the videodrome mk. XXVI

I tried desperately to resist posting this. I feel like a toddler with chocolate sauce up to my eyebrows.

Here we have a family, presumably from Calcutta, practicing an 'Acid Midget set' to the tight, tight sounds of Human Action Network. A fantastic promo vid depicting Chicago Acid House at its best.

moments of a cliché

Moments of a Crisis
Various Artists
Digital release: July 21

Physical release: September 8

The art of making compilation albums is quickly becoming as important as creating original music. Take a look at 2009’s effulgent ensembles Kitsune Maison Compilation 7 and The Bomb from DJ Ross. Even Remix After All, which isn’t a compilation, used the power of combining sex-based producers into a small musical space. Strength in numbers, ja?

Now Moments of a Crisis has beamed down upon us from the cosmos. Well, from Cosmo Vitelli actually. Moments celebrates the best work from his Parisian label I’m A Cliché and is looking to be one of the biggest of electro-house projects to surface this year.

For the laggard bastards out there I’m a Cliché has previously released 12-inches by Simian Mobile Disco, Yuksek, Bot’Ox, Quiet Village and Tacteel & Tekel.

The compilation comprises two discs. The first is titled ‘Overtime’ and features the label’s “classic releases”, according to the label’s publicist. The second disc is simply called ‘Holiday’. Why these names are so conceptually terrific is when you combine them, in either order, you have something called “Hedonistic Insanity”, or simply “Rip My Shirt Off This Feels So Fucking Incredible”. It's hard to argue with the ingenuity and creative forces at work here.

Overall the album is dark and brooding, like Batman gazing over a sad Gotham crying for its saviour to sever the darkness. The funked-up, rollicking ‘Converted’ (Cosmo Vitelli), ‘The Mighty Atom’ (SMD), ‘Putting in the Overtime’ (Runaway) and ‘Everywhere in Town’ (Yuksek) all glide like the Batplane through disc one, with a black & white motif in common. The rest of the disc is just excellent.

Disc two is more colourful. ‘Up and Down’ (Electronicat), ‘Car Jacked’ (Bot’Ox) and ‘It’s a Fine Line’ (Grease) are like shitting rainbows. They’re perfect numbers for escaping to a midday beach with a few friends. You could play them on your iPod dock while twirling around in brim hats and on surfboards, full of broad smiles and tan lines. The Canyons’ 'Blue Snakes' though, that’s just wow in an “i met god while I was tripping,” kind of way. It just didn’t occur to me until I heard it on this album, next to so many complimentary sounds.

A solid album worth an easy 4 stars.

Get your filthy little hands on a copy of Moments of a Crisis here.

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what did everyone think of van she's 'ze vemixes'? i have to say that i wasnt overly impressed.
sure, the changes remix was banging, but it really seems like the boys are in the midst of a remixing (vemixing?) identity crisis: to go on making their once genre-changing indie bangers which are perhaps a little stale and over-copied, or to follow most other aussie indie producers of note down the nu-disco road and sacrifice the crazy reputation that they earned for themselves.. hmmmmm... quite a dilly.

with all that aside, here is their new mix of 'synthetiseur' by frenchies housse de racket.. a definite banger to help you reminisce on the good old vst days..

Housse De Racket - Synthetiseur (Van She Tech Remix)

im going to the snow this weekend

do you remember that song 'toxic' by britney? are you willing to admit that it was a guilty pleasure? yes? i should certainly hope so.
have you heard of the band miike snow? do you like them? how would you feel if i told you that two of the members were actually the brains behind 'toxic'? i for one feel pretty good about that. in fact, i would say that it is these exact same pop street-smarts that make their self-titled album so damned irresistible.

Miike Snow - Cult Logic

at the same time, i think it is this same overriding pop sensibility that makes me worry that this album will be a fast burner: here for a good time, not a long time.
i hope not, cos there are seriously there so many high points on this record. after listening to their two previous blog hits 'burial' and 'animal', you might be forgiven for thinking that they are a fun, adolescent indie-pop band (which they kind of are), but the rest of the album reveals an intelligent, melancholy and musically gifted side to them that is really quite compelling.. oh and the production is as epic as you would expect from producers on britney spears' level (haha)

Miike Snow - Sans Soleil

i know that there a lot of these sort of bands out at the moment, most of whom are making good music and are due to be 'the next big thing', but watch the skies for miike snow - i have a feeling they just may make it.
grab (part of?) the album here

crying woolf

woolfy are one of those bands that i cant believe ive never heard about. they have had tracks championed by tim sweeney and james murphy, been remixed by the likes of in flagranti and have just had their latest release put out jointly by dfa and rong..
this last release officially came out last week and is called 'if you know whats good for ya!!'. i for one am over the moon that i somehow managed to find it.

tripping between upbeat and charming adolescent-like dance-punk and ethereal space-funk, 'if you know whats good for ya!!' is defs one of the classiest releases i have heard in recent memory.

Woolfy - Loa The Disco

Woolfy - Two Far Gone (Carlos Hernandez Remix)

if you like what you hear (i hope you do) wobble along to beatport and grab yourself the album.. and while youre there, treat yourself to some of the older woolfy vs projections work.. very nice.