Sunday, March 29, 2009

Independent Radio pts. 1 & 2


direct download to pt. 1 here
direct download to pt. 2 here

Tuesday nights… in the pantheon of DeeJaying it’s the graveyard shift. Its not the weekend. its not Monday, which in some towns, is the new Friday. Beat Research up at the Enormous Room, err Monday be doing their thing. i am glad we are not up against those professionals. its not a Wednesday, the middle of the week, humpday (what a stupid fucking term by the way) the day you most need a drink. its not Sunday, the day some people go out and get they chillax on. its Tuesday. and we love it. we love The Independent. we love the staff (major love and props to Liam and Nicole). the food is good, the beer is even better. Tuesday. when you first start dj’ing you almost always have your test run night on a Tuesday. the promoter says, come in, do your thing this Tuesday, we’ll tell you wassup. you move up from Tuesday. you don’t stay at Tuesday. if you’re good you keep moving up. sort of. there’s this myth that the dj should be working for the weekend. grinding so he can do the big party on Friday or Saturday night. she should be keeping her eye on the “big time” the “hott nights” but La MoDa, we don’t like to do things like other folks. so we don’t. Tuesdays. we’ve done the big nights, so don’t come at us like we aint good enough. we’re your girlfriend/wife’s favorite dj. we’re your favorite dj’s favorite dj. its about music. and control. come check us if you’re in boston. we do what we like. we play what we want. and people still come and enjoy it, and thank us at the end of the night. we aint packing them in. we never tried. we play in other venues, we leave town to do a gig err now and then, but we always come back to our comfortable, warm, generous, appreciative, spot. if you a dj, and you’ve left the confines of your bedroom/ “studio”, if you’ve gotten yourself something regular, like a “residency”, then you know what its like to have to put up with the bullshit, the dumb requests, the fucking bartender/promoter/owner, breathing down your neck cause you aint playing “what the people like” . Wowz. really. then there is the bullshit of the whole game itself. you play the top40 night after night, you get in. you challenge the folks, you play something they cant drunkenly dance/rape to then you’re out. so it’s a Tuesday. we aint ashamed, we aint making excuses. we’ve worked hard to do it our way. come by, check us out. you’ll like it. but if you cant….. here is what happens: we show up. we have a couple of drinks. liam regalls us with tales of quirky/weird/annoying customers. Nicole says hi! damian and i exclaim how great she is. no its not code for cute. but yes. she is cute. we set up the serato. damian sets up the monitors. we drink another drink. its 9 pm. we hit play and………


Independent Radio Intro track list:

New Light of Tomorrow (Bonobo Remix) – Husky Rescue
Kudos – Benji Boko
Unemployed in Summertime – Emiliana Torrini
Love Song – K-Os
Going Up – Lowrider
Bongo Red (Mosart212 dubbahstepah edit) – The Gladiators
Nothing Owed (Mosart212 mad ants blend) – Bonobo
Its Not The Worst I’ve Looked – Lali Puna
Stepping Into Tomorrow (Madlib remix) – Sarah Hethcoat
Drift Away (Prefuse 73 mix) – Via Tanya
Bings Bong (Delhi Shuttle Live) – Solid Ground
As The Stars Fall – Cinematic Orchestra
A Gentle Dissolve (Shawn Lee Ping Pong Orchestra Mix) – Thievery Corporation
High Time – Diesler
Hurricane – Beatphreak
Who’s Gonna Save My Soul – Gnarles Barkley
Ray Gun – Bird and the Bee
Precious – Ils


After a couple of more beers.... we kick the tempo up, and we start to experiment. mantis feels a particular groove, in this case he was feeling that "conscious rap"/ "backpacker rap"/west coast/ "independent" artists type vibe. He plays some great songs at the end of this here mix...the crowd on this particular night, a week after st.-lets-get-drunk-and-call-ourselves-irish-day was small, but receptive. thats all you want right? we'll take love over numbers anyday.



Independent Radio A Few Beers Later track list:
Fast Forward – Lali Puna
195 lbs. – Nightmares On wax
Sun Moon Stars – Mos Def
Talk To Me (live) – DJ Vadim
Cleopatra In New York (Zim Zam mix) – Nickodemus ft. Carol
Because – Bird and the Bee
The Tune – Wax Tailor
My Room Is White (Flying Lotus Remix) – Mia Doi Todd
On Boulevards (Kirlian mix) - Sin
Harvey Daley Mix – Stereolab & The High Llamas
(This Is For) The Better Days – The Bees
The Magicman – Bonobo
Gravitas - Little People
Recognize – Breakestra
Golden Touch (Connie Price Mix) – Blue States
Breakadawn – De La Soul
Bumpin Contraption – Latyrix
2hot 2cold 2touch – Maullem ft. Lyrics Born
Big Beat 3 – DJ Bombjack
Count and Estimate – DJ Shadow
Wildin Out (Kut Masta Kurt remix) – Mos Def & Diverse
Nostalgia – Marco Polo ft. Masta Ace
Klap Ya Hands – Das Efx
Samba Soul – N.A.S.A. ft. Del & DJ Qbert
Belshazzar (Machine Drum Remix) – Johnny Cash

parts 3 & 4 up soon! stay tuned...

Sunday, March 22, 2009

Nu Skool Slits

(pic:  Keith Eric)

Greetings everyone, it feels like forever since I last updated this blog.  Mo's been busy, pimping the site out with bells and whistles to make your La MoDa experience a pleasant and cutting edge affair, and I should take this opportunity to thank him for his efforts.

March sucks ass for me.  When Mo and I are not fighting musical crimes from deep within our secret mountain laboratory, I am a mild mannered immigration paralegal by day.  March is like tax season for immigration.  On March 31, about 130,000 applications will be sent to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service for approximately 70,000 available H-1B visas.  I won't get into how completely broken and backwards our immigration system is in this country, and I only even bring it up to excuse my blog absence in the month of March.  However, being tied to my desk for a month straight cranking out forms and support letters for people I've never met before does afford me one luxury I don't normally enjoy at work:  an opportunity to listen to music during the day in my office.  

I recently copped the new N.A.S.A. album, which is chock full of guest spots by such hipster luminaries as Santogold, Amanda Blank, M.I.A., Lykke Li, and David Byrne, as well as eminent MCs like Kanye, KRS ONE, RZA, Method Man, Chali 2na, and Del.  I highly recommend it, and will be incorporating into the La MoDa repertoire in the coming weeks. 

I've also been revisiting a lot of my mix sets from days gone by, and I thought I'd share one particular mix that has been making my ears hum over the last week or so.  It's called "Nu Skool Slits" (the name of a particular "brand" of E that was all over raveland during my P.L.U.R. heyday, if you must know).  This mix was slapped together mid-2002, but even then was programmed as a shout out to the late 90s.  There are a bunch of classic Freskanova tracks included, some classic Cassius and Basement Jaxx and Groove Armada, and Daft Punk from when they were popular the FIRST time (yes, I'm old).  The second half of this mix moves further into big room rave territory, culminating in a brutal funky breaks/warehouse stormer called "Back to 99" by the Freestylers (also off of Freskanova), followed by what can only be described as a wide-eyed backrub of a finale with Uberzone's "Dreamtime" and his remix of Sarah McLaughlin's "Sweet Surrender" (which, rumor has it, she commissioned after being less than impressed with the Rabbit in the Moon remix of "Possession").  Seriously, try to finish this mix without busting out the glow sticks....


1.  Uberzone - Beat Bionic
2.  Basement Jaxx - Crazy Girl
3.  Deejay Punkrok - My Beatbox (Les Rhythmes Digitales as de Pique Mix)
4.  Les Rhythmes Digitales - Jacques your Body
5.  Daft Punk - Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
6.  Agent Sumo - 24 Hours
7.  Moby - Bodyrock (Boris Duglosch Discotech Remix)
8.  Cassius - U Can't Stop It
9.  Tiefschwarz - On Up
10. Groove Armada - Superstylin'
11. Basement Jaxx - Get Me Off
12. Felix da Housecat - Sequel2Sub
13. Chemical Brothers - Star Guitar
14. Timo Maas - Shifter
15. Plump DJs - Electro Disco
16. Freska Allstars - Get Fresh
17. Metro LA - Boogie Star
18. Bowser - Codename Hardhat
19. Freestylers - Back 2 99
20. Uberzone - Dreamtime
21. Sarah McLaughlin - Sweet Surrender (Uberzone Remix)

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Direct Links to Podcasts YAY!



Ok the moment you have been waiting for is finally here: La MoDa Mixtapes is officially a podcast. From now on you'll be able to come here and get yo read on, and you will also recieve an "episode" update" from itunes. Your iphonies and itouchios will be very happy. when we post a new mix it will go directly to your device. yeah, even yurr crackburry. we've been conflicted for a while about doing this, mainly because we love writing about these mixes, but now that you can get yurr La MoDa mixsets sent to your umbilical organizational device, will you still come here to read our funnies? we dont know, but we will promise this, we will still be here. we will still post the humorous, scandalous, and yes scintillating witty bon mots you've grown to love. whether you come here or not. so without further ado is the first working episode of the La MoDa Mixtapes blog!


click this link to be taken directly to the feedburner podcast page. on the page, on your right hand side is an option to "subscribe with itunes", do it. you will get this mix first and then the option to get all the other ones sent to you as well. dont forget to set the preferences to UPDATE DAILY, in your itunes podcast window. if you are having trouble with any of this, please email us at lamodamixtapes@gmail.com

we hope yalls have been enjoying the work we have put into this endevor and we'll be posting goodies again soon.
peace,
La MoDa Mix Tapes mgmt.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Except For Just A Dream


Continuing on my experimental path, this mix takes the form of a dream. In this dream things are not making sense and its in this confusion that we see the narrative. Like in a dream, songs pop in and out of focus. There are multiple edits on this one, multiple sounds layered on top of each other, echoes thrashing about, songs getting sucked up into other songs, and some songs spitting up the next track. I dug deep and pulled the dust off of some of my favorites. i cant believe that “My Guru” song is by Jack Johnson. i have no idea what that even means since it doesn’t sound at all like him and his “work”, which is great but all sounds the same. This is not a song about some wayward girl, who model/surfer/singer/heart surgeon Jack Johnson feels bad for from afar, but instead of intervening decides to write a “song” about; nope, this is a kick ass beat with some serious sitar action. maybe a holdover from his backpacking/entitled exploitation days in India? I know nothing about Chimp Beams, only that they rock the shit out of all their instrumentals. every time I try to order their shit from turntable lab (i love you guys, i wish La MoDa could do an in-store sesh…?!)(seriously what would it take?) its Always sold out. So for now, i have only what i have. and what i have is so very good. Tried to play a little nerdy-sonic-guess-the-connection-test with the Yoshimi track, by introducing the song that plays before it on the album, the song that sets up the story of why robots wanna kick our ass and kill us. That Video Car track by Sporto Kantes is pure fiyah; so much fun and so fucking European. I don’t know where that sample with the little kid and the “Jamaican” guy talking is from, but man, it seals the deal. So It Is Baby! another example of Europeans taking the lead in/on the “interesting” music plane. french = good cheese, AIR, Sporto Kantes, and men wearing things bought at a woman’s department store, unironically and awesomely! yeah, me and my purse should be rocking sets in ghey paree, not here where 2/3rd of the population still wonders why La MoDa isn’t playing your Rhianna request, even tho its yurr birfday and you asked “nicely.” The answer is fuck you. stop sleepwalking baby, its time to go “dancing”….






Except for just a dream track list

Its Gotta Be The Shoes Intro – Mosart212
Paper Float – Cassettes Won’t Listen
Paper Float (Maker chill remix) – Cassettes Won’t Listen
Les Fleur – Zero 7 & 4Hero
Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots Pt. 1 (Mosart212 prelude edit) – The Flaming Lips
Lost in Paradise – Campbell & Joe
Gold Watch – Lupe Fiasco
Mute Salvation – Chimp Beams
Fake French – Le Tigre
New York City – Gil Scott Heron
Listening Man – The Bees
Four Hills – DJ Day
Why Should I Cry (Mosart212 Crybaby edit) – Avia
Big Lost (Mosart212 Big Stuffs edit) – Diplo
Montara (Mosart212 Zapped Momma edit) – The Roots
My Guru – Jack Johnson
Video Car – Sporto Kantes
I Hear The Drummer (Mosart212 Intro edit) – Luke Vibe
I Changed My Mind (Stereo Mc’s Rattlesnake Mix) – Lyrics Born
CafĂ© De Flore – Dr. Rockit
Let’s Get Known – The Unicorns
One Bruised Step Outro – Mosart212

track list said and done...

Thursday, March 12, 2009

...take a minute/think about it/ding!



Hey yalls, we dont normally do this at La MoDa but I had to take a second out to give a huge shout out to my man Sam Morris, the multi-talented musician and activist. Sam is donating 10% of the proceeds of his latest CD to the Wounded Warrior Project, a cause we happen to think is pretty damn cool around here, not uncool, like the Iraq/Afghanistan/We Hate Arabs War. Check out Sam's site, his music, and most of all stay politically active yall.


peace,
La MoDa team

Aw mang, i cant keep anything down...

What does being sick sound like? It sounds like this:


When I am sick I still like music, it’s just that my tastes are far more refined (read: narrow and anal) (wait – is narrow the same as anal?) i want chill. not downtempo. I want relaxed. no loud noises, no shredding guitars, and never no glitchy stuff. and i am sick. i am out-both-ends-sick right now. so i decided to make myself a mix. and share it with you. because i love you. because i am sick. no mixing, no beat matching, no nothing, but soothing tones, and pleasant voices. and yeah a littel muzac got snuck up in there. so the typos stay, but the beats are checked twiced over...

Sickasadog Track List
Do not Despair – El Perro Del Mar
el perro del mar is one girl. Sarah Assbring. she is awesome. her voice is pretty. yeah, pretty, cause it sounds light, delicate, and airy. her musical arrangements compliment her pretty voice. they are majestic, orchestral, kinda electronic, but kinda folky.

Alone in Kyoto (mosart sir wally edit) – Air
where do i begin? i have been to Kyoto. it fucking rules. i think backronyms are absolutely the most incredible thing ever, but not cooler than retronyms. but the coolest would be if my name were “D.J. McSpin Records” . AIR wrote and played all the music on the super brilliant 5:55. Serge Gainsbourg was incredible. only the French could make cheesy synonymous with classy. its like cheese; if you walked into a room and you smelled a French cheese but you didn’t know it, you would be like, “damn, what the fuck yo. it smells god-awful in here…” and if you were sick like me right now, you would vomit. wait – if you were sick like me right now you would just vomit cause you were moving around. ok, right. but if you walked into a room and it smelled like high hell, but you spotted some cheese, all of a sudden that very same smell is a good thing. not a bad thing. oh and for good measure i threw in a poem by sir wallace stevens, who was imprisoned with john mccain in the Spanish American war. bring our troops home now. seriously.

Stay Golden – Au Revoir Simone
Dear Savage Love, I am a thirty one year old man who loves Au Revoir Simone. I am happily married but my boyfriend doesn’t actually know this. Who should i break the news to first?
signed:
Marauding Outré Iconoclast Self Evolving Sycophant

It's funny that your question, MOISES—with its hint of gay panic—should arrive today. I've been on vacation with the family all week snowboarding in beautiful British Columbia, and what I enjoy most—besides the snowboarding and the half-naked, fully stoned Australian snowboard instructors lolling around in hot tubs at the end of the day—is watching the straight boys who refuse to sit four to a chairlift. They want to ride up alone or ride up two at a time on a four-seater with two empty seats between 'em. They seem to think gayness can be contracted through thigh-to-thigh contact.

Grasshopper interlude

Rainy Day – Shuggie Otis
Shuggie wrote the original “strawberry letter 23”

The Supine – Andrew Bird
One of my students said she ran into Andrew bird before his concert, in Harvard Square. she said he was mega weird. i believe it. he’s just too damn talented.

Triptych Part Two (mosart’s telling you blend) – Blockhead
I own everything Anthony Simon has put out. i mention that as a wake up call to all you black beat makers out there. what the fuck? get on your “grizzly” or whatever the hell you call it nowadays and make something worth listening to without some moron “rapping over it”. seriously. what’s the deal with ALL the incredible downtempo, beatstrumental albums being written and produced by creative, rich, white guys. don’t even try to tell me these fuckers aint rich. come on. same thing with the damn videos. its like the only videos worth watching are the ones featuring young, European, white guys. i’m saying. whats up black people in the music biz? take a goddamn risk. do something out of the ordinary. i’m bored to death here. thank god for rich white dudes and their legions of backpacking rich upper east side douche bag fans, otherwise i would be stuck listening to records recorded before 1996.

Break It Off – Family
this was on one of those real corny downtempo compilations that i so dearly love. i have no idea who Family is, and i cant find out anything reliable on the interwebs…but…i did find out about Family, a band from the 70’s. mucho nice. do like i did and pirate some of their stuff. i think they're all dead now, so its ok.

The Delivery (mosart’s staff infection blend) – Seekonk
When my friend Dave Noyes, of the band Seekonk, and also Rustic Overtones, let me get a hold of his band’s debut record, For Barbara Lee, i fell i love. Seekonk is it. ain't nan doing it like they doing it. Dave also put me on to Os Mutantes, one smoky night in his warehouse/studio/awesome apartment. if they come by your town, or you’re in Portland Maine, go check them. don’t tell them i sent you, this aint no damn movie, and i don’t want you ruining my reputation.

Dan In Real Life – Sondre Lerche
sondre lerche is handsome. i have now seen 50 movies in which dane cook is some hot white lady’s obnoxious, overbearing, retarded, man-child, boyfriend/lover/husband, and then someone comes and steals the hot white lady from him.

My Room Is White (Reminder Remix) – Mia Doi Todd
i really wish i could remember (damn you marijuana!) how i first came across ms. todd’s music. my life has not been the same since then. i have recognized her voice on works by some of most favoritist peeps, like prefuse 73, and nobody. her 2007 album gea is a gem. manzanita is great and the manzanita remix album : la ninja, are both pretty rad. she’s got a thick soulful voice. she sounds as if she should be singing in a language more exciting than English.

Tone Poem (mosart’s jlrmx edit) – Third Face/Jens Lekman
my old roommate hooked me up with the first two JL albums. I love JL’s music. his voice isn’t the best, but man, his lyrics are straight fiyah. this song is difficult to listen to the first few times you actually pay attention, but your repetition rewards you by dulling your empathy and sympathy, thus allowing you to enjoy the blend i put together here, without thinking too much about why your life sucked in high school.

Mali Dje – Ali Farka Toure
wows. AFT is wonderful. his music is soothing tonic. it makes me forget about my next offering to the porcelain god.

Puh Ji Na Mujese – unknown artist
i try very hard to avoid posting a mix on the internets with a song on it that i know nothing about. i have no idea what language this is even in. this reminds me of the time i was in Amsterdam and i ended up hanging out with a bellhop from the hotel i was staying at. we got together after his shift at 9 and thus began a night of debauchery that included in no particular order: running from the police, eating the best shawarma i have ever had, walking into a room full of cocaine and a big shirtless black guy in an apron giving another shirtless black guy a straight-razor shave, a dennis hopper movie i have never seen since, dj’ing at a private club, and plans to kill a state witness before he testified against one of the guys i was with. throughout this whole night, i did not understand a word people were saying to me, dutch sounds like someone speaking French after a stroke, but i did get everything that people were saying. you don’t need to know the words to know the point.

Beyond Words – Wax Tailor
the French are taking over the world. i like food, hot women, and berets, plus i aint a white American, so i’ll be fine…

Robots In Disguise – Four Tet
Kieran hebden is one busy piece of work. dude remixes for errbody. i don’t like all the stuff he does, cause frankly a bunch of it sounds like noise to me. but when he rubs me the right way, and sticks to traditional, western, 4/4, classic beat rocking blocks, type shit, i’m all there. all of his other stuff makes me feel like i fell and hurt something but i cant tell what, but when i try to get up it hurts like hell, and so i just lay there.

Warheads interlude

The Palm Sunday Tornado Hits Crystal Lake
– Sufjan Stevens
total man crush. total emo, fey, wimpy boy-child, savant thing going on. genius. i have never come across anything by mr. stevens that i didn’t like. that’s not to say that i am always in the mood to hear his shit. sometimes it soothes the beast, but at other times it can be very Sylvia Plath-ey.

Bamboo Flute Blues (kid koala remix) – Yusef Lateef
yusef teaches at my alma mater, Hampshire College, and all the “cool” kids there were up on his music. so you knows that means i too know me some yusef. the guy is versatile, and he has been around forevers. i never really got to know him, cause he gave all his attention to the music kids. which is how it should be. its like having Scotty Pippen be your high school varsity coach. my wife saw kid koala live at the SPACE where she used to work. she said it was one of the best shows she’d ever seen. she said if she were to become a “dj” she’d only want to do what he does. so does errbody else.

Warheads interlude II

Sunny Road – Emiliana Torrini
if you know emiliana it might be because her songs were featured in: lord of the rings, grey’s anatomy, one tree hill, and buffy the vampire slayer. if you know emiliana because of this, and not because someone said “hey there is another crazy chic from Iceland who can also sing the shit out an emotional yet playful song” then you need to get out more.

Casimir Pulaski (live) – Sufjan Stevens
for the record its: SOOF-yahn. but i am sure he wouldn’t kick your ass if you said it any other way, but he might write a song about it that would then inspire you to kill yourself, and so he wins in the end. Austin City Limits is an incredible show. if anyone reading this plans to bomb, burn down, destroy, take over, annihilate, and/or decimate texas, by all means have a ball, but please leave Austin intact, in case su-fee-yan and/or the pixies decide they want to do another show there.

Piano Solo – Nick Drake
i feel sick. i still do. this is a countdown till my next trip to the alter of the brown and yellow deities. but i got this out there. and that’s one small step for mankind, and one giant step for La MoDa mixtapes.


set list said and done. wash your hands after you are done enjoying this.
direct link to mix/feed

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Super Dynamite Soul


(pic: ???)

For all of us who remember a time when there wasn't an internet, or a Google, or cellphones with Twitters and Skypes and MTV videogames, sometimes you just have to take a step back and appreciate what we have available at our dusty fingertips.  As lovers of music - real, good music - it's been especially impressive.  In a few keystrokes you can go from Blk Jks in today's South Africa (fire, by the way, total fire) to Golden Era hip hop videos ripped from the Box and posted on YouTube to classic performances by some of music's greatest jazz, funk, and soul artist, performances from days before I was born, in far flung cities and far away times.  That's what I'm feeling this morning.  My boy Lo sent me a buttery link for the weekend, and I knew it had to be shared with the La MoDa fam.  

My moms was sort of a hippy, so I grew up on a steady diet of public television (on our 13" black and white):  Sesame Street, The Electric Company, Nova, the American Experience, old BBC reruns of Dr. Who, Voyage of the Mimi, public television laced me with the knowledge as a kid.  It almost makes me want to make a donation and rock a PBS tote bag just thinking about how much dope shit I caught on commercial-free public television as a yout'.  

I was obviously too young to see "Soul" when it was first broadcast, but thanks to the wonders of the amazing time machine that is the internet, that wrong can be righted!  WNET Thirteen in New York, who originally broadcast this show, described it thusly:   

This entertainment-variety-talk show was not only a vehicle to promote African-American artistry, community and culture, but also a platform for political expression and the fight for social justice. It showcased classic live musical performances from funk, soul, jazz, and world musicians, and had in-depth, extraordinary interviews with political, sports, literary figures and more. It was the first program on WNET to be recorded with the then-new technology of videotape, and most of the shows were recorded in real-time—not live, but unedited.

Just look at some of the guests:  Earth, Wind and Fire, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Tito Puente, Ron Carter, Willie Colon, Max Roach, are you f*cking kidding me?!?  I think my impressionable young mind might have EXPLODED if I'd been exposed to this much top shelf musical power as a child!  I have spent all morning going through the different episodes of this show, and each one is another gold mine of music and culture (Tito Puente's afro alone is worth the price of admission).  If you love good music, I implore you to spend some time with these episodes. 

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Uptown Hustle w/ La MoDa @ the Enormous Room


Just a reminder to everyone in the Boston area that La MoDa will be at the Enormous Room tonight for our monthly Uptown Hustle night. It's located in beautiful Central Square in Cambridge, there's no cover, and the sofas were voted most comfortable in all of Boston by me and Mo (in a stunning unanimous decision). Thanks in advance to everyone who's already planning on coming through...

Lightsonic Frequencies

(pic: sinix)

Hey everyone, sorry for the lengthy blog absence. La MoDa has been hard at work drinking beer and mixing records, though we're still not very good at hitting the "record" button while we're doing all this hard work. So if you've caught us out at the Independent on Tuesdays recently, you've witnessed us distilling millions of gallons of light sweet crude funk into a refined, high-octane jet fuel of jams. For those of you coming out to hear it live, thank you. For the rest of you, you don't know what you're missing!...


Anyway, as you may have deduced by the ravetastic title of this post, and the similarly named mix set posted below, this new mix is another of my "smoke machines and clove cigarettes" journeys down memory lane into PLUR'd out rave territory (peace to Recon, Muthajunksta, T-boo Ted Marshall, the Cryptek Wizard, and the rest of the breakbeat massive!). This mix starts with some razor-sharp electro (I could listen to Groove Armada's "Lightsonic" all goddamn day it's so good), moves into some pretty bass-heavy fidget/b'more territory (DJ Fashen's "Shook" is the musical equivalent of a gun in your face), and then settles into some up front, hands-in-the-air breakbeats.

I threw the Bassbin Twins remix of "Hip Hop Phenomenon" in there as a tribute to the late 90s/early 00s, because you couldn't buy a compilation or see a breaks/electro dj play without hearing this anthem. And the Bassbin Twins are my idol (-call me-)...The Secta Chameleon and Sonic Bee songs are fire, the perfect combo of ragga and bass-fueled breaks (with a little flanged-out female vocal action to get the hands up). And the last two tracks are probably my two favorite tracks of the last few months or so. I cannot get enough of the stirring piano breakdown at the end of "Sierra Leone" when the half-speed stutter beat thunders back in (wait for it....).


Tell your friends...


(if the flash player doesn't load properly, just click the direct link to the Soundcloud page, it's working just fine over there...)

mantisounds - lightsonic frequencies

1. a-trak - say whoa (boys noize remix)
2. groove armada - lightsonic
3. herve & kissy sellout - rikkalicious
4. the rogue element - vices
5. kid sister - family reunion (dem slackers shit loads below zero mix)
6. dj fashen - shook
7. tsunami One & BT - hip hop phenomenon (bassbin twins edit)
8. daft punk vs flapsandwich - work it
9. beat assassins - sizzla
10. freestylers ft. pendulum and sirreal - painkiller (ed solo & skool of thought remix)
11. sonic bee ft. chunk n attack - nu skool skank (farace remix)
12. secta chameleon ft. mc manic - push along
13. mr. no hands - button down (groove diggerz remix)
14. goose - bring it on (stanton warriors remix)
15. shimon & nixon - brainstorm
16. slyde - you're my fix (slyde remix)
17. agent k & bella - sierra leone (the phat riderz remix)


(pic: skulldozer)