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Serge Gainsbourg sings in 1968 French gangster film ‘Le Pacha’
02.16.2011
03:17 am
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Serge Gainsbourg sings “Requiem Pour Un Con” from 1968 French film Le Pacha starring Jean Gabin.

What a sweet groove.

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.16.2011
03:17 am
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Now I wanna be your drain: The ‘live’ debut of YouTube perv, Tonetta
02.15.2011
08:23 pm
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Can it be? Why, yes it can… announcing the LIVE debut of YouTube weirdo, Tonetta!

Yes, this Friday at Show Cave here in Los Angeles, the pervy, thong-wearing purveyor of his own special flavor of nasty ass R&B will be exhibiting his art and video work and doing a special live performance in celebration of his new album 777 Vol. II. So what if he looks like he’s got someone chained up in his basement, Tonetta knows how to party.

Show Cave, 3501 Eagle Rock Blvd , Los Angeles, CA.

Below, Tonetta wants to be your “drain” if you know what I mean and I think you do:
 

 
Thank you, Jason Louv!

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.15.2011
08:23 pm
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88 Roland Synthesizers from 1973 - 2010 Gif’d
02.15.2011
03:11 pm
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Thanks to Das Kraftfuttermischwerk for making this awesome animated GIF.

Posted by Tara McGinley
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02.15.2011
03:11 pm
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Netlabels: Jahtari.org
02.14.2011
09:00 pm
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In the first part of this on going series, I explained what a netlabel is, and gave some background on the set up of our own netlabel, Little Rock Records. For the second part I have decided to cover the daddy of them all, the netlabel that inspired me to start up my own, Leipzig’s digital reggae/free download heroes Jahtari.

It was after being shown the Jahtari.org website back in 2006 by my friends in Mungo’s Hi-Fi that the penny dropped - I really could do everything needed to get music out there without the aid of another label.  All I needed was someone who could build me a website where I could host music for people to download. The concept of net labels had been floating around before, but nobody had done it as well as Jahtari, with such a coherent outlook and music policy. They took it to another level.
 
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Mikey Murka “Sensi Addict” JTR NET 08
 

 
As the name would suggest, Jahtari is a combination of old school computing and dub/reggae. In particular, the classic King Jammy/Wayne Smith-style digital reggae sounds of the mid-80s (records like “Sleng Teng” and “Walk Like Granny”), largely made on Casio keyboards, but here compressed even lower into 8-bit jams. The design is classic reggae styles, refracted through an 8-bit prism, and combined with a love of arcade games like Kong. Most importantly for me was the format - “Net 7s”, a free download which comes packaged like a physical 7 inch record, with an A side and a B side (often a dub version), and corresponding inlay sticker art. When I first encountered Jahtari in early 2007, they already had a large catalog of free releases available, releases I plundered greedily. Yes, there is a slight tongue-in-cheek vibe about the label’s presentation - which is not out of place considering that this is reggae made by a bunch of white Germans - but the music is as high quality an hommage to digital-dancehall as you will find anywhere in the world.
 
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Disrupt “Arcade Addict” JTR NET 08
 

 
Jahtari was founded in 2004 by Jan Gleichmar, who records as Disrupt, and who provides the backbone of the Jahtari catalog. Apart from Jan (who has worked with some seriously talented MCs like Mikey Murka, Solo Banton, El Fata and Soom T) the artists’ roster also includes Bo Marley, Dubmood, Roots Ista Posse and the Jahtari Riddim Force. The label doesn’t just deal in free downloads, having expanded into vinyl, tapes and CDs over the years, and now has a 7inch (physical) offshoot label called Maffi. Well, you gotta earn a crust.

There are 20 net 7s and 10 net EPs you can download for free from the website www.jahtari.org, and it all comes highly recommended. If you like the sounds of the Mikey Murka vocal / Disrupt dub tracks in this post, you will like the rest of the catalog, so my advice is just to jump over to their website now and get downloading.

But if you want to hear more music first, there’s more after the jump…

READ ON
Posted by Niall O'Conghaile
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02.14.2011
09:00 pm
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Foo Fighters and Lemmy in ‘White Limo’
02.14.2011
06:47 pm
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Lemmy guest stars in the video for the Foo Fighters’ new tune “White Limo” produced by Butch Vig.

I’m not a big Foo Fighters fan, but I know fun when I see it. The battered video tape look suits the song which sounds like some dirty ass hardcore thrash from the 80s. Shades of Vig’s early production work with Die Kreuzen. Very cool.

Foo Fighters new album will be released April 12.
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.14.2011
06:47 pm
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Radiohead returns: New album ‘King of Limbs’ available from Saturday
02.14.2011
12:31 pm
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Radiohead is calling its new record, The King Of Limbs, “the world’s first Newspaper Album” (adding “perhaps” as a footnote).

Wouldn’t the first be Jethro Tull’s Thick As a Brick?

Here’s what the fans who pony up $48.00 and $53.00, respectively, for the MP3 and .wav versions of the record will also get this in the deluxe package:

Two clear 10” vinyl records in a purpose-built record sleeve.
A compact disc.
Many large sheets of artwork, 625 tiny pieces of artwork and a full-colour piece of oxo-degradeable plastic to hold it all together.

The Newspaper Album will be ship on 9th May 9th, 2011 but you can download it as of Saturday February 19th.

If you just want the digital download, it’ll cost you $9 for the MP3 version and $14 for the higher quality .wav file. It strikes me as somewhat absurd that there is a $5 buck difference in the price break between the lower quality MP3 version and the lossless wav files which will sound as good as a CD. Does transferring the wavs cost them $5 more dollars per buyer? Um, I doubt it. It’s like Radiohead are actively encouraging their fans here to go for the lower quality way to hear their music. That seems really counter-intuitive to me.

Posted by Richard Metzger
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02.14.2011
12:31 pm
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Velvet Underground documentary from 1986 puts it all together in a nice package
02.14.2011
04:57 am
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Originally broadcast in 1986 in the UK, The South Bank Show’s Velvet Underground documentary was directed by Kim Evans with the help of Mary Harron. It contains interviews with Lou, John, Sterling, Moe, Nico, Warhol and lots of early Velvet performance footage, including stuff shot by Jonas Mekas. For hardcore Velvet fans none of this will be new, but isn’t it nice to have it compiled in a visually pleasing package? And for the casual VU fan, this is essential.

John Cale: “The only reason we wore sunglasses on stage was because we couldn’t stand the sight of the audience.”
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.14.2011
04:57 am
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The Grimys: 37 minutes of non-stop go go action and relentless garage rock rhythm. NSFW
02.13.2011
07:55 pm
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Forget about The Grammys, here’s the real deal: The Grimys.

From penthouses to sleaze pits, strip joints and go go palaces of a bygone era, we present The Grimys, 37 minutes of non-stop bump and grind set to a garage rock and psychedelic beat that is guaranteed to blow your mind and set your monitor ablaze with the fires of unbridled passion. Enter the world of the taboo. Explore the desperate alleys where sin lurks in the shadows, lust wears a dress made of twenty dollar bills and rock and roll is the soundtrack to lives lived in the twilight zone between wasted days and wasted nights.

Actually, this is just plain old fashioned fun.

When the Dirty Wurds kick in at the 23:55 point you will be amazed and enthralled by one of the most frenzied displays of go go dancing in the history of the art. Who IS that woman? Her nipples could take an eye out.

Hide the children and put on your raincoats, this is Grind Mix #1. Exposed flesh abounds. You’ve been warned.

01. Congawa - The Zirkons
02. Zebra - The Youngsters
03. Jibba Jab - Tic & Toc
04. Groovy - The Groovers
05. Thunderbird - The Casual-Aires
06. Little Girl - John & Jackie
07. Take It Off - The Genteels
08. Crackin’ Up - Famen
09. Elevator Jam - The 13th Floor Elevators
10. Mr. Man - The Lyrics
11. Gotta Find Her - Pat Farrell
12. Why - Dirty Wurds
13. 1523 Blair - The Outcasts
14. Don’t Lose Your Mind - The Galaxies IV
15. Generation - The Jelly Bean Bandits
16. Joustabout - The Triumphs
17. Trashcan - Ken Williams
18. Drums A-Go-Go - The Hollywood Persuaders
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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02.13.2011
07:55 pm
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‘L’Amerotica’: the return of the brilliant Anne Pigalle
02.13.2011
06:18 pm
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The DM postbag always brings an assortment of delights, and this week was no different, as Anne Pigalle’s latest collection of songs L’Amerotica landed on my desk.

It was back in 1985 that Miss Pigalle’s exquisite voice first lit up the world with her brilliant album Everything Could Be So Perfect. It was a stunning debut, and revealed a gifted singer with a voice as richly emotive as Piaf and as strong as Lotte Lenya.

Raised in Paris, Anne’s earliest musical memory was the excitement caused by theme to Third Man TV series, which would make her rush from the kitchen to the sitting room. Pigalle started singing in the school choir, and was praised for her “golden voice.” Though father played double-bass, Anne had no musical training, and it would be the influence of Punk that set off her career. Punk showed the young singer everything is possible, as she later said:

“Growing up at the punk time gave me a great sense of integrity, which really saved me in the end. I’m not saying I never made any mistakes, but I always had a base to go back to. My music is not punk but it has a punk ethic behind it .”

Punk led the fifteen-year-old singer to pick up a guitar and start performing. In the 1980s, Anne moved to London, where her incredible voice soon enchanted audiences and critics alike, and led to her collaborations with Adrian Sherwood, Michael Nyman and Trevor Horn, who produced her album Everything Could Be So Perfect.

Pigalle was signed to Zang Tumb Tuum Records, the label founded by journalist Paul Morley, producer Trevor Horn and his wife Jill Sinclair. ZTT were behind such acts as Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Propaganda and Art of Noise, but while the label prospered, the artists didn’t always fare so well, as Anne explained in 2005:

“ZTT wanted to do a second album with me. There was talk of me working with Peter Hammill (a Brian Eno associate). They wanted Anton Corbijn to do the photography etc. etc. I felt dissatisfied. My contract was a bad one. I didn’t feel controlled by ZTT, I just felt things were not advancing and the contract was too bad to allow me to do what i wanted… Other ZTT acts such as Instinct didn’t even get to have their albums released. I found seeing the recent Trevor Horn tribute concert rather depressing. After 1988 I left ZTT and moved to America. I had such an interesting time. I got to perform with Leonard Cohen’s backing band. Very much more relaxed. America gave me so much more confidence in my own ability as a performer. My ex-writing partner at ZTT, Nick Plytas, went on to play with Nick Cave.”

In the 1990s, Anne moved to Los Angeles where she met Donald Cammell, director of Performance, with whom she worked on an idea for a film. Sadly, Cammell, who suffered from depression, committed suicide before this could come to fruition. Pigalle then appeared in Zalman King’s The Red Shoe Diaries, (“always decent”), and performed for the homeless, in downtown LA. She also performed in a theatre production about poet Charles Bukowski where she played Death.

Since then the multi-talented singer has established herself as a successful poet, artist, model and photographer. Two years ago, she exhibited a selection of her Amerotica Polaroids at the Michael Hoppen Gallery, and has since merged image and song together into a series of critically acclaimed multi-media performances across London, that mix cabaret with personal imagery.

Now the release of L’Amerotica confirms Anne Pigalle as one of our best and most important talents. The album, co-produced by Pigalle with Tommaso Del Signore, is a breath-taking mix of electronic beats and ballads, with such highs as “With My Blonde”, “The Pleasure Ground” (described by Chris Roberts, in Uncut Magazine as “chilly as Iggy’s ‘Fall in Love With Me’”), as well as the excellent “Mary Mother of God”, “Sesso” and the beautiful “Je te veus toi” and “Espore Spirale”. Throughout Anne’s vocals are nothing other than superb.

It’s been a long time coming, but the quality of L’Amerotica makes it all worth the wait. Here’s to more soon form the wonderful Miss Pigalle.

L’Amerotica is available on i-tunes and CD, details here.

If you’re in London, Anne Pigalle plays Le Montmartre Bistro, 144 Essex Rd, N1, on the 24th February.
 

 
Bonus clip, Anne Pigalle sings ‘He! Stranger’, directed by Bernard Rose, after the jump…
 

READ ON
Posted by Paul Gallagher
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02.13.2011
06:18 pm
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Momus: ‘Strawberry Hill’ and the ‘Hypnoprism’ album
02.13.2011
11:12 am
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This little jazz-psyche jam is perfect for a cold, dark and rainy Sunday afternoon. At least, that’s what it’s like here in Manchester, but I bet it goes well with the sunshine too. Or any weather state actually.
 

 
If you don’t know Momus, he’s a pretty legendary Scottish indie music figure who has been around since the mid-Eighties. He’s been associated with record labels like Postcard, Cherry Red and Creation. He keeps a great blog, with some very interesting articles and all his latest news, at imomus.

This track is from his last album Hypnoprism (2010, Anagram Records) and features keys from Ben Butler (him again!). Interestingly, Momus made a video for each of the tunes from the LP, and uploaded them one by one, as they were finished, to his YouTube account.

The rest of the album, in video form, is after the jump:

READ ON
Posted by Niall O'Conghaile
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02.13.2011
11:12 am
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