Bibio Video(s)

MPC chopping

A tribute to Madlib


Found the above videos on one of Bibio's defunct MySpace pages, in particular, from his hip-hop side project as "Duckular." These clips provide insight into the creative process, and are pretty mind-blowing in that he is able to emulate Dilla and Madlib so well. That the artist is apparently new to left field hip-hop, crafting near-perfect beatscapes, is entirely impressive. His academic background in music seems to engender the artist with an informed (and experimentally-inclined) pool of ideas to draw from.

"Fire Ant," below, from Ambivalence Avenue, is some of the best chopping I have ever heard in a hip-hop context--and I've been listening to hip-hop heavily, for almost 15 years.

Ambivalence Avenue made Pitchfork's "Best New Music," scoring an impressive 8.3/10, something I predicted despite the album's stylistic sprawl. I urge everyone to check it out because it's a great summer record, with or without Pitchfork's arbitrary endorsement.

R.I.P. MJ (1958 - 2009)

Most mainstream media seems to ignore the fact that Quincy Jones, irrefutably, played a critical role in Michael Jackson's success as a pop artist. Jones helped bring the shy kid, from an obscure place like Indiana, out of his shell; inadvertently plotting the trajectory of the most influential individual in the history of popular music. Too bad so much fucked up stuff happened between then, and this past Thursday. Still, his personal life, as fucked up as it was, won't overshadow the stalwart canon of pop music left behind, totally ubiquitous.

For a very cheap laugh:

On The Radar: Artists To Watch

This week: Teebs

Former skateboarder turned beatmaker, Teebs is featured this week. Based out of LA, aka the epicenter of contemporary left-field hip-hop (with respect to the peripheral UK scene), his beats are emotive, mercurial, and yet at times underdeveloped. However, he was only recently picked up by LA beat-scene harbinger Flying Lotus, prepping to release an EP on his BrainFeeder imprint. Who knows, perhaps Flying Lotus will take him under his wing (chortle!). In the meantime, check out the woozy guitar strums of "Bern Rhythm Codeine Version," as the perfect summer backdrop to porch-sitting and iced tea sipping.

Teebs - "Bern Rhythm Codeine Version"

Teebs is also a visual artist and painter. His artwork (below) draws immediate comparisons to Agnes Montgomery, who did the artwork for Panda Bear's last few releases, employing a similar cut/paste collage aesthetic.

Mary Anne Hobbs mix

http://myspace.com/teeeb

http://www.myspace.com/brainfeeder

iPod Generation: "What are those?"

Cassette tapes are great. I've picked up some thrift store bin winners such as Paul's Boutique (classic end-to-end), Rio (fun to throw on once a year, whilst imagining coked-up cocktail parties where it inevitably soundtracked), Dance Mix '93 (irony + childhood memories) and Ella Fitzgerald best-of (it was $1). These are pretty rad (click for detail), from this dude on Flickr:

Happy Weekend

Mantronix! I'm thinking about shifting the focus of my web log to electronic-based music, instead of riding the brain wavelengths of my ADD mind through genre and epoch, without regard. The last grip of posts have been electronic-y, so I guess it won't be much of a stretch. We shall see. Have a safe weekend!

Prefuse 73 Post-MoMA Mix

Found a decent new mix by Prefuse that he recorded for the occasion of his participation in some MoMA night back in May, via Flavorpill (read about it here). I blogged about Mi Ami a while ago, who appear early in the mix, and lately I'm drowning in the incredible sounds of Tim Hecker, who makes for the all-too-brief intro. Broadcast, Dilla, Doom and Madlib get lots of burn in my iPod too. The eclectic bent of the mix is something I can appreciate, all the same, it does get a bit murky so throw it on late in the PM.

Stream mix here.

Tracklist: (sorry, no song titles)

1. Tim Hecker
2. MadVillain
3. Mi Ami
4. Hudson Mohawke
5. LebLaze (Epstein slow crack remix)
6. Broadcast
7. Prefuse 73 Live Meditation
8. Beat Konducta Medley
9. Wu Tang
10. Unreleased Broadcast Security Screenings re-do.
11. EGG
12. We Are Not Together
13. FREAK BEAT MEDLEY(B MUSIC THROWBACKS,etc.)
14. MadVillain
15. RISIL
13. Boredoms
14. Broadcast (illest beat ever)
15. The Predicate: BRINGS “SLOW DEATH” TO: PREFUSE 73 (remix09)
16. SunnO)) German rhythm interlude.
17. eeiioo
18. Christopher Willits
19. Dilla
20. Push Button Objects feat. Mr.Lif+Del (Prefuse73 early 90s remix)
21. Bumps
22. Christopher Willits

Happy Weekend

On The Radar: Artists To Watch

This week: Bibio

A recent discovery for me, that he may be, this laptop-folk practitioner has been around since '04, having recorded an LP that was championed early on by Boards Of Canada. In fact, he was signed to Mush Records on the strength of BOC's word, and now, the artist has just signed to the forward-thinking electronic label Warp. His style will draw obvious comparisons to BOC, however, he samples a lot of his own compositions through lo-fi cassette recorders, even singing occasionally with an English folk sensibility. His Warp debut Ambivalence Avenue drops on June 22, and the lead-off limited 7" vinyl single looks promising.

Bibio - "Ambivalence Avenue" (side A)

As a producer he is able to showcase drastic variation in style from song to song, with side B's "Fire Ant" as evidence; chopping the "Impeach The President" drum break (leaning more towards a left-field hip-hop bent, recalling J Dilla et all), but "Ambivalence Avenue," in its erstwhile psych-folk stasis, is entirely stunning. The melody and 3/4 rhythm is curious, perhaps appropriated from somewhere on the Balkan peninsula, sung in haunting tones equally as retrograded as the guitar loops themselves. Recommended.

Pre-order the LP from Bleep
or
buy older Bibio releases from Mush

***

http://myspace.com/mrbibio

Check out one of his YouTube videos that he directed himself.

Next level Boombox

Want one! Also, that is the intro playing to Illmatic, which is perfect for summertime rotation (with blunts, bitches, and beers -- in a park, of course).

New Music: J Dilla (!)

My all-time favorite hip-hop producer, J Dilla, continues the slew of posthumous releases since his passing in '06, with Jay Stays Paid. I shamefully grabbed J$P online, heedless to the financial implications on Dilla's family. I urge any fan to purchase this album (which I will be doing tomorrow), to help ease the burden of "Ma Dukes" (Dilla's mother, and the executive producer of this record) having to foot the innumerable medical bills from Dilla's Lupus treatments.

One thing Pitchfork reviewer Nate Patrin (who is usually somewhat tolerable) failed to address in his exhaustive review is the fact that many of these beats have not been "unearthed" as he claims so. Some have been taken off of (and out of context) beat CD's (read: CD-R's with on average 30 short beat snippets--used to shop around to rappers) circa '03-'05, pre-Donuts. Stylistically, the lead up to Donuts is demonstrative here, and yet somehow, the album is nicely rounded-out despite having tracks from the artist's other more strait-forward beat crafting periods as well. Dilla, like close friend/collaborator Madlib, always had a knack for choosing off-beat samples to work with, but the incipient works pre-Donuts found the artist experimenting, soon unafraid to break convention entirely (see the tempo change of "Time: The Donut Of The Heart" on Donuts, for example) . This new LP is important for the canon of indie hip-hop in that Dilla himself, single-handedly inspired new movements in Avant-garde hip-hop, that resonate internationally.

"10,000 Watts"

"Coming Back"


http://myspace.com/thegiantpeach
http://myspace.com/jdilla

New Music: Prefuse 73

"Relief Choir" from The Forest Of Oversensitivity

I web logged in the winter about Prefuse when he dropped his latest LP, here. And now he has just released an EP of two remixes from that full length, b/w three new compositions. The Forest Of Oversensitivity EP is a succession of the same ideas and motifs that, despite being well-executed, require multiple listens to soak into the brain juices. "Relief Choir" finds Prefuse chopping the B.T. Express "Do It ('Til You're Satisfied)" break, slowed down, slotted between a slinky octave-jumping bassline, flourished cymbals, and echoed snare rolls. A "choir" of voices sing amid the signature glitchy acoustic guitar plucks, and somehow it all melds into a cohesive whole. Like a lot of Prefuse tracks, the conceit here is smart and morose--and like his best work, this is just as disarming. He apparently recorded Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian to Ampex tape, and one would assume the same applies to this EP (the circumambient reverb certainly sounds tape-ish). Prefuse is becoming Madlib-esque in his prolificity it seems, and as a long time fan, I'm not complaining. Go grab this EP asap!

On Repeat: "Foolish Fool" - Dee Dee Warwick

Dee Dee Warwick, the younger sister of Dionne Warwick, made a career out of singing backup for the likes of Aretha Franklin and Nina Simone. Beginning with gospel roots, her trajectory took her from session singing to an underdeveloped solo stint, to finally backing up sister Dionne, before her untimely death last October.

Her vocal stylings and musical accompaniment contrasted drastically against the polished, classy lounge outings of the more famous Dionne who, ultimately served as Bacharach's muse. In retrospect, Dee Dee represented an authentic pillar of late 60's soul that was seemingly ambivalent towards pop charts. However, songs like "Foolish Fool," with its tasteful string arrangements, jangly funk guitar and hardknock drumming, were able to galvanize pop audiences--on the strength of the singing alone. At times registering in the red, her powerful voice is decidedly the song's centerpiece, with boisterous range and strong emotive resonance. When Dee Dee sings, "She's a fool to think that she can take you from me," listeners can easily imagine the "other woman" on her way to a deserved black eye. Highly recommended.

"Foolish Fool" - from her S/t LP (1969; Mercury)

On The Radar: Artists To Watch

As you know with Clocks & Daggers, there is no emphasis on one particular genre, and such is the case with this post. Instead of a Weekend Playlist I wanted to web log about artists to watch. This week:

Mi Ami
myspace.com/miamiamiami

Based out of San Fransisco, this three-piece "drum punk" outfit straddles more than a few genres, with an honed post-disco, No Wave, Afro-rhythmic bent. The lead singer squeals over angular guitar splashes, along side (never over or under) a formidable rhythm section of jazz-funk bass and four-on-the-floor drums, recalling bands like Liquid Liquid. They have a history in hardcore, with two members from DC's Black Eyes, and are signed to Touch & Go subsidiary imprint Quartersticks.

Paradoxically managing restraint amid cacophony on their debut Watersports LP, Mi Ami remix "Devil's Trident" by Brooklyn's Telepathe to more minimal effect, shown here:

Telepathe - Devil's Trident (Mi Ami Remix) from Daniel Nixon on Vimeo.