", "what does it sound like", "vampire nightclub" and "I C U".

pretty interesting discussion about this whole thing here: http://www.residentadvisor.net/forum-read.aspx?id=149217

i think wolf and lamb and soulclap are sort of figureheads for a general "thing" rather than having amazing productions. not that their productions aren't good but i'd go along with vahid on not being wowed. also i find their mixes vary hugely in quality...sometimes the sloppy thing works great and other times it's just a big annoying mess.

I like Art Department, W+L, Soul Clap all just fine, thanks.

I'm actually not into Wolf + Lamb on their own that much. Soul Clap I think are frequently awesome DJs, esp. their Resident Advisor mix.

I like Rush Hour too heaps obv. My point was more that I think people "code" throwback party time retro house vibes differently depending on whether they think it's being made by coked up scenesters or disciples at the feet of the masters.

not heard the ra one, i like 5 years at the marcy a lot and the whole joint dj kicks thing is decent. thought the essential mix was shit tho (plus wtf was up with that horrendously cringey intro)

probably bbc's idea let's face it

my fav mix from soul clap: http://soundcloud.com/r_co/soul-clap-live-bar-25-berlin-september-2010

Trying to work out why I can't get into that Hot Natured track given I love everything I've heard of Lee Foss and Jamie Jones separately.

Forward Motion is great except it could do with a bit more "oomph" I guess. Feels like there's a backbeat missing

/pvmic

maybe they want to put emphasis to the bassline...

Well, that could be true - possibly a reference to juke/footwork where bass kicks are optional.

Not everything in 2011 is a reference to juke.

what about the circle dance-off in Eastenders last night? Phil Mitchell's got some moves...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-BSbE3fPI8

there's an orgasmic moment there, but I won't spoil it to you.

okay let me just say....this mix is FUCKING AMAZING

http://soundcloud.com/warmhq/lil-tony-bassment-mix-1

after a couple weeks of listening to it on headphones now taking advantage of my roommates' absence listening to the morphosis album v loud thru our pa & it is v great

i downloaded something by them and it turned out to be death metal.

yeah he really switched up his sound, didn't he?

find i often have to skip the first track though, like it puts me out of the mood, too static & noodly

i really liked that morphosis album too. moody.

the tom trago one is still killing it for me, just beautiful sounds everywhere

Haven't heard the Morphosis album, but his track Musafir from last fall is really great.

the tom trago remixes are pretty good, but there's an actress mix of "lost in the streets of nyc" that slays

anyone can ID this track?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCrEL2ahn48

yeah, please!

It's funny, I was just going to post here that I *get* Maya Jane Coles. This tune "Senseless" is great. I would say that, because it's at my current favorite tempo. But it's really a lovely tune. I'll admit that I've been put off by the hype a bit, but this 2020 Vision release is pretty damn sweet. "Little One" too.

feel like the oliverwho factory track got slighted in this thread. pretty excellent stuff, instrumental mix might even be better than the vocal one.

okay let me just say....this mix is FUCKING AMAZING

http://soundcloud.com/warmhq/lil-tony-bassment-mix-1

― Phelan Nulty (Local Garda), Wednesday, May 18, 2011 2:09 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark

the track around 27'-29' KILLS!

Xpost: if you're talking about Galactic Transit, then yes, 100% OTM.

looks like it hasn't been talked about here yet so i will just say the prommer & barck album is lovely - really lush, each track seems to have at least one really good idea behind it. a small sample (and no, not a chills cover):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_sSYhUSDTg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7vawbGEDvE

bout time! now where's levon vincent gone off to?

actually there was that inexplicably huge discreet unit thing last year but for whatever reason i think of them as totally different beasts

didn't realize til just now that linkwood was involved with discreet unit

new stuff is hella good, the panning in the second song on that ep just kills me (but i am a sucker for panning)

semtek's "west acyd shelter" is ridiculously great - http://soundcloud.com/semtek/sets/dba004-semtek-west-acyd

Hahaha just looked at that waveform it doesn't look like it's going to take any prisoners.

The track Maya Jane Coles was playing up thread is this
http://soundcloud.com/lazarocasanova/android-cartel-facelessness-lazaro-casanova-jay-you-remix

wow, thanks! awesome!

by the way i was browsing around and found a ghostly int'l artist named Com Truise. the fck, enough with it already.

he rules tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFtotlto7NM

has this been posted yet

this other com truise is pretty good too imo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtPq_tBkNjk&feature=related

feel like the oliverwho factory track got slighted in this thread. pretty excellent stuff, instrumental mix might even be better than the vocal one.

― Dominique, Wednesday, May 25, 2011 1:50 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark

yeah i think that might've been my fault :\

it's my fav record this year. really loving the track they co-write on Lerosa's new album as well

http://soundcloud.com/uzuri/uzuri-016-lerosa-in-my-mind

this is prob mad obvious to the real headz but im feeling this. some nice 80s R&B touches to the bass part
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGmGWWWfENw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnuEN0PvPYE

kinda feel how dude is jacking that loop that was used on a gang starr album

for ref
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ac7MFWXXc4U

i like this one

http://youtu.be/LFYE_n8pF8k

i wanna go out in leeds so bad

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jH2wQUd86g

everything i've previously come across that bashmore's done has been nonsense to me - but this, this is proper

yeah thats hot

^^ tpp, that Hot Creations sound good. Also, Leeds is great - Mint is fine + Basics. I took friends from Leeds to Love Fever & SecretSundaze last weekend and they didn't think too highly.

r|t|c that track is GREAT

yes but that Love Fever party was pretty terrible!

bashmore's got more good stuff than "father father". i wasn't that into his night slugs release but the one on 3024 is great.

i'm curious as to what rtc thinks makes "father father" so much better than previous bashmore? i'd actually contemplated starting a new thread for him, so consistently high-quality has his music been this year

those other bashmores

battle for middle you
grand national
batty knee dance
ribble to amazon
ask yourself
everyone needs a theme tune

^^all released this year alone!

bashmore also produced this for javeon mccarthy (who sings on "father father") which is excellent

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyj4z6X4c0s

haven't been to secretsundaze for years but hear uniformly bad things. i think last one i went to dixon played and it great tho.

yeah, bashmore has been consistently fantastic this year, "father father" just has the big vocals to make it stand out

not that i don't love "father father"

rmde "just has the big vocals"... cannot believe i'm being asked to justify a glorious bit of chi house against some weak idm bollocks

like i'm not saying he's not a good producer technically but this is the first time its actually been put to use for something that can stand for itself

'battle for middle you' is alright if i'm being pleasant

'batty knee dance' surely you must already know i can't stand, or any of the other trillion things that sound like it

d-40 and djp can i get a witness??

I commit to "'Father Father' is fucking great" because I haven't heard the other tracks yet and "weak idm bollocks" is one of my favorite musical things

so ... what exactly does rtc dislike about "batty knee dance"?

personally much more into "ribble to amazon"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5WBcwTtoQs

perfect blend of bukem + deep house

quick impressions:

"Battle For Middle You" - GREAT
"The National" - this is kind of dumb
"Batty Knee Dance" - GREAT
"Ribble to Amazon" - GREAT
"Ask Yourself" - GREAT
"Everyone Needs A Theme Tune" - this is unexpectedly weak until the bass shows up, and even then it's not that great

this is all hitting me like a deep house version of Lone, only with a lower strike rate because I think all of the Lone stuff I've heard is pretty much perfect

i will process this stuff & decide if its night slugs style overrated or pretty techno ish later
im feeling what moonship posted, tho

"battle for middle you" is better in its ramadanman remix version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4NCQotUdRU

kind of copying levon vincent's style IMHO but still a killer

btw what happened to levon? is he sick or something?

think levon took some time off intentionally to prevent overexposure. or so he said in an interview a while back.

i love this bashmore remix of classixx too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rM_O1aftso

Really feeling Deadboy's Here E.P.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmlSzToXaqg

I don't think I've seen this mentioned anywhere else on ilxor, its defintely one for the creepy&effete crew - I really love the way that last four minutes seem to be constantly collapsing and folding in on themselves around that seismic bassline.

While people are on a Bashmore tip, I think this is still my fave of his.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiAJLBT8ue0

That bass is so good, dunno if it translates on youtube but there you go.

I do <3 that vocal track he just released, its pretty sweet.

This might be my fave house track right now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUvUCIHWueQ

I can't stop playing it.

Can anyone ID a track with a housey beat and a kind of highish pitched vocal melody that goes uh-uh-ohhhhhhh?

Thanks.

― EDB, Thursday, May 5, 2011 9:59 PM (4 weeks ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

So it turns out this is the Julio Bashmore track on 3024 posted above. Thanks! (and great track!)

Clone Royal Oak is destroying it right now ... the new Reggie Dokes might be the best thing he's ever done ... and both tracks (but especially the "houston we have a problem" posted by Flopson above) of the Genius of Time release are absolutely beautiful, almost perfect, slices of house

not very up on the Bashmore and have bought very few of his releases but i did really like his take on the jazzanova sound on last years 10,000Yen Release

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeBmP-hTxQU

i love deamonds' "persistance" - insane hi-hat action

http://soundcloud.com/dissensus-raw-productions/persistance

also i think our very own reverend has been too modest to put his stuff here, but his "burners" is def another of my recent favourites - http://soundcloud.com/reverenddollars/reverend-dollars-burners - love that chiming melody

Lee Foss you fucking genius:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWhecNeCdig

Also this George Fitzgerald remix is almost as good as his take on Groove Theory:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N756IOlhcyk

That Lee Foss track is lovely.

RTC you want shooting for lurching this thread into dance partisans territory.

Really love that Lee Foss tune. Now THAT is proper good bass (as opposed to the current preponderance of good bass noises put to boring use), his sound is just so thick and infectious and immediately satisfying.

this lee foss! 4.49!

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa this is so good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjZwtsRvrU0

but really, he should've made the track 2 minutes longer just to repeat the piano line one more time.

ha that lee foss is ridic

WAU @ the last 3 youtubes. REALLY feeling that reggie dokes in particular, fucking beautiful

foss' 'your turn girl' ep is also pretty solid

not feeling lee foss' stuff. sounds kinda too easy-listening..

(facepalm)

that new lee foss doesn't seem to exist apart from on youtube :(

yeah i couldn't get into that lee foss either. i know why you responded like that tim, there may be better ways to say it, but to be fair to dan138zig it felt a bit lightweight to me too. struggling to think of an interesting way to say something just didn't really grab me in any way...

Its out here: http://www.juno.co.uk/ppps/products/425044-01.htm on the Starfruit EP.

ugh vinyl-only, no use to me :(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA2UOaAWWn0

not sure if this belongs in a dubstep thread (probably not), but it's explosive

the bass on the lee foss track is so so amazing = esp combined with the prettiness of the high-end and those drum fills! ugh, i want an mp3 of this right now

shiiiit is that a billie ray martin sample on the brawther/george fitzgerald track? amazing

another one not available to buy digitally anywhere >>>:(

not sure if this belongs in a dubstep thread (probably not), but it's explosive

― cuteforce, Monday, June 6, 2011 10:18 AM (48 minutes ago) Bookmark

it belongs in the rolling dance partisan thread. already mentioned there also.

love the bass in the lee foss track but the "rolling dance partisan spooky-spectral icey synth preset" feels as aimless as it usually does when i hear it crop up. maybe this marks me out as not a real hed (though you should know that by now), but this track doesn't actually get going until the midway point, so.... why not start it there?

It's designed for mixing. A whole heap of post-"miura" tunes are structured in this manner.

fair enough.

foss' 'your turn girl' ep is also pretty solid

Yeah this seemed to go under the radar a bit. "Warriors" is my favourite track from it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qbmwh6k1aws

loving that lee foss tune, the looseness of its like other people place era drexciya given a smooth disco makeover

What it really reminds me of is my personal classic from 2006, Marc Romboy's "SL Mirage":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtRD8x_-EYs

i was looking for new lee foss stuff a week ago, warriors isnt quite there imo

reminds me of the stuff he did with stephan bodzin. funny how all the wolf and lamb/soul clap/etc stuff refers, without knowing it, to this. are they the Get Physical of 2011?

there are major similarities there alright...

not really feeling the lee foss or reggie dokes but that george fitzgerald track is killer!

the dokes gets a bit... delorean? almost worth it for the mix-out beats at the end alone

speaking of beats, do you guys remember those DJ tool "loop" records that used to get put out? usually pretty punishing jeff mills style tribal techno loops.. some of that stuff was great. do people even DJ in such a way as to have that make sense any more? i'm imagining future crate-diggers coming across these and being like "wtf it's the same 16 bars for like 6 minutes"

yes, thee's still tons of this stuff out there, just check hardwax's new releases some time

there's something comforting about that.

i'm imagining future crate-diggers coming across these and being like "wtf it's the same 16 bars for like 6 minutes"

oh there are still plenty of records like this. i know because i have to listen to them.

but that's an interesting question, about the concept of the 'dj tools' record becoming obsolete. it's easy enough to make your own in software and since most minimal techno DJs i know don't use turntables anymore, there's that.

nu groove put out some good dj tools 12"s in the early '90s, didn't they? i think i have some of them.

richie hawtin made a mix once that was a very exacting patchwork of teeny samples from like 3000000 minimal techno records and the end result of it sounded pretty bland and monochromatic to my ears

The best dj-tools are are lock-groove records. 2 hour of the same loop? Why, yes you can!

repetition is a form of change!

hah yes i was sort of thinking of hawtin.

it's easy enough to make your own in software and since most minimal techno DJs i know don't use turntables anymore, there's that.

yeah, with even just the basic loop functions of CDJs or the much broader abilities of Ableton i feel like there's just no real point in putting out these vinyl loops anymore.

indeed, chewshabadoo!

i will admit here to being very tempted by this little thing for some time:

http://www.loopers-delight.com/tools/cycloops/cycloops.html

i forget about it for awhile, and then i remember and i want it again.

no 'up' (or even 'caribbean girl'):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNzW2rf-TJQ

^^ note to self : haven't listened to 'changed' yet.

in my head i keep confusing him w/ dude that did 'opium scumbagz'

not sure if this belongs in a dubstep thread (probably not), but it's explosive

― cuteforce, Monday, June 6, 2011 5:18 AM (16 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Either way: Thank you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaBKb3NId4U&feature=player_embedded

well here comes a big one

i think he does a certain kind of conservatism very very nicely

sublimely tasteful

XXpost.

I don't know about the rest of you, but my summer just began.

yay todd terry is back

ha right -- i mean, todd terry w/ the rough edges smoothed out (nb this is a qualitative difference rather than a value judgement)

yep that is a summer jam and a half

this thread has been delivering the goods lately btw, good work all

i asked in the 10snake thread but does any 1 have an mpeg layer three

Only a 128k, which i assume is just a rip from the video. The two new tracks are only out on limited edition vinyl so it might take a while for mp3s to surface.

I'm finding the new Sex Tags & Acido 12s something special. Is anyone else interested in this stuff? Sotofett's mixes on BiS and Roof.fm have been playing a lot round here.

George FitzGerald: http://www.sonicrouter.com/2011/04/sr-mix-77-george-fitzgerald-hotflush/

1. George FitzGerald – We Bilateral [Hotflush]
2. Midland – Through Motion [forthcoming Aus]
3. Anthony Shakir – Travellers (MRSK Remix) [Rush Hour]
4. Skudge – Depth Buffering [Alpha House]
5. Lando Kal – Further [forthcoming Hotflush]
6. Grain – Untitled
7. E-Dancer – World of Deep (Carl Craig Remix) [Play It Again Sam]
8. Paul Woolford – Let It Go (Appleblim and Komonazmuk remix) [CDR]
9. Kevin Mcphee – Words Not Chosen [CDR]
10. George FitzGerald – Silhouette [forthcoming Aus]

He did a mix for us the other month. He's quality, really dig that remix Tim posted up thread a little.

anthony shakir is the new carl craig, isn't he?

I'm interested in what you mean vahid.

go-to detroit techno guy across the spectrum of post-techno (microhouse, electrohouse, minimal, etc) dj mixes

he's the go-to guy for the post-berghain post-dubstep world

maybe i'm reading too much into it, maybe it's just that after the rush hour reissue his tracks are much more available. but he does seem to have reached a certain level of ubiquity.

the whole of lee foss's starfruit ep (from which "keep my cool" is taken) is EXCELLENT

i love this guy (not least for loving the vistoso bosses!)

anyone familiar with the off-kilter dance stuff from Not Not Fun and 100% Silk? would love some recommendations for records.

Thought star fruit ep was just ok I'm on a track by track basis w dude

that tensnake track goes through like every mood you could ever possibly feel.
First ten second I was thinking 'ok ubiquitous old school, show your influences tracks' but it really is much more than that.
love it.
Listening through star fruit ep now and I'm inclined to agree that it's a track by track thing.

Hi, I need a track ID here, played by Sandwell District at Plex. Massive!

<script type="text/javascript">var zippywww="www39";var zippyfile="50203905";var zippydown="ffffff";var zippyfront="000000";var zippyback="ffffff";var zippylight="000000";var zippywidth=680;var zippyauto=false;var zippyvol=80;var zippydwnbtn = 1;</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://api.zippyshare.com/api/embed.js";></script>

in case that doesn't work: http://www39.zippyshare.com/v/50203905/file.html

does anyone else think the transition from fingers inc to oracy on prosumer's panorama bar 03 is some kind of a train wreck?

xpost: never mind, it's yogoto (sydenham remix)

"bass mood" doesnt really work as a track for me in general

Been playing this on repeat, reminding me of cold loves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YsNO3qo1l0

man i love bass mood ... but whenever i put it on all my friends are just like "............."

captain ahab that is awesome

new Ada: Happy Birthday
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3-Vuykod08

just saw this--well worth a read:

http://mnmlssg.blogspot.com/2011/06/d-we-need-to-talk-about-blandoscattered.html

I've been trying to determine how to approach that blog post. I feel there are some salient points, but at the same time, praising current work at the expense of properly grounding it in the musical landscape is always tricky and is one of the hallmarks of popular media criticism. For instance, if Philip Sherburne had reviewed that Andy Stott release for The Wire instead of for Pitchfork (and he may well have, I don't feel like paging through the magazine to check at the minute), it'd not only be more concise but probably a lot more grounded.

On another note: I feel there's something to be said about the listeners of work, and not necessarily the artists or journalists. For every five people who are going to listen to that Games album, or whatever electro-pastiche is the flavor du jour, there will be maybe one who reads the references to past music and is intrigued enough to dig into that. Maybe one in twenty will either delve deeper or even come to the new work having been grounded in the works of the early 80s.

I feel sometimes that concert experiences, or album listening, are disingenuous for me because I know that the music is inspired by prior work that I find more interesting and even though I'm surrounded by people who are very much enthralled by the experience, I feel that it's somehow shallow. I think that's mostly a problem with my own perceptions -- who am I to judge others for what they enjoy? I've responded by avoiding those sorts of situations, but I'm not a published writer/blogger.

I basically can't read anything that talks about "the state of things", feel like thats something for other people to worry about

Still haven't found out what that track 5 mins into the maayan nidam athens podcast is:(

I have to admit that the line about "a black guy on the cover" being some sort of creative bankruptcy made me cringe and nod at the same time.

feel like thats something for other people to worry about

The cultural/academic edge that comes to bear on (as used in the article) "d&e" work is one of my guilty pleasures. I'm kind of naive -- I know that there are a lot of cultural ref blogs and part-time philosophers out there writing about pop and indie, but I feel like there's more of an overlap in d&e. Is that my imagination?

For instance, if Philip Sherburne had reviewed that Andy Stott release for The Wire instead of for Pitchfork (and he may well have, I don't feel like paging through the magazine to check at the minute), it'd not only be more concise but probably a lot more grounded.

I don't think a review in the Wire would have been more concise or grounded than a review in Pitchfork. It may well have been a lot shorter. But short and concise are different things. (I've written for both publications, for what it's worth.) You're also writing for different audiences.

I think Phil's review is good, though I've not heard the record he's talking about.

I think the short versus concise point is good. Concise implies that the review is more of a 360 degree view, while the blurb-style reviews in The Wire tend to give a good idea of what the music is like and gives more of an aesthetic judgement as an endcap, in most that I've read.

A well-written review doesn't necessarily mean that the audience will agree with the review, though, right?

Isn't mnml ssgs' whole schtick to just reiterate the same point over and over and over (it's what they've been doing since their inception, no?).

was about 2 say i feel like ive been reading those exact same sentiments in every techno thred in ilx history

not bcuz everyone agrees w/ it, they just all take a stand abt how lifeless the scene seems these days or w/e

(summon pipecock)

Who could possibly want to read some tossed off "things are boring" blogpost about techno? Seriously...less likely we're at the cusp of some great malaise and more likely it was a rainy day and a busy bus home.

x-post here come the cavalry...

Once upon a time, there were journalists. These near mythical creatures expressed talents creative, critical, crafted and vocational. They developed their chops over many years.

THANK YOU GEORGE ORWELL FOR RETURNING TO SAVE TECHNO

Pipecock actually disagreed with that thread on the RA message boards!

I always find plenty of music that I like, but 10-11 has been pretty ridiculous in terms of high quality new and reissued music. Like I think it is for most people, my guess is the ssgs are just checking the wrong records and artists.

And I agree with the 'cock: 10/11 have been very enjoyable years for me.

xpost to D-40: exactly. it's this reason why I stopped reading mnml ssgs, and why this post isn't going to change that. The line between being reactionary and being critical isn't always as clear as some think.

btw, if a release is beautifully done, it doesn't have to "add something"

sometimes, you can make a release in a style and "beautifully done" means that it's probably a success on its own terms

I was more referencing the fact that, were he here, pipecock would be telling us all we've got everything all wrong even if we do agree with him

x-post

xpost to D-40: exactly. it's this reason why I stopped reading mnml ssgs, and why this post isn't going to change that. The line between being reactionary and being critical isn't always as clear as some think. I kind of misread your posts, hence whi this doesn't make sense.

I mean to say, deprecative 'state of techno' ramblings are basically a constant; see 2008 when they were de rigeur among bloggers and interviewees looking to prove themselves by deigning music rather than, y'know, celebrating or making good music themselves.

the idea that negativity is somehow inherently more trustworthy than positivity is such a total cheapshot, and yet it's one of the cornerstone's of that blog's entire existence. it's so easy to accuse others of a lack of integrity if they are praising something, it's like so utterly engrained in people's minds to distrust success or to question it.

the real reason there isn't a lot of negativity about record x/y/z, 99 times out of 100, is because people praising it are probably genuine in their liking for it.

the idea of "corruption" just doesn't hold water for me, this is techno, not political writing or economics coverage. nobody is getting paid to write positive reviews and surely nobody writes about techno for the lucrative wage packet.

and negativity is just as open to dismissal as positivity, not least in the blogosphere where in my experience the easiest solution to a lack of ideas for posts is to let a long diatribe flow from your fingertips.

i'm not making a blanket accusation there, just pointing out that the scales are tipped unfairly when it comes to accusations of disingenuity, the negative thought is always seen as more authentic or more real or more difficult, as if it's harder or braver or more courageous.

it isn't. it's easier and more cowardly.

My opinion here us basically the same as it is for hip hop our whatever other genre is seen as "stagnant" by some part of the community which is basically, make the tent bigger; incorporate different aesthetics in ways that feel less like reviving some thing (even if you are) and more like engaging with potential new fans, that artists who aren't playing it safe w some imaginary core audience are more likely to catch my attention

interesting stuff.

i'll write more when i get back from the post office (i've developed a side hobby of selling house and techno records to collectors in europe. i don't DJ out, really, just in my apartment. but i really enjoy digging through crates and finding weird rare 12"s; a lot of DJs these days seem to want to point and click and find stuff on eBay, discogs, bleep, etc instead of digging. but the digging is the fun part, for me. plus there's good money in it, if you know what to look for.)

There were a few discrete points in the mnml ssgs thing I thought were interesting and/or correct:

- hype bubbles: these are smaller and faster forming than before, the multi-page blogiographies of artists who've released 1 track and 1 remix and 1 podcast is something that wouldn't really have happened even 5 or 6 years ago. Obv everything is hyped up by somebody and this has always been the case, but I guess the professionalisation of the process of hyping has the effect also of devaluing any hype you don't already agree with. Probably one of the reasons I regularly get underwhelmed by post-dubstep artists is less the quality of the music itself than the fact that I almost never hear it before reading a painstakingly constructed manifesto declaring the artist's revolutionary genius. This is not the artist's fault, and I could avoid it if I really wanted to, but it has an effect.

- twitter high-fives from artists - I am kneejerk irritated by the tendency of music writers to intimate personal knowledge of, and communication with, artists via twitter, and it does have the consequence of making what is often very thoughtful writing come across as loyalty-based boosterism.

I would say both of these things are indicative of people talking not enough about the "state of the world", or rather about scenes as scenes, rather than scenes as collections of individual genius auteurs.

Which is not to say that I want to encourage the sort of repetitive handwringing engaged in otherwise - 100% agree with Ronan on that point.

Imo, there is tons of great electronic dance music coming out right now, just v little of it 4x4-based. So if that's where your bias lies, I can see how you would be underwhelmed, but as far as I'm concerned, syncopated beats are in, and that's a good thing.

I would say both of these things are indicative of people talking not enough about the "state of the world

i think the vast majority of the time this is only good when someone is trying to say what that state is, or what they positively see as having formed.

it's not a matter of positivity for its own sake, just that negative state of the nation addresses are almost entirely repetitive in terms of their characteristics.

for someone to say what good things are happening and why/how is a far greater challenge. there's a whole heap of prefabricated grooves for the writer bemoaning the state of things to slip into, and for the reader to easily agree with. i mean, open the papers.

i just think the greater creative challenge is in saying why you think something is good, and i really am put off by the sort of baiting nature of posts like that one, ie surely the writer knows and relishes the fact that some people are guaranteed to say "oh stop intellectualising, it's just techno" which then cements the idea that this vague negativity constitutes "intellectualising" by default. it doesn't.

i'm far more stimulated by somebody making points about other records techno makes them think of, or books, or lots of other more concise ways of talking about techno that happen every day, than by vast state of the nation pieces.

and actually i'm just as stimulated by people's stories about their own relationships with records.

that's not to say i don't want theoretical discussion. but i feel like there's a tendency on that blog to incite people to accuse the writers of overthinking things. which i find again, a cheapshot.

i also find the bit about "journalism" just laughable really. "journalists" are probably some of the worst electronic music writers around, and some of those who understand it the least.

but above and beyond that music writers are expressing opinions, in no way does a music writer have to make the same considerations as a journalist in the day to day work, and i say that as someone who regularly writes things that are read by upwards of 1m people.

even if you were the most conscientious music writer in the world, you're not fucking writing about israeli/palestinian conflict or a child being murdered or northern ireland or whatever, i find the comparison trite and lazy.

..which then cements the idea that this vague negativity constitutes "intellectualising" by default. it doesn't.

This kind of needed to be said!

i also find the bit about "journalism" just laughable really. "journalists" are probably some of the worst electronic music writers around, and some of those who understand it the least.

but above and beyond that music writers are expressing opinions, in no way does a music writer have to make the same considerations as a journalist in the day to day work, and i say that as someone who regularly writes things that are read by upwards of 1m people.

even if you were the most conscientious music writer in the world, you're not fucking writing about israeli/palestinian conflict or a child being murdered or northern ireland or whatever, i find the comparison trite and lazy.

this is flat-out ridiculous, 100%

i'm giving up on this thread for now

I don't think that Ronan is really using "journalist" correctly there.

yeah--you need to define your terminology here (i love ronan, by the way)

i also believe that there is a wide gap between the way that "journalism" is perceived/defined here in the US vs the UK vs europe

yes, it is possible to do well-researched, smart, thorough arts journalism--which requires reporting and serious digging--and that's why this hits a raw nerve with me, because those of us who are trying to do this in the US already have all the odds stacked against us. you may not be on the ground in Gaza, dodging bullets or whatever, but to be honest very few news journalists are either. go read the New York Times on any given day, that bastion of old-school "hard news" journalism, and count how many articles were written straight from press releases, with all of the reporting done on the phone: I think you'd be shocked to find out that literally dozens upon dozens of news stories each day are written this way

Yes, one thing that isn't commented on enough is that a lot of the trends in music crit are the same trends in journalism generally.

I would say both of these things are indicative of people talking not enough about the "state of the world

i think the vast majority of the time this is only good when someone is trying to say what that state is, or what they positively see as having formed.

No that's what I meant. One reason the negative state addresses are so ineffective is that few people actually spend the time to talk about these broader issues positively or even neutrally, so they ultimately only get defined negatively.

"state of the world" type pieces make me suspicious from the off because they're so often basically just dresses-up trend pieces, and trend pieces tend to be the fakest bullshit in all of journalism - much of the time going macro doesn't help anyone understand a scene, but actually irons over and ignores the differences and tensions that make it interesting. macro = simplistic.

"state of the world" type pieces about music descend back from an earlier time in music journo -- look back at melody maker in the 1980s, or NME from the late '70s/early '80s and you'll see lots of that stuff. rushing to name and identify a scene, a look, a trend, a sound--it's all there, in between the 2,000-word interviews and features and reviews and everything else that filled those papers.

it makes me suspicious in retrospect as well!

i don't know, the more i learn, the more i think that things are more unconnected than connected, and that forcing links and trends into being just doesn't sit right.

Lex I would have thought you would defend such pieces - you've written some excellent ones yourself!

I had trouble sleeping last night and made mistake of actually reading the piece

When was the last time you really sat down and gave your undivided attention to a recording?

You used to be able to kick a ball in the street, but really when was the last time you saw kids kicking a ball in the street, giving the ball its undivided attention, kicking it? i mean really kicking it, going for goal, not just rolling it around a bit while tweeting? Fact is, i used to kick a ball but kids today if you ask them what a ball is they wouldnt be able to tell you. And looking at many of the streets today are we really able to say they are the same kinds of streets? there are literally hundreds of streets in every town now, where in the past there were only a few streets - I used to be able to tell you the names of all the streets but now I don't even know any more. There are people now that have never even seen some of the streets we had, never mind kicked a ball on them. And I find that really interesting. I overheard some kids last week walking down Argyle St and i thought to myself I bet you've never walked down Muncie St or Benson Avenue, they literally didn't know the streets i had grown up on. Sure a few will be interested enough to go for a walk and may discover Argyle St but the majority of them, there's just so many streets now, they're more likely just to ride the bus and not even look out the window, too busy high fiving each other and tweeting, but to what end? what does this achieve

I think its unfortunate although I feel lucky in a way that when I was discovering things I didn't have to wade through all this ennui and tweeting and capitalism. In our town it was literally just the one street and the ball and we kicked it, I mean really kicked it. I played on the wing, great days they were. We understood the difference back then, between kicking a ball and going for a swim. Men were men and you didn't celebrate unduly when you scored a goal. I look at kids today high fiving and tweeting in designer boots and wonder have we lost something, the simple joy of kicking a ball. I see them laughing and joking but are they really laughing or are they just copying the laughs of years gone by, can it really be a true laughter anymore?

I'm beginning to wonder if this is what we have begun to replace society with

yo tim i actually wasn't disagreeing with you per se, knew you'd prob agree, just used your post as a springboard.

i think people are misinterpreting me a bit but also worth pointing out my views are highly coloured by bbc experience, which is i suppose v different from working for other places.

i'm not talking about dodging bullets in the field though. i just think some ideas and stories are far more sensitive than others. i agree ENTIRELY that more actual "this has a topline" stories would be brilliant in dance music. people enjoy stories and narrative. anytime a dance article has a story and narrative flow it's just such a breath of fresh air. but the irony of this obviously is that STORIES, real journalism, are the total opposite to reviews, and to blogposts like that mnml ssgs one. it's not a dearth of honesty that's out there, it's a dearth of people being able to get off their ass and write stories. and it's mainly because nobody is getting paid to write about techno full time.

but to go back to my earlier point, you can't compare writing news stories to working with techno. yes you can take the same values of honesty and integrity but the issues that arise just don't challenge you in the same way.

my experience of writing news is, as i say, coloured by the fact that my work has no byline and thus is meant to appear completely and utterly devoid of opinion or interpretation. but i'm guessing even if you don't have this obligation you still have to make big decisions about how you portray something serious.

you're not going to encounter the same sort of issues writing about the arts as i do if i have to sub a piece about "northern ireland: the troubles explained" or something, or work on a feature somebody has written in gaza, where literally every single way you phrase something is likely to get complaints.

it's just ideologically more complex. i'm not rubbishing techno and i'm not even saying techno writers can't be journalists, they can be, sometimes, they should have integrity and yes, all the better the more efforts they make to unearth interesting stories.

but there is a difference between people writing about actual death, about issues where people are killing people, about government policy. like of course there is, even if you go so far as to disagree that it's more serious or important, i don't think you can argue that the choices and dilemmas are more taxing.

i know it can appear facile and worthless to say "oh music is irrelevant people are dying" and that's not really what i'm saying, just that arts writers are not strictly speaking journalists, there is no absolute truth in art!

x-post it's a disgrace!

you're not going to encounter the same sort of issues writing about the arts as i do if i have to sub a piece about "northern ireland: the troubles explained"

sorry if this sounds wanky with the first person, i mean because personally i have to ask myself questions about this, someone else from another background could have whole other issues. i know these questions arise with arts writing too, and hell, i know good arts writing can go to the core of belief in general, but it's still more oblique imo.

I was thinking about this the other day when cleaning the freezer and i realized that in the past we used to be able to put a record on at the beginning and listen to it until the end, i mean really listen to it and take it in. But nowadays i get barely one third of the way through a record before the little woman starts shouting "reg! REG! REG THIS FREEZER ISNT GOING TO CLEAN ITSELF", and oh alright woman im coming, and off goes the record and down i go to hack away in the freezer i really don't know why we have so many frozen peas in there i don't even like peas, and i never got time to finish listening to the record

Look, the point i'm trying to make here - and I do think its a salient one - is, we literally don't have time for new music today in the same way as before the little woman came onto the scene. There was no freezer back then to worry about cleaning and while admittedly there was a fridge, it was a more carefree time, we just left stuff in there and listened to the music, really listened to the music instead. Now since the emergence of capitalism and twitter i just think our landscape has changed unrecognisably and we've lost a lot of the innocence and joy of those times, we may have been poorer but you knew those Steve O'Sullivan 12"s literally inside out and now I don't even know where they are. little woman probably put them on ebay, wouldn't put it past her

i know it can appear facile and worthless to say "oh music is irrelevant people are dying" and that's not really what i'm saying, just that arts writers are not strictly speaking journalists, there is no absolute truth in art!

'there is no absolute truth in art' => what is 'absolute truth' in news? i don't see your point here. art and culture intersect with life --> art and culture intersect with politics, religion, science, technology, death, the world, everything else

people kill each other for art and architecture's sake. civilizations built, civilizations lost.

culture can be a weapon--culture is not a benign thing. the question is: how do you write about it?

i really REALLY need to go to bed now

geeta otm

there is absolute truth insofar as there are actual bare bones facts but no area of journalism is just about providing a list of facts

Lex I would have thought you would defend such pieces - you've written some excellent ones yourself!

i don't pitch them all that often, and often feel uncomfortable trying to make those connections

'there is no absolute truth in art' => what is 'absolute truth' in news?

an event that happened. that's the truth. i agree it's not about providing a list of facts, but it's far more serious to have to talk about events than a nebulous concept like art.

i mean yes, idealistically, art feeds into everything in the entire world, but i don't think in reality a lot of arts writing harnesses that ideal.

it's not even a value judgement, art wouldn't be art if it wasn't so frequently nebulous and abstract.

there's no reason why arts writers should be trying to say they're exactly the same as a news journalist, they do some of the same things but they also do different things, and this should be celebrated.

art and culture intersect with politics, religion, science, technology, death, the world, everything else

agree totally, but frequently NOT via the medium of arts writer to arts reader

like put it this way...the arts writer can decide that "seminal artist x" was actually a talentless hack and "obscure artist y" who lived 30 years previously on mars was the real genius, and i don't see a moral problem with that. pretty clearly if the news person decides "nobody was killed in the bombing" or whatever, it's more significant. there is a truth there that exists and can be distorted. there isn't a truth about art, there are only tiny moral concerns for someone writing about art 99 per cent of the time.

it's not a value judgement i'm making, just don't think the comparison with journalists works.

Lex I'm talking about your pieces on r&b in particular.

again i don't pitch them that often and don't think there's a great deal of call for regular ones. i'm much happier focusing on individual artists or even songs, going micro.

ronan you're comparing apples and oranges - arts comment pieces vs news reportage. news comment pieces make the same decisions. both arts and news commentary still needs to be based on objective facts, whether that's number of deaths or getting an artist's discography correct.

and it only takes a simple compare and contrast between say the telegraph and the guardian news sections to realise that objective truth and facts can be - honestly! - reported with completely different slants and conclusions.

ronan you're comparing apples and oranges - arts comment pieces vs news reportage. news comment pieces make the same decisions. both arts and news commentary still needs to be based on objective facts, whether that's number of deaths or getting an artist's discography correct.

i'm not comparing, i'm distinguishing! you can't compare any form of arts writing to news reportage, is my point.

but even if you compare with news comments pieces the facts are still more important. think of the worst example of a news comment piece getting facts wrong and find me an equivalent in a piece about the arts.

like "number of deaths" vs "getting an artist's discography correct", come on! which do you think is more serious? which would you feel worse about getting wrong?

objective truth and facts can be - honestly! - reported with completely different slants and conclusions.

of course, this is why it's a challenge, and a greater one because it's reporting about objective truths. also factor in the speed at which news journalists have to work.

just to reiterate i'm taking issue with the "we used to have journalists" line because i don't believe the tenets journalism are the vital guiding light for someone writing about art or music.

what does everyone think of the new move d on workshop?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r81glGiSc_w

and here's the unknown track i wasnted to know about maybe i already posted i forgot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKdWdzOkLDU

i like the chillwave b-side on the new move d

And the latter, Games (sic) - it is beautifully done, but adds nothing: why not just listen to Bill Nelson, Rupert Hine, Heaven 17 or, shit, even Jan Hammer?

because neither bill nelson, rupert hine, heaven 17 or, shit, even jan hammer made 'joey rogers'.

i'm not comparing, i'm distinguishing! you can't compare any form of arts writing to news reportage, is my point.

This is exactly where I was going with my remark about journalism yesterday. The crux of your point seems to be that people don't die in the arts, or that no one's livelihood is really threatened.

In recent memory, I can think of the Shepard Fairey case determining whether or not he used a photograph of Obama without proper licensing. That case had a number of nuances, including the fact he faked some evidence, that would require some tricky reporting. It also involved photography copyright law, a popular and influential artist,

Arts reporters are going to continue covering Ai Weiwei despite the fact his recent circumstances have definitely been more related to the lack of free speech in China. As an artist, he's had quite the reach and while most of his work has no inherent surface political context, it's definitely there. Boilerplate news articles would scratch the surface of that by interviewing arts writers, actually.

I've heard a number of NPR pieces about musicians in Afghanistan/Pakistan who have been thrown in jail due to their stated influences and political stances. Again, there's a lot of factual reporting to be done, but it'd be scratching the surface without placing these individuals into a larger cultural tradition of protest music or cultural subversion via outside influence.

If I was doing a broad swath of reportage, I'd feel worse about getting a number of deaths wrong, but at the end of the day, I got a factual piece of information incorrect in a job that requires citations and research for factual information. At that level, it's just whether or not you're doing your job.

what does everyone think of the new move d on workshop?

It's pretty good, a little formulaic. Personally I'm not too inspired by the recent strain of house that sounds like it easily could have come out ten years ago. Maybe I'm missing something.

i like the chillwave b-side on the new move d

Name please?

How about this take on Gil Scott Heron's 'NY Is Killing Me', from Fanick + Ksky:

http://soundcloud.com/fanick/fanick-ksky-new-york-is

Slowed down and heavy as hell. Without the syncopation it would be shite.

an event that happened. that's the truth. i agree it's not about providing a list of facts, but it's far more serious to have to talk about events than a nebulous concept like art.

i mean yes, idealistically, art feeds into everything in the entire world, but i don't think in reality a lot of arts writing harnesses that ideal.

it's not even a value judgement, art wouldn't be art if it wasn't so frequently nebulous and abstract.

there's no reason why arts writers should be trying to say they're exactly the same as a news journalist, they do some of the same things but they also do different things, and this should be celebrated.

― LocalGarda, Wednesday, June 29, 2011 9:30 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the 'event that happened' in art, though, is the fact that you listened to an album. Its the exact same thing, essentially, imo

i disagree tbh, there are no responsibilities in reporting "me listening to an album". it's a free for all.

Not so sure about that. Kind of feel like I'm essentially reporting how I experienced a record, same as I would anything else I experience

how can you tell a lie about "how you experienced a record"

It was five minutes long. I heard a strong Bob Marley influence. I believe the artist may be of Belgian descent.

(Villalobos review)

but again...it's just an abstract or stupid lie, and the second one there is not in any way a lie, is totally subjective. i feel this has gone way too far into minutiae to keep coming back to the same thing tbh.

anyone else think soundso's untitled track from panorama bar 03 is really something?

The same way you can lie about anything? I read dishonest reviews all the time, even if the writer isn't endeavoring to be dishonest

into the territory of second guessing people now though

san proper - lost track of time

^ finally realized what this is (just what i want to hear right now)

http://soundcloud.com/boysnoizerecords/gonzales-knight-moves-lone-1

don't love everything lone does but like some of it, nice metro area meets lawrence vibe from this.

Yeah that's good. I think i prefer his remixes in general.

hello everyone hope all is well do u know what this track is?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7-IHzZCZ_c

That's Goldwill-Blush http://www.juno.co.uk/ppps/products/394784-01.htm

thanks!

lol i just remembered nick craddock played this at Sud last year and i asked what it was but forgot

is the ssgs bit of mnml ssgs, sausages? gen cnfsd hre.

"sausages"?

sau-sag-es

yes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IMOSN0WYvg

New Gabriel Ananda EP is surprisingly great (and epic). Kinda assumed he'd gone off the boil totally since 2006 but this is lovely, big field stuff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WMY47Q0Mjo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kCsjundfsg&feature=related

haha this sounds like early '90s trance!

i'm into it, though, i'm into it

sounds like every other gabriel ananda record ever...

XXXP: Was about to construct a lengthy reply as to why Local Garda is wrong about his journalist/music writer distinctions (no disrespect to his one million plus readers) but came to a realisation that I'm pretty much glad to be thought of as a music writer and not a journalist at the moment.

someone had to discover the notw stuff too, what was their profession, a plumber or something?

would love to hear those ananda tracks in a danny tenaglia set

i hacked danny tengalia's voicemail, he will play "smash" on aug 12 in ibiza

mixmag gave me £15 for that info, not too bad

XP: As a former "real journalist who wrote about death and war and shit" when I was a freelance news reporter working on Fleet Street (broadsheet/tabloid/large London local) for five years I now get really frustrated by the lack of "real" journalism chops amongst a lot of music writers. (As an aside, it only took me one Summer of moving up from freelance roving reporter to working directly for two, non-Murdoch, non-Daily Mail (my own line in the sand) taboids to persuade me I needed to change jobs to something where I could take more pride in my journalsim.)

While when you choose a loaded example of reviewing a techno record the need for proper training isn't as clear, but you only have to look at the number of harmful libels contained in a lot of music blogs, the awful interview technique among writers, the overabundance of hagiography, how most 'citizen journalist' music sites have slumped immediately into becomin an extension to the music industry's PR arm, how a significant proportion of music writers can't even tell the difference between opinion and fact, to tell that something's not right.

Many trained journalists are awful, many untrained music writers (especially the ones I use) are brilliant but if I hadn't come into an industry (internet publishing) which had been set up and run for many years, seemingly by narcissistic teenagers then perhaps I'd be able to raise enough advertising revenue to pay all of my writers a decent wage and, more importantly, offer them proper training rather than an open door for coffee, cake and advice on good interview technique and why you actually do have to understand the UK's libel laws even though you're writing about techno.

Reviews might well be opinion but it's lack of proper training that sees publications get sued.

Like I said, this is a much more condensed version. There's also stuff like music industry stories - after all this is a field that employs millions of people world wide.

We're not all like Peter O'hanrahanhanrahan you know: "Some people have downloaded some songs... and now we're fucked. Ted, over to you in the studio."

"journalsim" ha ha ha! I've been up all night looking after a newborn but you get my drift...

While when you choose a loaded example of reviewing a techno record the need for proper training isn't as clear, but you only have to look at the number of harmful libels contained in a lot of music blogs, the awful interview technique among writers, the overabundance of hagiography, how most 'citizen journalist' music sites have slumped immediately into becomin an extension to the music industry's PR arm, how a significant proportion of music writers can't even tell the difference between opinion and fact, to tell that something's not right.

Many trained journalists are awful, many untrained music writers (especially the ones I use) are brilliant but if I hadn't come into an industry (internet publishing) which had been set up and run for many years, seemingly by narcissistic teenagers then perhaps I'd be able to raise enough advertising revenue to pay all of my writers a decent wage and, more importantly, offer them proper training rather than an open door for coffee, cake and advice on good interview technique and why you actually do have to understand the UK's libel laws even though you're writing about techno.

Ah but not all bad writing is the result of a lack of journalistic skills or training. Writing is not the exact same skill as journalism, and some of what you bemoan is just a matter of intelligence.

I mean "not being able to tell the difference between opinion and fact", this has nothing to do with journalistic skills or training.

Yes you can teach libel but the original argument centred around people bemoaning the actual quality of writing due to lack of journalistic skills or training. Do you really believe that's the case, you say yourself you work with good writers who aren't traditionally trained?

I agree that "bad writing" is annoying but that wasn't what the original blog was saying, it was acting like you learn "integrity" in journalism college.

To quote from my own reply: "Many trained journalists are awful, many untrained music writers (especially the ones I use) are brilliant".

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but essentially, if a writer is interviewing the head of EMI about falling record sales, or Morrissey about alleged racism or even just setting a dance record in the context of queer politics and AIDS (Routes Not Roots by K-SHE for example) in a review, this is journalism.

I don't agree with the blog post, and all the shit going on at the momenet with News International shows that it might actually be counterproductive to learning integrity to even study journalism, hence my joke a few hours ago but my point still remains, that music writing should be seen as journalism if you do it professionally. How important this style of journalism is, is down to the writer and the reader but saying it's something entirely different - like hobbyism, with all due respect, is wrong.

I mean "not being able to tell the difference between opinion and fact", this has nothing to do with journalistic skills or training.

Hah, I was actually in a class on logic in college (easy credit for me) and it was apparently either required for journalism majors or fulfilled a particular requirement (it may have actually fulfilled a math requirement). We spent almost two full class sessions on the concept of whether statements are falsifiable because a few of the journalism majors just could not get it.

While most people who actually become paid journalists might understand logic and have the ability to differentiate between objective and subjective statements, I think there's always the possibility a few might slip through the cracks!

Good God, there's obviously more than a few - journalism is in a parlous state! But it stands to reason that with more/better, journalistic training we'd have fewer sneaking through... unless you're implying there's something generally inferior about people who are or who claim to be journalists as compared to anyone else who writes.

x-post that's not really what I was saying at all, I actually argued the point because I think there are positive and difficult things music writers do which are not the same as what a journalist does. It's more creative I think, there's a chance to build worlds around theories in a way that there isn't in journalism.

I feel like this is a weird argument in that the only reason I can think of to want to call "music writing" journalism is some perceived inferiority, there are reasons to exclude it that are positive towards music writing.

journalism as defined which basically means anything reported or analyzed for mass consumption

versus journalism as reportage of important or newsworthy events

versus people who have gone through a "journalism" program to get a degree or have some formal training but they're barely able to write press releases

journalism as defined which basically means anything reported or analyzed for mass consumption

for mass consumption would exclude a lot of music journalism...

"I feel like this is a weird argument in that the only reason I can think of to want to call "music writing" journalism is some perceived inferiority, there are reasons to exclude it that are positive towards music writing."

I think the perception of inferiority lies with you though. Someone interviewing, reviewing, previewing, writing obits, think pieces, business reports etc as a profession for a publication is a journalist and is practicing journalism. It's your insistance on calling it something else that is "weird".

mh: Don't let me stop you from having your moment in the sun, but as everyone, myself inlcuded, has consistently said, just because something is written by a journalist doesn't make it better than something written by a non-professional. We're all in agreement that the opposite is often the case. This is NOT what we're talking about. We're talking about whether writing about music professionally constitutes journalism or not.

XP: The mass consumption thing is pure bullshit. There are lots of local newspapers with ciruclations significantly lower than NME.com or MSN.com's music channel.

faaaalse biiiiinary

Someone interviewing, reviewing, previewing, writing obits, think pieces, business reports etc as a profession for a publication is a journalist and is practicing journalism.

haha, i think of myself as a music writer not a journalist because I want to avoid all but two of these things at all costs.

"music writing" and "journalism" are not completely distinct and mutually exclusive entities, and the point is surely that they overlap quite a lot

I'm not saying they don't overlap, I'm saying it's just plain wrong to say that music writing is not journalism. Simple as.

Or not necessarily journalism.

i think i was agreeing w/you doran

or at least, agreeing with you more than making a point of drawing distinctions between them

Glad to hear it!

(Sorry my dander's up now. I knew I shouldn't have posted on this thread!)

the distinction becomes especially meaningless if it's your career - most who make a living from this have to move between "music writing" and "journalism", often in the same project, and the insistence that they are completely separate seems unbelievably precious

Yeah, and I'd like to think that when I'm writing something for free for a website or small magazine, in a lot of ways, I'm essentially using the same tools/training as when I'm doing something for The Word or the BBC.

Pretty much I'm 100% in agreement with Doran as well.

I didn't mean to imply that there's any intrinsic quality that writing from a trained journalist has! I got the impression that others were privileging that distinction and I was criticizing it as well. You are correct, it's besides the point.

I think the reason I chimed in was that Ronan's assertion (and I may have this wrong as well) that music journalism isn't "serious journalism" is irrelevant because journalism is a large tent.

While we're sailing across the calm waters of accord, I'd like to say how much I enjoyed reading Colby's posts upthread about the little woman and kids kicking balls.

There's a whole thread dedicated to that (think Ronan started it), but yeah the colby post is one of the funniest examples.

Do you have a link? I'd love to read it...

Should I be listening to this tobias. album?

Doran: Society is in the gutter

Cheers!

i still think the best music writing is at its essence 'journalism' & i still dont understand what the actual functional difference is between reviewing a cd and reviewing a concert

bringing critical tools to bear would probably make it a two-part process, but in essence you are still describing an event as it occurred & your experience through that event

so music writers are the reporting & the editorial in one

I'm saying it's just plain wrong to say that music writing is not journalism. Simple as.

It's not really that simple. End of.

I think the perception of inferiority lies with you though. Someone interviewing, reviewing, previewing, writing obits, think pieces, business reports etc as a profession for a publication is a journalist and is practicing journalism. It's your insistance on calling it something else that is "weird".

Think you're not really readying what I wrote.

I think good music writing when it attempts to be journalism is the exception rather than the rule. The papers are mostly full of the worst music writing around. Adding the tropes needed for news stories to music writing is so often the cause of crap critical thought, with "top lines" for culture or history or entire seas of personal experience and individual works boiled down to one sentence in a 1000 word article.

We're talking about whether writing about music professionally constitutes journalism or not.

Who said anything about professionally? Way to exclude the entire swathes of music writers least likely to be journalists, ie everyone.

I like music discourse divorced from professionalism, eg this board, someone's Facebook status, someone posting a YouTube video, someone discussing a record in the pub, a blog, because nobody has to care if anyone wants to read it. Arts writing in newspapers has to be needlessly provocative or fit existing definitions of newsworthiness, eg the thing has to be popular enough, or again, have a "top line".

What I've been saying repeatedly is that I value elements of music writing that aren't journalism. A bit like why Tim asys he doesn't describe himself as a music journalist.

But my point also is that in practice, music discourse or "writing" is mostly shoehorned into the pre-existing mould that is news journalism. In a diff world where people gave a shit perhaps it could have its own rules.

Largely though somebody's thoughts are far more important than their facts to me in music writing. I accept that NME.com or MTV.com is a little different, but those sites are basically operating as news sites.

People thinking in text about music, it's not journalism, if it was then everybody on this site would be a journalist, everybody in the world would be. Music criticism on the other hand

And I still maintain that none of the examples given raise issues of integrity as much as life and death raw news stories can, it's v infrequent for the music journalist to face that kind of thing.

Just because there is overlap doesn't mean two things are the same, I mean by definition of overlap it doesn't.

Anyway I feel like initially I criticised the idea that music writing was journalism in a negative way and from a journalism perspective and now I've done it from a music writer's perspective to try and dispel the idea I'm making a value judgement.

you seem pretty down on the idea of music criticism/journalism as a thing people should make a living from, which, uhhh, okay but you shouldn't really be surprised if people take offence at that

i mean each of your posts of late could just be replaced with "HI I THINK YOUR CAREER IS POINTLESS AND WORTHLESS" to anyone who is making a livelihood from this

not intended to be personal lex...

intention makes precisely no difference to how it comes across, is the thing

it's my opinion, if you disagree then it's largely irrelevant to you i'd assume.

"Way to exclude the entire swathes of music writers least likely to be journalists, ie everyone."

Given that I publish somewhere in the region of 30 people who consider themselves to be music writers rather than journalists and as I've always said we've got an open door policy to anyone who can write, can put up with our appalling pay situation and get on with us in a cool manner REGARDLESS of their day job, training or previous experience I don't know how you can say this. We've got people who write for Rolling Stone and The WIRE and we've got people who have only ever written about music once, for us. They get treated the same.

"And I still maintain that none of the examples given raise issues of integrity as much as life and death raw news stories can, it's v infrequent for the music journalist to face that kind of thing." This is basically the crux of my disagreement with you - the level of importance may be different but it's still the same trade, it's like saying an ENT doctor isn't a real health professional because he's not doing open heart surgery. All I wanted to say that in my experience - which does kind of cut the heart of the matter given that I've had stuff published in both fields - it's journalism. But seeing as you're choosing to ignore everything that I've said, I'll leave it here.

it's my opinion, if you disagree then it's largely irrelevant to you i'd assume.

it's irrelevant what strangers think of my job.

Fair enough but I don't see the need for the edginess, I was polite and laid out my argument in response to more aggressive responses than my own.

I wasn't talking about your career when I said "way to exclude", just highlighting that this isn't a debate solely about "professional" music writing from my POV.

the level of importance may be different but it's still the same trade, it's like saying an ENT doctor isn't a real health professional because he's not doing open heart surgery

the level of importance is everything though. it dictates the nature of how you write. it's why good music writing involves a different form of creativity, an ability to think about records in unusual ways and make unusual connections, an ability to create theories and abstract ones, these are the things I want from music writing, when it really is let stretch its legs it's so different from the kind of news writing and journalism people are genuinely held to account for.

x-post to doran