I'm Off [yeah, again], + go to Daryl's house

In approximately one moment I'm headed out the door and off to NYC, Boston and maybe Providence, to couch surf and simply enjoy my last week of freedom before classes start again. I'm driving. With three friends. It should be a good time.

And I don't have any downloads to share right now, but I wanted to share what is pretty much the coolest thing I've seen in a while, and very unexpectedly so. It's Daryl Hall, from Hall & Oates. And it's his house. And it's a jam session. And it's Chromeo. Just go check it out. They play some Chromeo and they play some H&O. They fugging play "No Can Do", with some Chromeo stylee. It's amazing. Srsly.

Live from Daryl's house.

See y'all when I should be studying.

.

The Tough Alliance

I first talked about Sweden's The Tough Alliance last fall but had totally geeked out about them to my little mp3 e-zine or whatever [first incarnation of this hrr blog, if you were lucky enough to receive it and remember] during the late spring // early summer when I was totally in love with their very summery jams.

The two lads grace the front cover of the latest issue of Fader [download it here]. In the picture below, they are the whitebread Scandinavilads on the right, not the dancehall rhyme-spewing Busy Signal on the back/left. In the feature about them, the writer says their summer anthem and Swedish radio hit "First Class Riot" [download it below] "sounds like the sun emerging from puberty". I don't know exactly what that means, but I'm sure many of you don't know what I mean half the time I write about music I'm loving. Nonethenevertheless, I agree. I would have perhaps made that analogy/simile with their more summery anthem "Something Special" [download it below, too], which I blogged about last year. Then I said it was "good pop with a shadow of chill and a sprinkle of electronic coating the whole package". Unhuh.

TTA are part of a music collective in Gothenberg that also include like-minded and similar sounding Air France, who've kinda been my TTA of this spring/summer. They're on the same label and I'm pretty sure each often record with the other. Gothernberg, also home to space-dub chill maestros Studio, from what I can tell is like the new Bergen, Norway [home of Royksopp, Erlend Oye, et al]. Or like the new Bristol, England [home of Massive Attack, Tricky, Portishead, et al]. Little cities // big towns that harbor too much musical creativity. Like Austin or Denton, Tejas. Or any one block in the white parts of Brooklyn. Or any one block in the black parts of Brooklyn. Anyway,

Dig The Tough Alliance:
TTA - "First Class Riot"
TTA - "Something Special" highly recommended!
TTA - "A New Chance" highly recommended!
TTA - "Neo Violence"
TTA - "Koka Kola Veins"
TTA - "Miami"
TTA - "New York City Violence" [Alvy Singer remix]
TTA - "Taken Too Young" [a Taken By Trees cover]

Related:

Studio - "Brown Piano" highly recommended!
Studio - "Impossible"

Their album New Chance comes stateside later this year, but was released overseas last year. Purchase: Amazon : Strictly Discs : InSound : iTunes

=

Also, much thanks to those who came out last night to see me throw down a couple of the above tunes [two people even asked about the above "Brown Piano", which was cool], along with some Weezer, MIA, Ike & Tina, Santogold, Chromeo, and other crazinesses. For the first time, I was even tipped out by Matt the bartender, which was very nice. That was most likely in part due to y'all coming out and tipping your waitresses and bartender Matt. Thanks, it was a very fun night.

.

Teiam Player @ Natt Spil, Thursday

It's absolutely gorgeous in Madison right now and I'm going to try to make this quick so that I can go back outside. I started this post out there, but after the 3pm sun started making my laptop smell like melting plastic I decided it was time to come in.


Anyway.... That's right, kids. As I recently mentioned, this crazy guy above will be DJing at Natt Spil. And don't worry- I may be wearing a hat, but it will not be that one.
Thursday night.
21 August 2008.
10pm --> 1.30am
Come one, come all. It'll be a grand ol time.

And as I usually tell friends in an effort to get them to come out, if you request a song in advance, if you show up I will play it. There are few exceptions-- but chances are that if it's on the Top 40 list, it'll be rejected. This request thingy also works if you do so when you show up, but chances are better I'll have it if you tell me in advance.

Enough of that.

=

But on that tip.. here I share some dancey tunes, some of which one may hear if he or she were to show up at a certain awesome little bar this coming Thursday night.

First, the remakes or remixes of 80s or 90s songs. These are great:
Anoraak - Talking in Your Sleep
the original is by the Romantics, remember?
Belind Carlisle - Heaven is a Place on Earth [Hidden Cat remix]
This is my current favorite song, and if you were my neighbor you'd know that too well by now.
Ruby Isle - Solsbury Hill.... ....removed per band's request
The original, by Peter Gabriel, was right up there with Smokey Robinson's "Tears of a Clown" [first OHWNT'd here] as one of my favorite songs to whistle to. Srsly. This Ruby Isle remake is awesome, as is pretty much every other song they've redone. They have a habit of it.

Now some other top tunes which I've been loving lately:
Santogold - Say Aha [Tepr remix]
Another good Santi track, another good remix.
Van She - Virgin Suicide
Van She are from Australia. And like paisanos Cut Copy, Mystery Jets, they make really good music. Heavy 80s new wave influence, and a lot of dance stuff [they also have several dance remixes of others' tracks out there]. This song is a bit more low key.

Now some Teiam Player refizzes. These are basically some dance mash-ups I did recently, mostly to put on the mixtape I mentioned here and here [it's good! go download it! it got me a good gig!]. Without further..
Mr Miyagi - Pick Your Poison [Felix Cartal remix] [Teiam Player Clipse Love You edit] A gritty electro house track with Clipse vocals [from a JT song!] tossed over top.
Soulwax "Miserable Girl" [Royal Rumble remix] vs Britney Spears "Outrageous" [Teiam Player Invites Prodigy edit]
Two soundalike gritty electro house tracks with Mobb Deep's Prodigy over top. Note: the Britney song sounds nothing like a Britney song.
Heavy D & the Boyz - Now That We Found Love [Teiam Player Hey Muscles I Love You edit]
The classic Heavy D track paired up with the recent classic Muscles "Hey Muscles I Love You".

As always, go buy some musics:
Strictly Discs : Turntable Lab : iTunes : Amazon

Have a killer night.

.

OHWNT 080808: the rebirth. Also, upcoming Teiam Player gig

If my blog is still around at the next 080808, then mankind is doomed. Hell, if it makes it to 090909 I'll be surprised. And while I don't find this day to be particularly noteworthy, what better day would there be to be reborn? I mean, really.

So some or many or all or none of you may know I was out of the country for a while. Technically, since Guam is a US territory, I was in country, but it felt more like some place like.... Puerto Rico. Oh, wait-- that's Los EEUU as well. In Guam, five distinct languages can be heard on a regular basis: English, Chamorro [Guamanian], Japanese, Tagalog [Filipino], and Engrish [ya know, Engrish]. All the maps and tourist craps are in one or two languages, English and Japanese, but if only one then more often than not that one will be Japanese. It was a nice place. But this isn't a travel blog, or even a life blog really, so on with the show.

The only musical worth that trip had for me was that I heard the same six or seven songs over and over and over again. Some of those I still like, remarkably, but most [like Lolli Lolli, Lollipop, I Kissed a Girl].... notsomuch.

I also had one CD to listen to in my rental [a pimped out 2009 Toyota Corolla]-- my recent bloghouse/electro mixtape [which happened to be the topic of my last post]. I listened to that thing so much that two things happened: [1] I fell in love with most of it even more and [2] I found a few little things that bugged me so much that the first thing I did when I returned to the mainland was repair it. That can also be found at the same ol' link, which is right here in case you missed it the first times.

I have to say, that mix is pretty sweet and you should go listen to it [you can stream it!]. Straight up dance mix, the kind of set I'd be playing if I were playing a club. And of course since the man cannot be stopped, Teiam Player had to throw a few refizzes in there-- a blend featuring Heavy D & the Boyz, and some hip hop-apellas over other tracks.

ANYWAY, on with the new news....


TEIAM PLAYER @ Natt Spil 08/21! After fearing I may get bumped from the lineup because of reasons that aren't worth explaining, I am playing at the Spil on a night which has all the potential in the world to get a little crazy. Why? [a] it's a Thursday night [2] it's the day after my birfday! [d] I haven't been out in Madison for a while. Oh yeah, and like I always say, it's Natt Spil. So come down. There will be reminders closer to gameday.

Now onto the new musics. Here below are a few of those tunes I heard over and over and over while in Guam which I never got sick of. You've probably heard some on the radio, and others perhaps not. Anyway, I like these, and without shame.

Gavin DeGraw - In Love with a Girl
First saw this video one morning getting ready for work, and then heard it on the radio and never got sick of it.
Solange - I Decided
Also first saw this on MTV as well, and loved it instantly. Never heard it on the radio but I see it's been blogged to death, with loads o'remixes, one or two of which are quite good.
Estelle feat Kanye - American Boy
The first few times I heard this I never heard Kanye's verses, and the rest of it seemed pretty lackluster to me. Then I heard Kanye, and he tears it apart. Then I caught it on the radio a few times, always already halfway through the song, and I was always like "damn this is a good song, what is it?" and then I'd hear the chorus and then Kanye again and then I was always like "oh yeah, jeez". I hate it when I miss a song's potential the first time I hear it and it takes the radio or a club for me to like it.
Jason Mraz - I'm Yours
Again, saw this video first, without even knowing who it was. Jason Mraz, like the early Jack Johnson stuff [only stuff I've heard], is very islandy, with a strong island music influence. So it was in a perfect setting in Guam. It's an island. It's islandy. It has perpetual summer. No breeze and it's muggier than a Buenos Aires alley. But it's still islandy. This song was all over that rock, too. I'm sure all the songsters at the bars in Hawaii are playing it on their ukeleles. Guam is pretty ukelele-less, too.

Ok, enough of all that overplayed [but good!] crap. Here's the overhyped [but still equally good!-- no, way better!] stuff. The mega-blogged stuff, as I'm sure it was the past few weeks. But I'm just now catching up and these guys are all rocking it.

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
AWESOME song. Download it if you don't ardy have it.
Grizzly Bear - While You Were Waiting for Others
This song is nothing short of fucking amazing. Presumably a song from their next album, they played it for KCRW or KEXP. You will love this song, perhaps more than the Fleet Foxes song. I've played it about a dozen times in as many hours.
Holly Golightly & the Broke-offs - Bottow Below
Never listened to them before, and never really cared to. And I don't think I like much of the rest of the album, but this song is real nice. And it's an opener, which I always love. Note: I'm still unsure if this song is sposedta be entitled "Bottom Below" or in fact "Bottow Below" like it says.
The Dodos - Jody
I've been rocking this album for a while, but somehow didn't have this track. And Holy Crap, they totally rock out on this. It's an epic seven minutes long, but they power through the whole thing and so will you.
Santogold - Icarus
This Santogold track is on the recent Diplo // Santogold mixtape Top Ranking. I haven't listened to the whole thing yet but there is plenty of new Santi White [aka Santogold] material, and plenty of rerubs by Diplo, et al. This is one of the closing tracks.... EDIT: it is the closing track, with exception to the hidden track, which is a Bad Brains cover, apparently.

Buy tunes:
Amazon : Strictly Discs : InSound : iTunes : Turntable Lab

=

There were plenty of other tunes I planned on posting, but that just gives me the motivation to come back and write soon and for you to come back and read soon. I have like six or seven others I wanted to share but it's already going on 11pm and I really wanted to get this done [especially seeing as I started it like six hours ago, then went and had dinner and beers and beers and beers].

Welcome back.

See you soon.

.