Remix Me. I'm Going In...#8: Radiohead

(photo by o.brien)

Some of these posts I could probably write with my eyes closed. For example, I knew nothing whatsoever about Pole, and very little about Battles, but Radiohead were - like so many others - my first love. Sure, I'd heard music before, I'd even enjoyed it, but it wasn't til I found myself wrapped up in an evangelical fervour at the release of OK Computer that I knew I'd found my one and only.

We've been through some tough times, Radiohead and I. We don't seem to see eye to eye, and our paths and destinations sometimes cross at the wrong times. There was that initial flurry, that outburst of emotions in 1997 that led to such rapturous outpourings back then. I was 15 in those days, you see, and impressionable, but I think rightly so: there's not really been an album before or since that has fitted so perfectly with my frame of mind. I was a teenager, for crying out loud, with all the angst and naiveté that brings with it, but to find something so... intellectual, so stimulating that also cut me to my very heart, that was satisfying.

Course, by the time Kid A came round, I was 18, and listening to Wildhearts, to NoFX, to Rancid, to Therapy? I bought it on the day of release anyway, I managed to convince a little MVC man to root around in a box and find it. I was perplexed by it. My knowledge of electronica is still fairly limited, if ever growing, but then it was by and large non-existent. A gaping void. But even so, it didn't click like it should have, for a Radiohead record. It should have held my heart delicately in suspension and tickled my brain, but instead it focused on appealing to the psyche and my heart was completely untouched. There's some fine moments, for sure, and every so often I come back to it, but it's never an album which was I was encouraged to spend days and weeks. Amnesiac barely registered because of this, leaving aside Radiohead's typically lengthy gestation for a quick turnaround.

Then Radiohead headed back to rock at about the time I was looking for more out of my music - Hail To The Thief was a retrogressive step for Radiohead, and while (as I've probably mentioned before) there were dizzying highs, there were also some pretty low lows. This was the year, for example, in which Four Tet's mindblowingly awesome Rounds was released, and Mogwai's monumental Happy Songs For Happy People. Music for people who weren't looking for the return of Radiohead's accessible side with such enthusiasm, but had been entranced by the post-rock of Godspeed, or Sigur Ros, or Fridge. So Radiohead and I missed colliding again, they were heading backwards while I was heading forwards, if you like.

Maybe soon will be the day when Radiohead again become the most potent force in my musical life, where one or two great singles aren't the only reason to embrace an album. There was an advert for OK Computer at the time: Remember when albums where albums? Remember Radiohead? Remember?

For now though, I have nostalgia, and I have some great music from different stages of the band's trajectory. I have Radiohead still, they're just in a different part of me.

The Music
Radiohead - You Never Wash Up After Yourself
Radiohead - Lucky
Radiohead - Skttrbrn (Four Tet remix)

The 'fo
Artist: Radiohead
Website: radiohead.com
Recommended: OK Computer
Label: Parlophone
Buy: Amazon
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Sigur Ros - Aegetis Byrjun
Tags: Radiohead; alternative; Four Tet; remix; electronica

Remix Me. I'm Going In...#7: Pole

Pole is brand new on me, a German DJ and producer who's carved out quite a niche for himself specialising in the brutally minimal. This is no bad thing obviously; for example, who doesn't love a little Murcof every once in a while. From my first impressions, Pole covers similar sort of territory- there's that familiar reverb distance - but where Fernando Corona's beats are sparse and exude space and agaraphobia, Stefan Betke's sound is claustrophobic and tight, nervy and uncomfortable. It seems to have evolved from a slightly different base as well: Pole incorporates the zoned-out basslines of dub to a far higher extent, giving an undeniable groove to what could be cold, detached electronics.

Pole's bio describes him as having a passion for distilling sounds: his DJ style used to be to use two turntables, two CD-players and his laptop to have four or five different pieces fighting for attention, which could be anything from avant-jazz to dub to contemporary club tracks to Steve Reich, which would then be mixed and resampled midset. I'd love to have heard that, I can't imagine a much more exciting way to listen to a DJ, but it appears that these days his yen is more to experimental hip hop and electronica. And who can blame him?

I wanted to quote his bio again, actually, I think this is fantastic. Pole works in a dub field, and what is this? "Computer-arranged sound design which, in the tweak of the tiniest loop, celebrates reduction right down to the essentials." That's cool. Celebrating reduction is something a lot more artists could do with. There's certainly dub motifs there, the very occasional skank, the stretches of time covered by beautiful repetition (obviously a nod not only to dub but to Steve Reich and his ilk), but just as much hip hop (featuring Fat John from time to time), experimentalism and pure electronica. It's a quite lovely blend.

The Music
Pole - Heim (Four Tet Remix)
Pole - Fahren

The 'fo
Artist: Pole
Website: scape-music.de, MySpace
Recommended: CD1/LP1
Label: Scape
Buy:Amazon
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Murcof - Remembranza
Tags: remix; Four Tet; Pole; Scape; dub; electronica

Remix Me. I'm Going In...#6: Battles

(photo by gregoryperez)

A Joy, the opening track from Four Tet's last album (Everything Ecstatic) seems to be a popular choice for remixers, as evidenced by no less than four different versions on one disc. And so to today's choice, by popular beat combo, Battles. Battles are from New York and they have an excellent drummer. This is literally the level of my knowledge of the band. So, I dig.

It's kind of unusual to see a drummer credited first on a lineup, but it turns out that this is with good reason. John Stanier was a member of Helmet until their acrimonious split in 1998. He's currently a member of Battles alongside being in The Mark Of Cain and Tomahawk. Good going on the avant garde front, nice. Helmet, of course, rocked, like, hard. Wikipedia's always fun for these sorts of things, and states that despite having a drum corps background, he "never actually marched a summer season." Some things are so totally American to make absolutely no sense outside of the continent. I have heard great things about Battles live based solely on the drum skillz of John Stanier.

The rest of Battles is Ian Williams, formerly of math legends Don Caballero, Dave Konopka formerly of Lynx (now, I've no idea if this Lynx is the same as Fame Academy's David Grant; I somehow doubt it), and Tyondai Braxton, offspring of avant-jazz hippy Anthony Braxton. A fine pedigree then, and no doubt about it, some interesting music. Battles is occasionally glitchy (all good) but more often focuses on the sort of hyper-edited sampling that Four Tet often employs, creating a sound not far akin to what you might if you knew nothing of, say, a Stockhausen/Reich collaboration before hearing it.

Well, sometimes anyway. Battles seem a far more diverse proposition than a single comparison can suggest, running the gamut from hyper-kinetic electronica to mathy guitar rock. You can see their range just from the four tracks on MySpace, which I highly recommend you check out. I particularly like Dance - while the other tracks seem to have been given names from the Autechre school of song titles, Dance suggests dancing. yet the irony is that if you were to dance to Dance, you'd do yourself a serious injury, such is the spasmodic and continually shifting percussion and samples.

Battles are a band worth looking further into, and you can rest assured that at some point, I surely will. A good starting point would seem to be their Warp debut, EP C/B EP, which is a collation of their earlier, more obscure releases from the last couple of years. I've also posted a little Floridian hardcore, in the form of Page Hamilton's angry yelp, backed of course by M. Stanier's awesome drum battery. Rocking.

The Music
Four Tet - A Joy (Battles remix)
Battles - Dance
Helmet - In The Meantime

Teqnicolor presents: Battles in session

The 'fo
Artist: Battles
Website: bttls.com; MySpace
Recommended: EP C/B EP
Label: Warp
Buy: Amazon
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Tomahawk - s/t
Tags: remix; Four Tet; Battles; Tomahawk; Helmet; John Stanier

Remix Me. I'm Going In...#5: Bloc Party

(photo by Shane Bee)

Bloc Party are big news these days. Their latest album has leaked around various blogs, and I'm sure if you knock up SoulSeek or the Hype Machine, you'll be able to find some tracks. I haven't listened myself. Silent Alarm is a good album, but certainly not flawless, and I'm not sure it warrants the excessive hype that surrounds it.

That said, the album captured what I think a lot of bands were going for a couple of years ago a lot better than most of those bands; when it gets it right, it's urgent, spiky, joyous; when it doesn't it grates horribly and leaves you wondering what all the fuss is about. I never expected Bloc Party to get quite as big as they are: why, when I first knew of them they were friends of a friend. Check me out, I saw one at a party once. If I bribe the right person, I could probably offer the guitarist's school shirt as a competition prize. But big they got, and fair play to them I suppose. At least they're aiming for a slightly higher intellectual level than most of their lowest-common-denominator peers, for which they have my respect.

You can tell a band is kind of pretentious when they release a remix album. For an indie band, at least. Silent Alarm Remixed came and went with, as usual, just a handful of decent versions. Four Tet's was (for me) the highlight, pouring on the gorgeous to a sublime rendering of So Here We Are, really the track that interested me about Bloc Party in the first place. I'll stick the original up here and another track from the remixes record, and another from the less frenetic facet of the Party, Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Nick Zinner's take on Compliments.

The Music
Bloc Party - So Here We Are
Bloc Party - Compliments (Shibuyaaka Remix by Nick Zinner)

The 'fo
Artist: Bloc Party
Website: blocparty.com
Recommended: Silent Alarm
Label: Wichita
Buy: Amazon
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Editors - The Back Room
Tags: Bloc Party; remix; Four Tet; Nick Zinner; Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Remix Me. I'm Going In...#3: Percee P

(Percee P @ The Fire, 12/7/06, by Ryan Briggs)

Despite having written loads about hip hop fairly recently, I still have no idea what I'm talking about, for the most part. So it's with complete naiveté and my apologies that I present Percee P.
His rap over A Joy is one of the highlights of Four Tet's album, and it's been around a while - I think I first heard it on Comfort Music or Foewheel, and it's kind of stuck around in my head since then. He's apparently considered an old-skool rapper, which to my mind is a good thing: I had a great laugh doing the Message compilation, so it's all good. And listening to the few tracks I can find online, I guess I can only agree with that: Music.Download, my saviour a couple of times before, throws up a couple of songs, Bee Eye and Lung Collapsing Lyrics.

Now, the details: Percee P, while an old-skool artist has not actually released an album of his own to date, although it's on the way. According to this scarily comprehensive discography, John Percy Simon's recorded debut was back in 1988 and he's been known since for his wide range of collaborations which have kept him going, of which Four Tet is just the latest. Of the ones I'm familiar with, these include Jurassic 5, Kool Keith, Aesop Rock, Big Daddy Kane and DJ Shadow. Not bad going.

According to Cocaine Blunts: "aside from Big Daddy Kane, he’s the illest quote unquote fast rapper to ever touch the mic. But because he’s only recorded about 18 verses in as many years, not a lot of heads know what’s up." I can't really argue. It's kind of cool though, he seems to have made a living by selling homemade mixtapes outside a record shape in New York and doing MC battles and collaborations etc. Fair play to the fella. Now though, he's recording an album for Stones Throw (home of J Dilla, Madvillain, Koushik, Breakestra et al) recorded with Madlib, so maybe he'll get his dues yet.

Check out YCCMB podcasto numero trio for the Four Tet version. Also take a look at Smother Me from the other day - I've finally got hold of a copy of the Booth & The Bad Angel track for you.

The Music
Percee P - Lung Collapsing Lyrics ft. Pharaoh Monch
DJ Shadow - Napalm Brain/Scatter Brain
Edan - Torture Chamber ft. Percee P (Cut Chemist remix)

The 'fo
Artist: Percee P
Website: stonesthrow.com
Recommended: Now & Then
Label: Stones Throw
Buy: Amazon
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Edan - Beauty & The Beat
Tags: Four Tet; electronica; remix; Percee P; hip hop; rap; Edan; Cut Chemist; Pharaoh Monch

Remix Me. I'm Going In...#2: Manitoba

(photo by slowmotionlandscap_e)

Stupid computers. I just finished typing this wonderful long post and boom, Internet Explorer goes and closes itself. I know, I know, get a Mac, shut up. Don't wanna.

Anyhoo, today's post was themed upon the theme of Manitoba. This is nothing to do with the state (indeed our heroes emerged from Ontario), nothing to do with the Frank Black song (lovely thought it be), nor, contrary to opinion in some quarters, Handsome Dick Manitoba. I say in some quarters, I mean in Handsome Dick's quarters, as he sued our protagonist for infringing upon his surname. Yes, really. We are of course referring to Mr Dan Snaith, formerly Manitoba, now recording as Caribou. No word on whether the species is preparing a class action.

Why am I talking about Manitoba today then? Well, I thought I'd rashly plunge headlong into a new feature based on Saturday's Four Tet post. For contained within the shiny, white double-sleeve of Remixes/Remixed are the works of a veritable multitude of fine artists - some with whom I'm familiar, some not. I'm going to take a look at each and let you know the down low, and hopefully teach myself a thing or too also. True. I'm not going to post every track from the album though, sorry.

So Manitoba eh? They remix Hilarious Movie Of The 90's here - dream ticket, two of my favourite acts together at last. I tend to lump the two in together sometimes, but in reality they have their similarities, but also some significant differences. Where Four Tet is quite organic, Manitoba/Caribou is maybe the most natural sounding electronica you could hope for, with actual, traditional song structures, vocals, (almost) discernable lyrics, harmonies, everything.

In fact, there are some beautiful songs right here. Across Snaith's last two albums (2003's Manitoba offering Up In Flames, probably the best work he's done, and 2005's The Milk Of Human Kindness (as Caribou)), he's produced some wonderfully-warped pop music spilling out of the cracks between some huge beats and some dazed, muggy-sounding, dreamy vocals. It's all pretty accessible - for me a good thing, much as I normally tout a the-difficulter-the-betterer toeline. I like my out-there music to work a little bit in here as well *points to both head and heart*. M/C has something for the mind to get to grips with, the freewheeling trumpets, the complex beats, the delicious overall haziness. But it also touches the heart like a proper songster would, and like few beat-artists do, with actual, beautiful, often aching vocal touches. It doesn't matter that the words are indistinct, not in the slightest.

I'm going to post the tracks I put on my first podcast: from Up In Flames, maybe my favourite drum track in the world (Cherry Bomb), and from Caribou, maybe an archetypal Snaith moment on Pelican Narrows.

The Music

Manitoba - Cherry Bomb
Caribou - Pelican Narrows

The 'fo

Artist: Manitoba/Caribou

Website: caribou.fm

Recommended: Manitoba - Up In Flames

Label: Leaf

Buy: Amazon; Posteverything

More: Hype Machine M/C; elbo.ws M/C

If you like this you might like: Clue To Kalo - One Way, It's Every Way

Tags: Four Tet; electronica; remix; Manitoba; Caribou; Dan Snaith

Remix Me. I'm going in...#1

(photo by mk30)

Alright, so it's not cover me, it's as good as.
I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised when the remix that grabbed me most on Four Tet's remixes/remixed double album was by... Four Tet. There's some great acts on here: Manitoba and Koushik both remix Hilarious Movie Of The 90's, Battles do a great job on A Joy, and Boom Bip's No More Mosquitoes is also ace. This is only CD2 as well - disc 1 features Hebden remixing Radiohead, Bloc Party, Beth Orton, Madvillain, Aphex Twin... I'm sure those'll come up soon.

But yes, my favourite remix of a Four Tet song was by Keiran Hebden himself. He does As Serious As Your Life, and to be frank, it's wonderful. The original, if you'll recall, has that great, ever-so-slightly funky guitar riff that's chopped up at times with that gloriously sparse beat. As per Hebden, there's not only melodies that ebb and flow in and out, but also completely random interjectory bleeps and the odd drum freak out.

The remix retains the funky but goes for almost an inversion of the riff transmuted to a great, indistinct bass sound, making it one of the best melodies on the disc. At times remixes can veer so much into trying to impress the remixers own sound onto a track that all semblance of melody and listenability is thrown out of the window. Not here though, this is one of the catchiest tunes on here, which says a great deal for Hebden's original work. It can't be easy taking a sound so vastly innovative as Four Tet's and keeping it accessible, but I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the man's a genius.

Listen out also for the free jazz trumpets (reminiscent of some of Manitoba's Up In Flames actually; think maybe Cherry Bomb?), and a whole host of other things. This man's good.

The Music
Four Tet - As Serious As Your Life (Four Tet remix)

The 'fo
Artist: Four Tet
Website: fourtet.net
Recommended: Remixes
Label: Domino
Buy: Amazon; Domino
More: Hype Machine; elbo.ws
If you like this you might like: Manitoba - Up In Flames
Tags: Four Tet; live; electronica; remix