MC TUNES - THE RESULTS

Okay, I'll be starting this off in the next hour. Ultimately I received 78 ballots and votes for 117 different tracks, but I've decided to condense the results to a top 20 so that we can get this out of the way in time to start canvassing for a Buck's Fizz poll.

Incidentally, several of you wrote to me alongside your ballot to say "FOR FUCK'S SAKE DON'T LET THEM DO ANOTHER TWOTTING BEATLES POLL, BUN DOWN THE BOARD, BUN DEM BAD MAN". I'll be passing your comments along to the mods, so thanks for taking an interest.

TOO LOW

TOO HIGH

JUST RIGHT

Not a single rap track yet, typical ILM

http://smilys.net/aengstliche_smilies/smiley5166.gif

Got some great blurbs from a few posters btw. I know some of you have connections to the Industry and you've asked me to not risk antagonising a major player like Nicholas William Dennis Hodgson so all comments have been anonymoused to ensure freedom of speech.

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20. DUB AT ITS HEIGHTS (1990) [532 points, 20 votes, 1 number one]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7p6rHBmbyM

(Original video unavailable on Youtube, sorry)

Oof, there goes my number 46.

G___ H_____: Some people have told me that this just sounds like a bit of "Primary Rhyming" with the raps taken off and some echo stuck on it. What they fail to understand is that this elegant little reprise creates a haunting sense of irresolution at the end of the album. I think of it as Tunes sauntering into the sunset along Piccadilly, a jaunty skip to his stride and the real sense that his work here is done but we shall be hearing from him again, and soon. So that's them telled.

Funnly enough, I was playing a 2CD compilation "Baggie Baggy Boggea" and MC tunes was on it with one of his tunes. It had a sample of the big country on it, and had a bit about biting.

Which one would that one be?

no spoilers!

Ah, I love that one.

Damn it, I forgot to vote. Someone had better have put in a shout for my top three (1. Put A Donk On It, 2. Call It What You Want, 3. Don't Mug Yourself).

Surprised at the amount of love for "Dub at its Heights" but i promise you there are a number of deep cuts scattered thru the top 20.

Quick review of the results so far, have put the ones I voted for in BOLD

20. DUB AT ITS HEIGHTS (1990) [532 points, 20 votes, 1 number one]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/cream_420x315.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/atomic-kitten-20050826-66210.jpg

no wait i could've done it in 1

http://news.bbc.co.uk/media/images/39802000/jpg/_39802305_milk.jpg

back in 5 minutes guys

Damn you, suspense is killing me.

shit, has this started?!

Just seen that Atomic Kitten picture again, back in another 5.

too early for predictions? Own Worst Enemy a lock for the top 3, Mancunian Blues highest placing non-album track.

http://img.metro.co.uk/i/pix/2008/02/clintboon_450x250.jpg

^ he's ready

19. TUNES SPLITS THE ATOM (CREAMATOMIC RAP) (1990) [564 points, 31 votes]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iImvf8VZ68

(Original video unavailable on Youtube, sorry)

TOO LOW

Don't forget individual remixes count, that' all I'm saying.

What are Atomic Kitten doing in that picture?

Hang on, back in 5 minutes.

Waxing their moustaches. xp

Put A Donk On It

do feel the transPennine counter-'nuum is undertheorised by reynolds crew. Tunes –> Donk lineage representing discontinuities generated by material Kapital of North (King Cotton) vs Immiseration of the Hands, where Londonocentric 'nuum = Virtual Kapital of The City aligning w/ entrepreneurial streetscene? idk just kicking ideas around.

ooh forgot the blurb.

___R _____O: Whilst hardly reaching the, um, heights of the album version, the Creamatomic version of "Tunes Splits the Atom" definitely brings some new elements to the party. The relentless use of what I assume to be a sampled goose honk is surely a tip of the hat to Public Enemy's "Rebel Without a Pause", and Tunes delivers one of the greatest raps of his career, nimbly inserting a verse which dissects UK government post-War economic policy into the flow we already know and love. I have to say this is banging and I'm completely on its dick. PS could you mail me back a copy of them Atomic Kitten bukkake pics than you.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/the-defiant-ones-20100614-152528-medium.jpg

18. CONNECTED (1992) [588 points, 21 votes, 3 first places]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kezbMtlwW5Q

choon

This poll is a travesty, have sugbanned everyone for their lack of discernment.

GH: I usually prefer my Tunes a bit rawer than "Connected", but I have to admit that its slinky funk groove and racially incoherent backing vocals were a surprising change of direction for Manchester's finest MC back in 1992. Of course over here in Hammerfest we were very much getting into the bludgeoning sounds of America's Gunge scene, with artists like Poison and The Quireboys very much dominating the charts. "Connected" was seen very much as a reaction to this primitivist atavism and a much-needed reintroduction of the essence of James Motherfucking Brown y'all into contemporary music. PS Got the Atomic Kitten pix thanks, BRB

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/rhyme.jpg
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YESS!

would've been my number one!

17. THE ONLY RHYME THAT BITES (1999) [603 points, 45 votes, 1 first place]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zfw_FwmC4A

Sorry, that shd say THE ONLY RHYME THAT BITES '99.

No, me neither.

heart-in-mouth moment there

Don't know this version but this tune is so dangerous there should be a COSHH data sheet for it.

I'm looking forward to seeing what makes number four

Mystery Commentator: TS Eliot reckoned that April is the cruelest month but when it's late December and you're not expecting the sun to rise for another 6 weeks then April looks like a
drikker samling in a smerten horehuset to be honest. Anyway, there was a terrible shortage of Smørrebrød during the winter of 1999 and spirits were understandbly low. Picture the scene then, when NRK P3 suddenly started playing "The Only Rhyme That Bites" on the reg. Grown men were crying for joy into their akevitt and the nation found a renewed sense of hope and purpose. That this sudden boom in Tunes-age on national radio turned out to be because of an alleged "remix" which sounds exactly the same as the original was perhaps the biggest kick in the baller I have ever experienced in my life.

Bump. It's a shame this poll was never finished - we should rerun it to get modern-day ILM's view.

oh sorry I gotta go do some work for a bit. Numbers 15-11 later today.

maybe even number 16 if you're lucky

Yeah, it's best to hold off for a bit anyway until America wakes up.

wake up america you're dead!!!!!

never really felt the '99 version of TORB but the '98 version he did for the World Cup 'Le Only Rhyme That Bites' is dece and Darren Anderton's comedy collapse in the video is all time jokes.

no spoilers

Yeah that one's le bomb.

Tunes had better flow than Orinoco. FACT.

so many lyrics he was afraid to use them

DJs actually lost fingers spinning his records.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/child_rapper.jpg

16. PRIMARY RHYMING (1990) [604 points, 45 votes, 1 first place]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD9Ls-BkFlE

(Not sure what that vid's supposed to be but it ain't "Primary Rhyming". Thanks random Youtube numbnuts.)

Ooh, only one point in it between those two!

'Primary Rhyming' was my #2, lots of happy memories of this one. My roommate and I took a fortnight off from our freshman year at Brown to do a road trip across the US in October/November 1990 - incredible times, good friends made, good ol' boys evaded, good strong liqour quaffed at sunset in Monument Valley at the climax of the trip, waiting for the peyote to take effect. I'd lined up some Gray Shadow Hawk ambient stuff to soundtrack the moment, but had sold it to buy junk back at a truck stop on '66, and in the end all I had was a Soup Dragons cassingle - picture the ecstasy when it turned out I'd recorded over it with 'Primary Rhyming'! Best night of my life.

loving the jifpgs

Commentator X: I am not inclined to rate "Primary Rhyming" particularly highly as the unholy squawking of females is repellent to me. Having said that, the rhymes performed by The Microphoness bear the unmistakeable artistry of Tunes and are therefore acceptable as art. Clearly no woman would have the brain capacity to create lyrics of such truth and beauty. Also, the Wizard Boy Blizzard is now the presenter of Norway's top-rated show on occult affairs, Feeble Screams from the Morten Gamst Pedersen Theatre in Stavanger, and his fans often playfully chase him through the streets of Stavanger waving firearms and shouting "Kill the Darkling". For these reasons and for the delightfully cheesy organ riff I bunged it a couple of points.

Øystein otm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iBSW_9OQgA

God Bless that man

Clearly pisses all over Diddy's so-called "empire" anyway

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15. TUNES SPLITS THE ATOM (ZERO GRAVITY MIX) (1990) [636 points, 39 votes, 2 first places]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5J2Dfi_0no

(Original video unavailable on Youtube, unfortunately)

Certainly splitting the vote lol amirite?

ZTT loved a few money-spinning remixes.

Can you imagine an Art of noise tracks poll?

Just digging out some of the blurbs.

I'm sorry, I have nothing, I justed wanted to look like a big man on one of the Hip Hop polls, prove I'm not a one trick pony, y'know? Just make something up about tørrfisk and I'll get back to you.

Hope he's gonna stick around to enjoy some melodic Candyflip beats.

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14. SECOND CLASS RETURN TO DOTTINGHAM PLEASE (1983) [675 points, 50 votes, 8 first places]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhnKjR0ESPs&feature=related

Think some of you were wrong about this, he looks almost unrecognisable without the beard, but who am I to argue with the poll system?

^ would have been my number one, but I didn't vote in case somebody said that it was unnecessary

Tunes Helps You Breathe More Easily Remix.

Essentially, for me, music is a metaphor, a tool for reflection. We need to think of music as information, not simply as rhythms, but as codes for aesthetic translation between blurred categories that have slowly become more and more obsolete. For me, the Dj metaphor is about thinking around the concept of collage and its place in the everyday world of information, computational modelling, and conceptual art. All of them offer exits from the tired realms of Euro-centric philosophy into some kind of pan humanism. That’s why I like Deleuze and Guattari’s work. Other figures from the European aesthetic realm like Ludwig Feuerbach (who promoted the idea of “humanism” in his works of the mid 19th century), Spinoza, and Giordano Bruno’s exploration of Semiotics are also influences, but the basic sense of “rhizomatic” thought - thinking in meshworks, in nets that extend to other nets - it’s the driving force of my music and art. It's about making multiple rhythms work together, synchronized, cut, pasted, and collaged. That’s the real “abstract machine” - cross reference that with James Brown, think Garrett A. Morgan (the African American inventor of the street light - the choreography on every street corner of the global megalopolis), think Duke Ellington with his “Afro-Eurasian Eclipse” jazz modernity, think Albert Murray’s essay “Spyglass Tree”, think Detroit’s underground forerunners, stuff like Drexciya, but most of all MC Tunes' "Second Class Return To Dottingham Please"

Dottingham IN DA HOUSE

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/1307913096_ad_iow_sun_063.jpg
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13. THIS AIN'T NO FANTASY (1990) [712 points, 47 votes, 3 first places]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYanc6FJZRI

(Video not available on Youtube, unfortunately)

great to see the chill beats represented

Only twelve to go. Trying to work out what's missing. If I've called the bankers right, by my reckoning either 'The Only Rhyme That Bites' or 'Tunes Splits The Atom' isn't going to make it.

http://smilys.net/aengstliche_smilies/smiley5166.gif

hang on in there, i'm working on some more jokes

nothing from his 1999 album "Manconia" so far, v disappointing

Think "Bombs Over Bolton" is in with a shout tbh

RIP

ANCOATlians

Our Kid n'Play

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This 'Noodle Vague' fellow sure knows how to work a crowd. Must have been taking lessons from the one, the only ...

Results so far

20. DUB AT ITS HEIGHTS (1990) [532 points, 20 votes, 1 number one]
19. TUNES SPLITS THE ATOM (CREAMATOMIC RAP) (1990) [564 points, 31 votes]
18. CONNECTED (1992) [588 points, 21 votes, 3 first places]
17. THE ONLY RHYME THAT BITES '99 (1999) [603 points, 45 votes, 1 first place]
16. PRIMARY RHYMING (1990) [604 points, 45 votes, 1 first place]
15. TUNES SPLITS THE ATOM (ZERO GRAVITY MIX) (1990) [636 points, 39 votes, 2 first places]
14. SECOND CLASS RETURN TO DOTTINGHAM PLEASE (1983) [675 points, 50 votes, 8 first places]
13. THIS AIN'T NO FANTASY (1990) [712 points, 47 votes, 3 first places]

I think he's letting the Beatles have a crack at the big time first, what with that poll kicking off.

xp oops maybe I was wrong

here we go

What is 'beatles'?

i'm reliably told they can fuck right off

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http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/owenwilsonmarleyandmelu5.jpg

Ah, Jump Grave Slacks, my favourite!

12. DANCE YOURSELF TO DEATH (MARLEY MIX) (1990) [721 points, 39 votes, 1 first place]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6tSlgJoWPw

It's the actual fucking record! What are the odds eh???

So did Jump Grave Slacks not make it?

dammit i got so excited i missed off the bold tags

12. DANCE YOURSELF TO DEATH (MARLEY MIX) (1990) [721 points, 39 votes, 1 first place]

That bloke looks nothing like Bob Marley

He didn't have a dog for starters.

http://ihasahotdog.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/funny-dog-pictures-your-dog-bit-the-mailman.jpg

That was possibly the least racist GIS for 'bob marley dog'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKnL54cBjbA

Just a bit of fun, let's be cool

Still time for Jump Grave Slacks (DJ Top Buzz Mix) to make the top five.

I think you'll find that single was credited to the Soup Dragons and the rumours that Tunes was behind it were apocryphal

History is written by the winners.

GH: It was very pleasing to see Tunes release this heartfelt warning on the dangers of engaging in dancing to rhythm-dominated musics rather than contemplatively smoking a Petterøe's and gazing off into the Northern Lights to the sound of SUB: INSERT NAME OF CLASSICAL MUSICS MAN IN HERE.Why he chose to remix it with a bunch of samples from The Muppet's Christmas Carol I am at a loss to explain for.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/van_morrison-100.jpg
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Psych Spice Ant Legs?

Featuring Junior Reid on "toasting".

11. THEM GIRLS THEM GIRLS (1994) [791 points, 56 votes, 6 first places]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrQ8-U4UmOE

this is some britishes thing I can safely ignore, yes?

"These are dem word from my grandaddy! BO! These are dem word from my grandaddy! BO! Don't feel 'shamed to feel pscyh spice ant legs!"

You ingore Tunes at your peril! As a friend of mine found out to his own cost in the Ducie in Levenshulme one night in '94.

Tunes' collaboration with Ian Brown of Barron Knights tribute act The Stoned Roses caused controversy in some quarters when TV Quick's Richard Arnold pronounced it "not strictly for the headstrong". But it proved a huge hit with fans, as it poll placing proves.

this is some britishes thing I can safely ignore, yes?

MC Tunes is BELGIAN ffs unbelievable

What do you think of when you think of Belgium? Poirrot, Tintin, Front 242 and MC Tunes smoking a Benson and Hedges down an alleyway.

MC stands for mussels & chips.

http://firstrung.co.uk/dbimgs/applause-754063.jpg

'Moules Beats' just missed my ballot

feat. Friterie Christian

Tunes Splits The Herring.

Ooh, Ooh! The Clapping Song!

Some sort of Maginot Line of clapping going on there tbh

"Moss Side Diskow" gotta be top 10

omg, so many lols

"So many lols" was when he was still Nicky Hodgson, so doesn't count.

ty Spotify for finally allowing me to hear this whole album

TUNES HARDSONS THE ATOM

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT

I have been contacted today by the Metropolitan Police who have informed me that several of the email accounts used to collate the MC Tunes poll may have been hacked by private investigators employed by a national newspaper. Given the circumstances I have decided to suspend the results thread until these allegations can be fully investigated. It has been suggested to me by the Met that many other ILM polls of the last 5 years may be seriously flawed as well and should not be taken seriously.

Sincere apologies

Noodle Vague

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Politics/Pix/columnist%20thumbnails/2009/4/30/1241090133943/David-Cameron-001.jpg

think i saw Tunes stood at a bus stop on Bransholme while i was having me driving lesson today

you forgot to number that one

Great to see the enthusiasm of this poll got some reissue action moving:

The North at its Heights (Deluxe Edition)
Posted on 09.11.11

Following the recent release of 808 State's career-spanning, career-defining album Blueprint, we are lining up MC Tunes' The North at its Heights – recorded, written and produced with 808 – for the deluxe reissue treatment.

The original 10-track set has been expanded with seven recently-unearthed gems and one brand new recording:

Dance Yourself To Death – dust bros club mix: remixed By The Dust Bros, 12.4.90
Pump and More – recorded at FON (eng. Al Fish) and Jacobs (eng. Al Stone), 19.5.95
The Only Rhyme That Bites – 808's instrumental: recorded at Spirit and Sarm East, 1990
Dance Yourself to Death – original 909 mix: recorded at Spirit and Advision studios, 1989
The Only Rhyme That Bites -- optical mix: remixed by Optical, 1998

The Only Rhyme That Bites – ugly as sin mix: remixed and remodelled by Tunes' new outfit, The Ugly Project, especially for this release

Tunes Splits The Atom -- creamatomic mix: recorded at Square One, Out of The Blue, Strawberry and Sarm West, July 1990

The North at its Heights (Deluxe Edition) is out 19 November via ZTT Japan.

shit! need a re-poll to include new material

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/madchester-rapper-mc-tunes-wins-4024653

fair play to him ...

you know i could add that dust junkys album to the current lonely obsessions thread ...

despite my deep, abiding love for Tunes i've never knowingly listened to the Dust Junkys

Reading this and the hardson mix tape thread in the same month has helped me reduce my medication by 25%.

ok, shit got real :

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-27080346

who has heard this follow up ?

his roadie noodle vague

my reaction to this news:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g_GeQR8fJo

funny guys

More excited for this than I was for MBV tbh

^^^ truth nuke

a wait is a wait

can we re-poll with these new song titles before the album comes out, I think this is crucial

Jump Grave Slacks better make the cut this time if we do.

unfortunately due to new rules i wd have to get in the queue behind some cunt's 14 Iced Bears poll scheduled for 2021

i laughed, it was out loud

XP ^Reads like Sleaford Mod lyrics.

classic nv post :)

damage by stereo OUT MONDAY!!

Mega lol @ nv's xxxxpost!

i ask myself, did we ever get this sorted?

outsider for a nobel laureate in '17?

his Jump Grave Slacks: Collected Lyrics and Essays deserves a look for sure

thinking of running a write-in poll for famous horses where everybody can nominate animals that clearly aren't horses but then argue that they're basically the same as horses so it would spoil the famous horses poll if they aren't allowed to vote for these not-horses

also i would express a burning desire for Trigger to win in a manner that suggests it hasn't occured to me that it absolutely does not fucking matter

maybe I shd keep it in here, I dunno, ILX has been weak lately

surely "Tunes Splits the Bucket" would scan better?

Bloop

Bleep Bloop

Bleep BANG

feeling so attacked rn

not for the first time this thread has made me think about changing every mention on his wiki page to McTunes but the man the ledg doesn't deserve such treatment

thinking thru the lyrics this was probably a low taste idea

imagine if the tune they play to the aliens in Close Encounters was the bleep bloop bit from "Tunes Splits the Atom", how much better would that film be?

bump

only ten hours to wait for the results on / drastically influence this poll:

Qualifier 56!

DREAM WARRIORS - "Wash Your Face In My Sink": https://t.co/BLtMGIblKY
QUEEN LATIFAH - "Come Into My House": https://t.co/9AJ4EklIMz
MC TUNES and 808 STATE - "The Only Rhyme That Bites": https://t.co/kU64WM4E54
GARY CLAIL - "Beef": https://t.co/hfIGoWJsM2

— World Cup Of 1990 Tracks (@peoples_pop) July 9, 2020

Tunes has made it into Round 2 proper (and seeded). But based on the early returns, he’s going to need all our support in order to progress further in the tournament. 🙏

Match 2.17!

Moss Side's lightning-tongued MC Tunes up against Bushy's most famous son George Michael.

MC TUNES and 808 STATE - "The Only Rhyme That Bites": https://t.co/zK1qkJH1C3
GEORGE MICHAEL - "Freedom '90": https://t.co/LSM0INpxvN

— World Cup Of 1990 Tracks (@peoples_pop) July 21, 2020

thanks for the reminders Jeff

really this should have been "Tunes Splits the Atom" tho

Is that a SPOILER re our Top 10?

Tom's doing debut singles next month, obv the Tunes massive were keeping their powder dry