make predictions about what will be in/win magazines' end of year polls - 2003...

Geir has another avatar far more worthy of that distinction.

I'd like to see a lot more raving press about Aesop Rock's record, but it seems too angular to be singularly praised.

ps. yo matos!

Woohoo! Japanese secret bonus track required!

Actually, the real sticking point is the whole "no no, El only produced one track, I did the first six, and it is just a coincidence that I, too, chose the path of drunken horns and Vangelis Blade Runner synths" sound. I mean, when the beats work, then great, and I like how all the Jukies hang out in the same brownstone indie-rap bunker and learn from each other and swap ideas and shit, but if this is the first sign of a "signature label sound" that will eventually become Neptunian in its exhaustion then oh no oh shit.

Geeta, how do you feel about banning the terms "chamber-pop" and "Beach Boys" for a year?

nate, your subliminal diss was funny. But your point is pretty good. I also see the obvious influence of El-P on Aesop Rock's sound. I just feel as if there's enough of a tilt to it to legitimize it. If anything, he's borrowing from his partner in crime, Blockhead, more. And for the record, I hated Labor Days.

matos, I'm just trying to say that the album isn't getting as much praise as I expected it to get and that the people who would probably like it best if they gave it a chance, are avoiding it like the plague. I stated it poorly before.

Tim, rude? Wow, are you just hurt by the fact that I insulted the new sound of Britain or something? I don't understand why he's supposed to be Jumping Jack Jesus and why his album is so acclaimed. After what I've said about sampling, legitimize the greatness of the beat of "Fix Up, Look Sharp"? If it's okay to sample, period, is it okay to use the same sample the same way as someone else?

Which is my feeling re: "Work It"; I was swarmed on ILM for stating it, but what's the fucking point of playing an old record in the middle of yours. "OH SHIT I KNOW THAT!" Appropriation/nostalgia/respect...what-fucking-ever. How about some creativity, it's supposed to be an art form.

"How is it okay for Dizzee Rascal to take the same sample that Run-DMC used and do effectively the same thing, when you'd probably villify Puffy for doing the same, repeatedly?"

I can't speak for Jess but I suspect he'd agree with me when I say that I wouldn't have a problem with Puffy doing the same thing. Often when Puffy *does* do the same thing (or something very similar) it works brilliantly; sometimes it sounds shit. The determinative factor is not the obviousness of the sample or its prior use.

As for Dizzee, you're totally taking this one song out of context and making it representative for Dizzee's craft as a whole. All the other tracks on Boy in da Corner are self-produced and don't like they rely on much sampling at all (except the occasional Playstation game noise maybe). The fact that "Fix Up Look Sharp" deliberately uses a familiar sampled beat and nothing else suggests that it's very deliberately trying to do and be something else; that "something" is two-fold, I think:

1. it's a demonstration of Dizzee's talent for freestyling over the beat, for being a raucous MC with no concerns about production/songcraft. The point of garage MCing is to ride other people's beats, to take them and make them your own. The backstory behind "Fix Up Look Sharp" is that Dizzee was in the studio, heard someone playing the instrumental break, and just started freestyling over it. If anything, the beat having a lineage and tradition makes it more ideal, because the assfuck-recontextualisation by the MC is consequently more radical and impressive.Oh, and see also: Jamaican riddim culture. And then see also: the eternally piratical nature of sampling throughout the hardcore continuum (hardcore--> jungle--> garage--> grime)

2. "Fix Up Look Sharp" is an old-skool beat in an album full of new-school beats. It's a very deliberate attempt by Dizzee to show that he's not "just" garage, but at the same time it's something of a very enjoyable novelty. Dizzee doesn't take the tradition of hip hop beatcraft seriously a la Jurassic 5 or DJ Shadow-style producers because he's working in a genre that is more forward-looking than tradition-venerating. For that reason, the sole purpose of the tune's old-skoolizm is to announce itself as old-skool. And it's much more effective to use an actual old-skool beat that is vaguely recognisable than it is to find something new and obscure. As I said in relation to Missy's Under Construction album (which has a fairly similar attitude to old-skool as "Fix Up Look Sharp" does), if you're going to an Eighties Revival costume party, you don't go as some obscure indie icon no-one but yourself will be aware of; you go as Cyndi Lauper or Madonna or Prince. This is about the past as fun, as shared history, rather than the past as a chessboard for beatmining fetishists.

Oh my god I bet you'd be the most boring DJ in the history of existence!

(i heart tim finney)

Yeah I'd be pretty angry too if I had to listen to you play "Chris Ott's History of the Best and Most Obscure Breaks Ever!!!"

Probably yes - but I agree with Matos that this doesn't necessarily make the records better. Perhaps "Get Ur Freak On" and "Lick Shots" work as great pop records because Missy knew she wasn't a brilliant MC and realised she had to compensate for that in other ways. Like, the problem with "Pass That Dutch" is that Missy evidently thinks she's good enough to get away with releasing a first single without a chorus.

I'll also be really sad if she does abandon R&B, as I possibly prefer her in R&B mode - "Sock It 2 Me", "Sticking Chickens", "We Did It", "One Minute Man", "Play That Beat" etc. etc.

I agree, but the fact that there's no chorus *and* the groove is so tuneless (I don't mean that negatively) mean that it doesn't really stick in the head the way "Work It" or "Get Ur Freak On" did.

I suspect that This Is Not A Test might be the Da Real World to Under Construction's Supa Dupa Fly.

Tim, I thought ODB's 'Welcome Home' track was kind of uninspired. An obvious rush job, nothing really notable about it. I remember being glad that he still had the delivery going, but that's about it.

g--ff, there's a difference between a rock song being loose and unrestricted and a rap song being sloppily produced. This isn't my main argument.

I'm saying, why can't artists evoke previous musics while still utilizing their own outlets? This is why I feel like Under Construction is a boring nod to the past and something like Paul's Boutique winks at it's forefathers while still remaining almost fully forward-thinking and original.

Saying "Bring The Pain" on Under Construction isn't simply a rehash is strange to me. New lyrics, yes, different mood, yes, but how is it such a forward step? What influence is this giving? As long as I have the original artist on the track, it's cool for me to take the frame of a song. Excuse me while I call Sadat X about jumping punks and beatdowns. We have a hit to make.

Your choice of sampling is just a personal preference thing anyway: I prefer El-P freaking "Mexican Radio" by Wall of Voodoo for Cannibal Ox over someone building on top of "Paul Revere", regardless of how funky it is or what nostalgia is promotes. I'm not saying such uncreativity is wholly unenjoyable, I'm saying I like other methods more.

Fine, you like other methods more, but your subjective preference doesn't make El-P objectively creative and Timbaland/Missy objectively uncreative.

needless to say, the Sterling-Tim-Geeta front is OTM throughout this thread.

*sniff*

Radiohead has never been "African" in any way. But they, like all other bands, are best when they create melodies with verse and chorus, not just a phrase or two that are repeated endlessly. Repetition and minimalism always bores the listener.

Geir, this is really, really, really untrue if the listener is me.
Thus, it is untrue.

i'm really stumbling tho with the 'with you in that dress/my thoughts i confess/verge on dirty' bit

Miles Davis & Beethoven both strongly disagree with this statement.

Dorinne Muraille Mani (Fat Cat)
The Books The Lemon of Pink (Tomlab)
Matmos The Civil War (Matador)
Nathan Michel Dear Bicycle (Tigerbeat 6)
Colleen Everyone alive wants answers (Leaf)
Gal Hinaus:: In den, Wald. (CD-R / radio))
Lullatone Computer Recital (Audio Dregs)
Anne Laplantine Hambourg
Robert Wyatt Cuckooland (Hannibal)
David Sylvian Blemish (Samadhisound)

Can someone please tell me some more about this band? The internet doesn't know shit, but "Motherless Bastard" (I think it's called) is fab.