Summer Radness: Kool & The Gang (Keeping Kool When All's Gone Mad)

Download newest summer mix. Yeah!

Well, I've gone and done you another solid. Whipped up a precise blend of parts that together join up to make a Voltron-like colossus:
Summer 'Showerz': LoveLeigh Days



("showerz" refers the "singalong in the shower" nature of all the songs; "Leigh" refers to a friend who prompted me to finish this mix. THX!)

So, specifically summer, particularly shower jamz. Summer songs are feelgood, but perfect summer songs have to be melllllooooow too.
Not sure how feelgood mixes with ultramellow? Then listen to Kool & The Gang's "Summer Madness". You'll see.





Above is from the official Philadelphia Mural thingy, visible from the El tracks in West Philly. I see this on my way to work. More info, deets etc. (like how you could have gotten a tattoo designed by ESPO, the dude what did that mural).

Just like the summer. You are feeling nice in the summer, but you know, low-key like.
A perfect example of that perfect mellow feeling is perfectly evinced by the classically perfect first song, which is Youtubing above.

Summer Madness, by Kool & The Gang. This song was looped, 'slightly transformed' (like Voltron!), for Fresh Prince & DJ Jazzy Jeff's "Summertime".
So, now we've picked up on a recent theme, of great older songs outtfitted with a little rappin'-freshness. Oh yes, surely you recall my last post, on Biggie and his Other Brothers (The Isley Brothers), whom he sampled for "Big Poppa". I'll probably drop some more of those, about songs in different forms.
Note that The Isley Brothers are included on this mix too- a clear nod to Leigh, who praised them recently.

But anyhow, here is the track listing for the mix.
Download my newest mix: Summer Showerz: LoveLeigh Days.

Summer Madness ~O~ Kool & the Gang
Reunion ~O~ Bobbie Gentry
Maggie May ~O~ Rod Stewart
Summertime ~O~ Billy Stewart
Spirit In The Sky ~O~ Norman Greenbaum
Party Lights ~O~ Claudine Clark
In the Summertime ~O~ Mungo Jerry
If Not For You ~O~ Olivia Newton John
Summer Breeze ~O~ Isley Brothers
Two Tickets To Paradise ~O~ Eddie Money
I Fought The Law ~O~ Bobby Fuller Four
Summer ~O~ War

Please note that the symbol, lovingly crafted by myself, in betwixt track and band: looks like a sun, yeah?
ahahhahhahah I'm unstoppable hahahahahahahah

Brothers From Another Mother: Isleys and Big Poppa

Speaking of samples (as I did last time), here is a gem of a song I've been sitting on for a minute. In a hot HOT batch of records I snatched up the other day, I procured a few Isley Brothers albums.
Of which there are roughly a million, by the way. In fact, Wiki tells me they had 20 albums between 1969 and 2006: excuse me, that's 20 albums that reached the Top 10, in 35-ish years. I guess when you have like 7 guys in the band, there are more songs getting written?
(7/35=5; 5x20=100; 100/10= 10; 10/10 = perfect: do the math, it adds up)

Who knows- the point is, that these Brothers From The Same Mother got sampled- and that produces another song, A Brother From ANOTHER Mother, as it were.

Here is the "elder" song, a real sexy satiny sort of thing.
Download Isley Brothers: "Between The Sheets"



A little suggestion: give it a listen on YouTube whilst ye download it.

The Isley Brothers: Between The Sheets on YouTube



And here is the song built around the former- I'm pretty sure we all love this song.

Big Poppa, Notorious B.I.G.



Also, I was trying to find a good picture of sample-sized-spoons, and I found this instead. A marrow- that's bone marrow, you understand?- spoon. A Narrow Marrow Spoon, that.



Interesting. I bet Biggie would be crushing on some marrow if he weren't dead. Sigh.... His loss, and ours.

Pirate Radio- "Lost" and Found Sounds

I have put together two mixes based on the TV series, "Lost."
DOWNLOAD "Lost- Pirate Radio One.zip"
Now, I've never seen this show. I just want to cash in on its popularity while I still can (before everyone realizes that it just is not that good).



My favorite character (again, haven't seen it: this is all overheard hearsay) is one John Locke. Why my favorite?
He uses a machete,
He has been in a wheelchair,
He has no hair.

I would do all these things: I would roll around viciously swording all those who dared not step out of the way of my wheeled chariot (and my head is shaved already!).

He also will defend his property, which I guess means something to those of you who read philosophy.
But as (philosopher) Locke tells us, the natural right to property, in civil society, may come with contractual limits. For instance, a DVD I bought at the dollar store informed me that my right of ownership, granted to me by my purchase, in fact "excludes the use of this DVD at locations such as clubs, coaches, hospitals, hotels, oil rigs, prisons, and schools."
Okay!

On to the mix: since I never saw the show, only two things are guiding the selection:
1) that something about the title/band name/ evokes something "Lost"-y to me: islands, water, fighting, Weird Science, etc.
2) that the songs would be fun enough that, even if you didn't know them, if you heard them in the background at a party, you would like them. So they must be 'party' songs, like funtime partytime, not like dancing partytime. Some you can dance to, though; it is not contractually forbidden.

Whereby a wonderful radio-like mix is made.
(This is the actual contract that I and my computer signed. Computer being digital, it signed it electronically, with a PIN.)

!TRACK LISTING!
for "Lost- Pirate Radio One.zip"


1) Hey There, Little Insect ?? ? ?? Modern Lovers
Funky little ditty. 'Monologue on Bermuda' coming up on a near-future blog (it's by Jonathan Richman, lead guy for ModLovers).
(because islands have insects?)

2) Jailbreak ?? ? ?? Thin Lizzy
Lyrics: "sirens wail, tonight all systems fail; hey you good-lookin' female: c'mere"
(because trapped on an island is roughly jail?)

3) No Fun ?? ? ?? The Stooges
Clapping- pretty much the most fun Stooges song, oddly enough.
(because would being on an island, even if there are polar bears and limbo contests and you get a really good tan base, really be that fun, after a few weeks?)

(download mix here)

4) In The Mouth A Desert ?? ? ?? Pavement
(sand=desert; islands have sand, right?)

5) Perfidia ?? ? ?? The Ventures
Off the sensational follow-up to "Vol 1. Original Hits". Off the 'present' side of the vinyl, not the 'past' side. Apparently, the 'present' is about '62. Surf rock classic. The Ventures covered "Apache"; a later cover by The Incredible Bongo Band is one of the most sampled songs ever. RESPEK!
(because surfing is what islanders do? Also, because this song sounds like sun?)

6) Eisbär ?? ? ?? Grauzone
punk-funk, new wave, whatever you need to call it. Sorta awesome. I got this actually in Germany: how about that?
(because 'Eisbär' in German means 'polar bear', and wasn't there a polar bear one time?)

7) This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody) ?? ? ?? Talking Heads
I got this song off a free promo CD that Gary gave me; ehm, it was "She's just not that into you", I'm afraid to say. But this and 5 other really good songs on it. So I took it.
(because the island must be 'the place', whether 'the place' is purgatory, the future, or whatever? Have they even told you what the island actually is yet?)

(download mix here)

8) You Can't Hide From Yourself ?? ? ?? Teddy Pendergrass
Classic Philly soul. RESPEK!
(Cos where are you gonna hide on an island, huh? Riddle me that!)

9) I Think We're Alone Now ?? ? ?? Tommy James and The Shondells
By the band that brought you the ultrafamous "Crimson and Clover" (over and over...). This song, you will remember from your misspent youth- Tiffany covered it!
(cuz, 'cept for the other people there, you are abandoned by all humanity? Except maybe DARPANET or whatever it's called?)

10) Cocoanut Water, Rum, and Gin ?? ? ?? George Symonette
Calypso, which is about the most fun music ever. This songs claims that this drink will cure diseases, make you rich and attractive, and also get you drunk. I partially believe him.

11) Tide Is High ?? ? ?? The Paragons
Another song covered when you were just knee-high, by Blondie this time. This is the old-style reggae, uprock sweetness. Just a delight, a delightful delight.

(download mix here)

12) Sailor Man ?? ? ?? Turbonegro
I gave you a little fireside chat about this song already, here.
(b/c Sailors go to, and get you to, islands? and PIRATES!)

13) Survival of the Fittest ?? ? ?? Mobb Deep
This is an absolute classic hip-hop track; quoted sampled homaged etc in many many tracks. A few classic lines:
"You scared to look, you shook, cuz ain't no such thing as halfway crooks" (EPIC)
"worse come to worse, my people come first"
and, mais oui, the chorus lines: "Survival of the Fittest - Only the Strong Survive"
(Because, there are no welfare programs in the State of Nature, and you cannot get voted immunity on the "Lost" island?

Got it?, Good!

As a treat to myself, I got me some more records, all of which are top drawer: they all get top billin'.


Audio Two - Top Billin'



One of them is this bad bad bad beat. An ol' skool hip-hop classic, I mean classic cut. On the Youtube comments, someone rattled off 4 big songs they knew that sampled this song- the drums, I imagine- and someone else dropped a few more on there.

A bunch of the other songs posted as this on Youtube are not the song; remixes (by Youtube users, not real remixes), other songs entirely (they will make you take the songs down sometimes, they = copyright holders, and people often put up a new song and leave the name of the old), and one version that was so very quiet, you couldn't hear the bass go

....boooooooooom.....

which, on this version, you can.

Brief News In Brief

[A] Mr. Lif is at Johnny Brenda's coming Monday (May 18th, my dad's birthday). That's him up der. A very Public Enemy-ish beat, which can only be understood as high praise.
[B] The Roots, at their Roots' Picnic, are playing with Public Enemy, doing "Nation of Millions" all the way through. {also with TV on the Radio, The Black Keys, & Santigold}
If you have $50, go; if not, see Lif with me. (He lives in Philly now.)

[C] Woody Allen is engaged in a legal spat with the founder of American Apparel. Dov Charney used Woody's image sans permission. I think Dov's billboard might have been saying that anti-Semites want to drag down any Jew who has sex? Maybe yes? Anyway, check the summary of AA's defense:
1)The Meteoric Rise of Dov Charney and His Company, American Apparel
2) The Media Vilifies Mr. Charney and Turns Against American Apparel
3) The Woody Allen/Annie Hall Epiphany
4) The Display of the Images [booty]
5) The Images as Mr. Charney's Artistic Expression, Social Commentary and Art Parody
6) Mr. Charney Consistently Champions the First Amendment's Freedom of Expression
(full analysis by real lawyers here, NJK)

[D] Roxana Saberi was released from prison. She's an American reporter who was jailed for espionage, after a 15-minute trial, in Iran. Then she was let out.
You already knew that, huh? Well, how about this: She used to be a "Miss North Dakota". She wears the charming white one-piece below, and says she would like to end both world hunger and politically motivated, judicially suspect jailings.


[E] Popped! musical goings-on is free and in my area June 20th.

You can 'rent a tent' for $125.

[F] Steven Wright, who I web-blabbed about here, is playing the Keswick Theater. I don't really go see live comedy (do you?), but I though this presented me a golden opportunity to link to myself, which is done by any mature blog worth a hill of beans.
He says things like this:
One time a cop pulled me over for running a stop sign. He said, "Didn't you
see the stop sign?" I said, "Yeah, but I don't believe everything I read."

AMX To The Max - Still Ill

The other day, I told you of a plan I had: make a mixtape inspired by some of Quentin Tarantino's movies.

Download ZIP file: 'Still Ill' mixtape

I got this idea because my Dad recently got a really rare muscle car (an AMX), which is talked about in Quentin's "DEATHPROOF". That was the impetus- just random inspiration; it's not like I am some QT fanboy, or that I am so very dearly devoted to his soundtracks. I don't even own one anymore...
There is a pretty distinctive sound to each of his films' musical accompaniment, though, so I figured this idea had the necessary specificity to generate a mix. (Mixes that are just 'songs that I like/that I thought you might like' are not worth my time to produce; I could just put my ITunes on shuffle for that, right?).
All taste requires discrimination; discrimination by definition is specific:
("I like all kinds of music" is general, and shows its speaker to lack taste entirely; or at least to be a "mollycoddle with shaky legs")
there you have it.


My directorial debut is "AMX : Still Ill." ( <--- clicky makey downloady)
Obviously, based off of the RZA-fashioned "Kill Bill" soundtracks.



TRACKLISTING:
#1 Il Ritorno Di Ringo /// Ennio Morricone
4th Chamber /// GZA
#3 Champion Sound /// Jaylib
Poison Dart /// The Bug ft. Warrior Queen
#5 Backyard Betty /// Spank Rock
Bullet /// Ellen Allien
#7 Don't Smile, It's Post-Modern /// Ghislain Poirier
Hide Ya Face (ft El-P and Ghostface Killah) /// Prefuse 73
#9 Wanderlove /// Claudine
Nagasaki Nights /// ...unknown artist...
#11 Slow Grind Italian (interlude) /// The RZA (as Bobby Digital)
Mantis (ft Masta Killa & Tekitha) /// The RZA (Bobby Digital)
#13 Bila El Mambo /// Hell's Gate Band
Heart It Races /// Architecture In Helsinki
#15 Still Got It 4 Cheap /// Clinton Sparks f/Clipse & Pharrell
Bells /// Vitalic
#17 I Lost My Shit in Tel Aviv (live) /// Apparat
1980 /// Pierre Rapsat

(" /// "?: 'oh, that? those are SWORD SLICES !')
"AMX : Still Ill"

Here's a track from the mix; listen to it while you download said mix...

Ennio Morricone is a must for this. This guy composed all those Western movie themes that you know: A Few Dollars More, GoodBadUgly, etc.

"Choose the ball, or the sword": GZA's Wu-Tang Kung-Fu thang. Starts out with a kungfu flick sample: precisely why QT picked a Wu to head the soundtrack project.

You know Wu will be all over this mix; but there's room for other rappers too:
We get J Dilla rapping on a Madlib production. Later, we get the Clipse, SpankRock, El-P -aka El Producto- (with Ghostface), and from the Caribbean, Warrior Queen.


"AMX : Still Ill"
Most of the rap beats employed here lean to the tech-y side ("Glitch-Hop"?). That was the sound of Kill Bill, so that's our sound here.
What that means is that the hip-hop turns naturally and smoothly over into the smart techno of Berliner Ellen Allien and her label-mate Apparat. This isn't daffy club beat or euro(trash)pop -- closer to the Knife, okay? -- so nuh be afeared, even if you are 'not that kind of girl'.
Vitalic & Apparat supply us with sounds that absolutely must play when The Bride is riding on her all-yellow motorcycle through Tokyo, sword slung over one shoulder; faceless in her helmet. She's on her grind: her only love is the game of revenge (she'll win).
"AMX : Still Ill"

Also, we need some of the more strictly computerized beats, not only to keep this from being purely " mixtape-hustlin' ", but to ensure that it sounds like a movie soundtrack. To work with the arc of drama, we have to use some songs which build and intensity and then destroy it. Hiphop can have tension, but it doesn't often 'climax' : it doesn't resolve that tension.



"AMX : Still Ill"
There are mellow moments in Kill Bill, especially in the second volume. So, there is a passage around the middle of the mix when we move to some tropical climes and pop open a ginger beer. Steel drums, and an international feel. Kill Bill involved some serious jetsetting, and after REVENGE gets had, calm settles over the film.
After the international/downtime slice, though, The Clipse set us back on our feet, and the blades start swinging again:



(...it's still not too late to download "AMX : Still Ill", you know...)

S.A. Smash doin' somethin' about it . . . R.I.P. Camu Tau of S.A. Smash

"ain't shit worse than a waste of talent
still,
life goes on without it
still,
real ni**as do somethin' about it-
Smash Brothers doin' somethin' about it"
That's from Illy by S.A. Smash.



HEY are you listening? I said, You Can Still Download The Songs. Download them thru the link w/ the song title- the MediaFire link. Easy Breezy.

Camu Tau was half of S.A. Smash (with Metro) and he died this May. He was a sick, sick rapper with a unique style. His gruff and fierce style was helped out (on the S.A. Smash album) by fittingly on-point production from El-P and PRZM (who also died recently).



He also did an album with Cage that's supposed to be pretty good, but the album I know best is "Smashy Trashy".



"Smashy Trashy" is a good album, all the way through. What is unusual about Smash shows up right away- "seen you acting up, from the bottom of a plastic cup": Smash get drunk, get WASTED (see [How'm I gonna] "Get Home"). Most rappers don't get wasted - they don't rhyme about it at least - but why not? because rappers have to act (act) hard, all the time. Remember, like Fat Joe told you:

"Said my ni**as don't dance,
we just pull up our pants and,
Do the Roc-away.
Now lean back, lean back, lean back, lean back..."

But Smash ain't fronting- if they wanna dance, they gon' dance. And if they wanna drink, then they are getting right ready ripped. I mean, they have a track called "A.A.", nahmean?
And it's Natty Ice, Steel Reserve, not Moet and Kris: so they're real ("You seeing where I'm layin', and you sayin' I'm making it up?"). Anyhow, they might get splitfaced and they might dance, lose their keys, chase groupies (ugly or not: a thug doesn't care, I guess).

Oh yeah, they're thugs too though- but weird thugs. Like misanthropic sadists, not just rough to avoid getting hassled, or rough to own a corner. No, they threaten you with weird shit like getting a "shovel in the face", chasing a punch to your face with a glass of stout (also to your face), and so on.
Cos enough of this same-old-same-old "thugg"ery. Rappers talking about guns you don't use: it's experiencing diminishing returns these days, right? So Smash keep the violence-- and we keep the little thrill from thinking about some UltraViolence-- but flip it into something more interesting.
More like this (from "Clout.mp3"):





"now that everybody rhymes,
it's time to battle for souls,
start a single-file line and pay me after the show...
the monster and we conquered half of the globe
with an attitude like that'll get you clapped in the dome
we be the menace, we like the sound of shatterin bones...
my intentions are infected and I'll pass it along
You askin if the passion is gone?
Motherfuck you and that watered-down rappin you on
pipe ni**as smoke crack to this one, fake ni**as practice packing a gun
the aggravated immigrant, African son,
smoke a blunt with you, punk, put a stab in your lung"
Etc.

(see how the rhyme scheme switches from the sound "oh" to "own" to "on" to "un"? Not Easy: Guys can flow, right?

And if you're rapping about new thangs, you should have some new-sounding beats under you: S.A. Smash produced 10 of the tracks, getting serious help from El-P on a few others. ("Illy" is produced by him.) The beats lurch around- makes sense, they were probably wasted when they hit the studio- jumbled and dense.
Guitar comes in and out, but this isn't rock and rap- that never works, does it. No, but here, the guitars=gutter. You know El-P's style, and the album has that feel, and that level of quality too, no matter which producer did which track. Yeah, El-Producto did "Illy", but that other dope jam "Slide on 'Em (Escapade).mp3", which has a truly awesome rhyme on it (by Vast Aire), that jam was a S.A. Smash production.


Well, Camu's gone. Here's a few tracks, by him solo.

Told you he could spit...

Illy.mp3 S.A. Smash
Clout.mp3 S.A. Smash
Slide On 'Em (Escapade) Ft. Vast Air.mp3 S.A. Smash