Portishead, DJ Andy Smith

Fans of old genres lost, reunite. Trip hop, or some new media-empowered tag that equates it, is back. More accurately, the queen of the scene, nee Beth Gibbons, and her partner in crime, beat extraordinaire of trippy and headnoddish fodder, Geoff Barrows. What's that you say? Massive Attack is the reigning king of trip hop? I'll allow you that opinion. But in my world, Portishead rules the rainy days.

In any event, this is hardly the trip hop of the 90s. This album walks a path which sometimes crosses the one which leads back to their classic first album Dummy, and it walks near the path which goes to their second, Portishead. But it's winding and there are more hills which lead us up, up, up, ["We Carry On", "Machine Gun"] before the comedown, down, down. We eventually meet up with the Dummy path once again, and stop and walk in the grass before lying down on our backs and finishing it by injecting ourselves with the old Portishead we know ["Threads"].

I offer my immediate favorite, the opening track. A perfect opener, "Silence" climaxes at its abrupt ending when it surprises us with.. silence. "We Carry On" is strong, driven by a bleepy, Detroity beat and frenetic drumming, it gaining energy all the way through. "The Rip" is simply nice. Starts acoustic, picks up in the middle with some organ fun.

Third comes out 29 April. It'll also be available as box set with other goodies, says Pitchfork. Hear parts of it here and now, as I get my gloom and depress on when it's finally sunny outside here in Madison.

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If we're lucky, P-head will come here and if I'm lucky, they'll have their tour DJ Andy Smith in tow. Smith is one of my all-time favorite DJs; a master of all things with a beat, whether funk, reggae, jazz, hip hop or otherwise. He is in my mind one of the first mash-up artists, and has the best series of mix CDs going [although they haven't been going for a few years]. It all started with this:

I played this 45-minute masterpiece of mixology non-stop in my car and everywhere else for a couple years straight. And then it resurfaced again a couple years ago and I couldn't stop listening to it. The man fuses and blends The Jungle Brothers, Jeru the Damaja, The Meters, James Gang, Barry White, Marvin Gaye, Tom Jones, Grandmaster Flash and more into one symphony of funk, and it all sounds perfectly natural, perfectly normal, and perfectly sublime. Check out and stream or download some of his other mixes here and here. Purchase from Amazon.


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Portishead music, from upcoming album, Third.
"Silence"
"We Carry On"
"The Rip"
"Threads"
Go get the first single, "Machine Gun" from any of the other hundreds of blogs offering it.

Thanks for reading.

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edited: I simply cannot stop listening to "Threads" and it's 60 seconds of foghorn zounds at the end. I almost didn't post this track. Very glad I did. Simply. Fucking. Marvelous. Get it now.

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Sunshine on a Cloudy Day, More on VietNam

Happy Monday!

First, here are a couple VietNam tracks I alluded to back on Turkey Day. "Step on Inside" is another OHWNT-approved opening track. Way to go, boys! You really know how to open up an album.

"Step on Inside"
"Welcome to My Room"

Both tunes be purchased as part of the same great album, VietNam. And if you like these two songs, don't go buy their older album, because I guess they're totally different. Which is strange: I swear to jah they're channeling all sorts of Vietnam-era bands on this new album; if I'm not wrong, then what the hell could they have been sounding like if nothing Vietnam-related?

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Ok, I gotta do a little more on VietNam. And as much as I don't particularly care for the way they throw that capital N in there, I never didn't write out CYHSY!'s or TG!T's or ON!OM!'s or TAN!'s or P!atD's YSP!WSD!'s !s, [or !!!'s chks, for that matter] so why should I not respect their capitalization creativity? Besides, I do it all the time.


Anyway, if you thought I was full of shit before, when I was talking about them sounding all 60s/70s-ish, hopefully you've listened now and can believe me at least a little. If you see the picture to the left [it is to the left, right?], where they were featured on last month's Fader, they even look like they're stuck in Vietnam era. Fucking hippies. But they're from Brooklyn! What kind of posers are these guys? Are they trying to be ironic? I don't know. Their neighbors Yeasayer are more close to them sonically than any other Brooklyn hipsters that I know of, but the interview-elusive and semi-mysterious Yeasayer at least seem like they're hip. Maybe it's just their neoretro promo image [don't be fooled, they photoshopped that arm so that it's wearing a pink shirt. And crudely, I might add] or the album cover slash promo shot with the cool tat-like YSR initials.. which aren't even initials.

Anyway, Yeasayer seem like they're naturally cool or they're trying to be cool. Either way, it's working. VietNam seem like they're just being themselves. I've never met them. I haven't even read too many interviews. But if you allow something like Fader to depict you as a bunch of long-haired stoner hippies who are just happy to be in the sun and still have all their hair, you're either Tommy Chong or you just don't give a shit [not that Tommy Chong gives a shit. Obviously]. Seriously, that Fader pic coulda just been an Allman Brothers photo from forty years ago. See?

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Alright, on with the cloud-forgetting. I don't even know what I want to listen to when it's cloudy and miserable, so I sure as hell don't know what does it for you. So.. I'm giving a bit of a mixed bag. Get 'em all or feel free to direct yourself straight to your own pigeonhole/stereotype.

Bedroom-Dancefloor junkies: Klanguage - "This is Me" [Yuksek Remix], TBReleased

Head-nodders: Pharoahe Monch feat Showtime - "Desire", from Desire

Tight-jeaned hipsters: Deerhoof - "+81", from Friend Opportunity

Couch-lying book-readers: Great Lake Swimmers - "Your Rocky Spine", from Ongiara

Cool Like Me [this is the one that's currently working for me, thanks to a Lovechild]: MGMT - "Kids", from Oracular Spectacular

Hopefully one of those does the trick.

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Favorite Songs of 2007, Part Uno

Well, there are roughly 40 days left in this wonderful year. And in a good portion of those days I'm going to sort through my various "best of" playlists.. that could be an entirely different post altogether.

Anyword.. I'm going to be randomly be adding anywhere from two to.. five? six? seven? songs each time up until either [a] I get sick of doing it, [b] I get sick of the songs, or [c] the end of the year. So without further..

Oh! Brand new idea: the percentage to the right of each album is the probability that this album would appear on my Favorite Album of 2007 list. Watch out now, kids-- lots of links, lots of stats.

Matthew Dear - "Fleece on Brain", from Asa Breed; 68%
I really need to make a regular "opening tracks" section where I share some of my favorite opening tracks. If I did, this would make the list. "Fleece" is one of the most electronic-sounding tunes on Asa Breed, with its oscillating synthlines and neverending looped bassline and probably not one of the most immediate, so perhaps it's a peculiar choice for opening track of an album that is definitely trying to reach out to indie audiences. But it's that never-quite-reaching-climax aspect of it that I think makes it work as an opening track. Besides that, what does it for me is the fact that he sounds one part [OHWNT favorite guilty pleasure] Clutch lead singer Neil Fallon, and one part [TVotR's] Kyp Malone [as I contest he does elsewhere on the record].

UGK feat Outkast - "Int'l Player's Anthem", from Underground Kingz; 4%
This song does not need any introduction. It's bloody brilliant. Earlier in the year I incorrectly deemed it the summer hip hop anthem. Well, who could have predicted the staying power of what turned into two of the most annoying tunes-- I speak of "The Way I Are" and "Umbrella"-ella-ella. ANYWAY.. you have to see the video if you haven't already, because whereas he hasn't yet totally realized greatness on the big screen [although he's definitely trying], Mr Andre Benjamin steals the show in the opening scene. Fo reezy. Further along, though, big UGK thug Bun B flexes his experience and.. bigness. But then the real Big Boi shows everyone why this tune should have really been an Outkast song, featuring UGK.

Bonus: it just so happens Teiam Player got hold of this and totally had his way with it. The "official" version ["The Int'l Man of Metropolis", one of the better TP tunes if I may say so myself] can be heard over at TeiamSpace. But another [kinda never totally finished] one can be downloaded here [an exclusive, feel special]:
UGK feat Outkast + White Rabbits + Sufjan Stevens =
Teiam Player "The International Player's Plot"

Menomena - "Wet and Rusting", from Friend and Foe; 98%
This was, if not the, then one of the first albums I knew would be my year-end favorite. And this song has it all. Pianos! Strumming guitars! Chaotic drum beating! Dual vocals, quasi-harmonizing! It's killer. And with the props to Kanye, the video for it is alright, too.

Bonus: and guess what? That's right, Teiam Player's version!
Menomena + The Pack = Teiam Player "Wet Candy"

Phew. Was this the most fun-filled OHWNT post yet, or what? And it's a frigging Friday night. I need to leave the house now.

Find all of my FaveSongs2007 posts here.

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