Cale Parks — multi-instrumentalist for the band Aloha — released a solo album — Illuminated Manuscripts — about a year ago. It’s shimmery and delicate and quivery and pretty much electronic, save for the snappy live percussion. These characteristics contrast so nicely with the rasp and grit of the acoustic folk rock that’s lately been pouring through my earbuds that I don’t care how old it is; I’m just happy to be in the haze.
Mojib
Staffan Ulmert (aka Mojib) shares a taste in music with many of us here at 3hive. He lists Explosions in the Sky, UNKLE, Sixtoo, and The Avalanches as inspirations. Instead of blah, blah, blahgging about about these artists however, Ulmert settles down in front of his computer in Gothenburg, Sweden, and composes his own music and remixes some of his favorite artists (check out his remix of Ian Brown and his UNKLE / Notwist mashup). No new formula here: solid hip-hop beats, pop melodies, strings, pianos, and samples galore (what’s that main riff in “Break of Dawn”??? It’s driving me nuts. Sigur Rós? Radiohead?) Mojib provides plenty of teaser tracks on his website, but the litmus test, his first proper full-length (Whimsical Lifestyle) drops next month on Canada’s Non-Existent Recordings.
Calvin Harris
Three song titles from I Created Disco, the debut long-player from Scotland’s Calvin Harris, succinctly sum up the sound of the album: Electro Man-Making Merry At My Place-Disco Heat. Drop this track during any ol’ get-together at your pad and you’ll have the place bumping, friends, enemies!, making merry to the thumpin’ bass-line. Don’t take the tongue-in-cheek title literally. What Calvin Harris has created is disco in his own image: bedroom producer of the YouTube generation, behind his Amiga computer, making beats & riffs like it was 1984, the year of his birth.
St. Vincent
Annie Clark, aka St. Vincent, used to play guitar with the Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens, which might account for her pleasingly random-seeming musical influences. Contrary to standard operating procedure, I don’t have a whole lot else to say other than I really like this woman, she has pluck and style and and I think you should listen to her. Plus, you’ve gotta love a woman who names her album “Marry Me.” Brassy!
General Elektriks
This gem’s been on the back burner for two years! Ouch. I started a post on General Elektriks back in August of 2005, the year his debut album came out. I remember the label pulled the MP3s, and since we like to play nicely with others, I pulled the review (crying, all the while, on the inside, gettin’ all emo). Since then, Quannum has partnered with a solid digital distributor, ioda promonet, and the goods are back! This is such a great album. French-Brit, and current resident of Berkeley, CA, RV Salters, is General Elektriks, a man with an impressive quiver of vintage keyboards and the playing skills to go along with it. Smooth ‘n’ easy grooves made for lazy summer afternoons. Quantic said it best, “Like the Beatles in a pub brawl with the Neptunes.” And as a bonus, plenty of the Quannum crew make guest appearances on the album. Two-years-old, but packaged with stay-fresh beats. Satisfaction guaranteed.
Looks like General Elektriks will strike again early next year. He’s been busy with his other project Honeycut.
Justice
Justice is a French DJ duo known for, among other things, a rumbling synthetic bassline that hits you like an electric shock. They released the addictive if woefully abbreviated Waters of Nazareth EP just over a year ago, and I’ve been dancing to it, especially the piece de resistance title track, ever since. Now, mind you, I was born without a stitch of rhythm or grace, so when I say I’ve been dancing to it, what I really mean is that I’ve been bobbing my head to it. But trust me, it’s been a wicked head-bob. “Waters of Nazareth,” unfortunately, has never been available in its original form as a free download (understandable for club DJs who live track to track) so you’ll have to go to MySpace and listen to it through your browser. Likewise “D.A.N.C.E.,” Justice’s latest cool-kid craze (with an awfully cool video to boot). And there’s plenty more where that came from: It may have taken over a year for the boys to get together an LP’s worth of originals, but they’ve been rather busy mashing, remixing, and getting remixed. Here’s just a sampling—go to Vice’s great MP3 “Blog Up Your Jaxxy” for loads more hard-to-find Justice tracks and remixes.
George Sarah
It’s been almost four years since I had George Sarah and his string trio on my KUCI show. And just about as long since he’s released a proper album. He’s back again tonight on the program, this time as a guest DJ and I look forward to catching up with him. I do know he’s been hard at work scoring music for, and placing his music in, television and film. One listen and you’ll hear why his work is sought after. Sarah’s downtempo beats and synth work flow in and around gorgeous strings of all shapes and sizes. He calls it Electronic Chamber music. I call it a super-smooth-chill-explosion. Cool down your hot summer head with some George Sarah swimming between your ears.
Laurie Anderson
It’s rare for a label to offer up a free track from their catalog, from one of their bread and butter albums, the albums that pay their bills year after year (not that Laurie Anderson is bringing in barrels of cash for WMG…). Even more rare is finding Laurie Anderson, the iconoclastic musician-artist-instrument maker (the tape-bow violin), revisiting her older projects. “Let X=X” can be found on her 1982 album Big Science, an early mainstream electronic album. The lyrics are wonderfully disjointed, seemingly found sentences, notes and conversations woven together with swelling synths, handclaps and doubled vocoder vocals. I believe this re-issue will be the first of several from Anderson’s catalog. Take advantage! If your music collection is void of Laurie Anderson start filling that void today and expand your education in American electronic artists.
South Central
Leave it to a couple Brits, thousands of miles away from the hood, to snag South Central as the moniker for their punked-up, electronic efforts. Don’t, however, expect them to address gang politics or aesthetics in their dance floor offerings. On their forthcoming single, due August 13th on Regal’s Single Club, the b-side track, “Revolution,” and its refrain “Can’t stop the wheel,” pays homage to both Spacemen 3 and to the novel of Russian philosopher/mystic P.D. Ouspensky, The Strange Life of Ivan Osokin, who explores the idea of eternal recurrance. Deep, trippy stuff to be sure. Catch their DJ sets or live appearances (with a five piece band) this summer in London and its surroundings. If they ever slow down their remix work, hopefully South Central will concentrate on banging out their very own, proper album. An archaic wish I know…
Various – From L.A. With Love
Andrew Lojero brings musical and visual artists together as a collection and an introduction to the prolific art movement currently unfolding in Los Angeles. Usual suspects like Madlib, Daedelus and Nobody all provide tracks under various monikers. But newcomers such as Georgia Anne Muldrow and Gaby Hernandez also make significant contributions. Lojero passed the tracks along to visual artists with the mandate to produce works of art inspired by the songs. Several of these works are provided below. No stranger to this vibrant art scene, Andrew Lojero curated this collection as he has been curating live gatherings, er, parties, legal and otherwise, all over the L.A. area: in lofts, under bridges and in warehouses. From L.A. With Love places the power to party likewise in the palm of your hand.
