Tuesday 12 February 2008

"DO NOT SEEK THE TRAY-ZURE"

Some bits & bobs that have helped us persuade our quack to reduce our Citalopram script over the last couple of weeks;
Dobie Gray - You Can Do It (Infinity)

Cash in disco with more than a hint of the Tony Orlandos about it, but a winner nonetheless.

Barbara Jones - Never Let Me Go (A Side)

A sunny 7 inches of prime Lovers, ideal for this unseasonably clement weather that we're currently enjoying.

Panda Bear - Good Girl/Carrots (Paw Tracks)

A tad shy of 13 minutes worth of Tribal drumming, gobbledey gook lyrics, Inuit throat singing, lurching dub basslines, Northern stomping, reverb, Tibetan finger cymbals & Noah Lennox's plaintive vocals. If you don't already own the magisterial "Person Pitch" might we humbly suggest going & availing yourself of it RIGHT FLIPPING NOW.

Jay Dee - Games & Funky Things (Instrumental) (Warners)

Barry White production formerly used as a theme by the Big Dawg 'imself, His Holiness Timothy of Westwood for his wireless programme - recently snagged on a 7 for 20p in one of the all too infrequent CDL Charity Shop snatch missions.

Lovefingers - Kentucky (RVNG)

Christ alone knows what the original is but ol' Funky Spingers is bang on the dough with his edit, the get.

The Bee Gees - Love You Inside & Out (RSO)

Quite how that intro hasn't been pilfered for sampling purposes is beyond my admittedly limited ken, unless of course it has; in which case disregard this dreck.

Bill Nelson - Another Willingly Opened Window (Mercury)

The former Be Bop Deluxer heads right up his own hoop on this "experimental" LP from 1981 but this the opener on Side 2 makes the rest of the guff worth sticking with.

The Glimmer Twins - Music For Dreams (Glimmers)

With those frankly sickeningly talented Nordic types Lindstrom & Prins Thomas on board for the ride this is one of the stand out cuts from their "The Glimmers are Gee Gee Fazzi" see-dy.

Terry Riley - A Rainbow In Curved Air (CBS)

If there was an award for the most cloyingly idealistic sleevenotes, this LP'd win by a country mile but as there isn't currently any such award (nor is there likely to be if we're being honest) the 18 or so predominantly beatless minutes that make up side 1 will just have to do.

Hercules/Love Affair feat Anthony - Blind (DFA)

In any right minded society this'd piss all over the records set by Bryan Adams/Smack Smack Smack for the longest running Number 1 of all time, EVER! but we don't so it won't - comfort yourself by simply listening to it time & time again. Lush as a last minute derby winner.

Thursday 7 February 2008

Cafe del Lar Classics # 1 - Masami Tsuchiya - Rice Music (Epic, 1982)

Opening with the title track, a typically Nipponese plink plonk rhythm underpinned by Mick Karn’s trademark rubber band basslines, Rice Music is an album that could’ve only been made in the early 80s. It sets the tone for ten tracks of ‘globalearic’ grooves that throw everything at the wall to see what sticks.

Se! Se! Se! is a funky Talking Heads style global groove with itchy n’ scratchy guitars and Tom Tom Club-esque shouty stream-of-consciousness vocals. Haina-Haila is a tribal drum fest with Karn’s drunken master bassline and what sounds like Japanese schoolgirls (infact backing vocalists Eve, Nachiko and Yoko) chanting mantras over a Buddhist monk’s sermon. It is perhaps the greatest tribal drum, squelchy bass, Buddhist chant tune ever recorded. Tao-Tao ups the tempo with a flinty funk-pop workout. Side one’s closing track, Neo-Rice Music borrows the main riff from Tao-Tao and slows it down to a drowsy, dream-like drool.

On side 2, Kafka opens with a weird discordant cello sound effect over a dislocated voice that builds gradually with an synth-accordian/bubbly bassline (the midpoint between Kraftwerk’s The Model and Nirvana’s Come As You Are) jam. Rice Dog Jam barks it’s intentions in another take on Mutant Disco’s frantic arty post-funk with syncopated woofs, megaphone vocals and Toshio Nakanishi’s ‘preaching.’ Secret Party is a murky, underwater orgy of mysterious oozy sounds and textures for which the term ‘Balearic As Fuck’ could have been invented, whereas Silent Object is a beautiful ambient instrumental that evokes the calm meditative pools of a Japanese garden. The LP closes with Night In The Park, a Bowie-esque vocal over a traditional pop structure reminiscent of post-Eno Roxy.

With the ubiquitous assistance of Riuichi Sakamoto, Bill Nelson, Japan’s Mick Karn and Steve Jansen and with Tsuchiya not only providing vocals but playing everything from guitar, drums, synth and bass to bamboo percussion, koto and yokin, (Kiyohiko Semba also provides wadaiko, tsuzumi and tabla percussion) cynics could maybe criticise Rice Music as an exercise in plastic Orientalism for worthier-than-thou world music wannabes. Yet, at a time when the likes of Sakamoto, Bowie, Japan, Eno, Byrne and Nelson were blurring the boundaries between ethnic and experimental, traditional and transcendental, Rice Music is an LP that constantly throws up surprises and only underlines the energy and imagination of post-punk pop during this era.

The cover shows the artist sat at a desk in a fetching mauve trolly dolly meets International Rescue outfit. His heavily made-up, prettily androgynous face stares enigmatically into the distance, one hand balanced on his chin, the other plucking a guitar. To his left is a huge globe, angled to show Japan, China and the far east. The message is simple; the world is shrinking and old codes of sexuality and culture no longer matter. ‘New York-London-Paris-Munich-(Tokyo), everyone‘s talking about Pop Music! In 1982, anything appeared possible.

Monday 4 February 2008

Back In The Day - Fanzine Charts 91/92

We don’t wanna get too nostalgic here on CDL but we ARE a pair of lazy cunts, so here are a few charts culled from various old fanzines to get you all welled up about the first time you dropped a Scotty Road pigeon and hugged your aul fellar with a tear in your eye :

Jack Of All Trades - Upfront 25

1 Love Decade - World Is Listening (White)
2 Royal 1 (White)
3 Fortran 5 - Heart On The Line (Mute)
4 Too Damn Free - Too Damn Free (White)
5 WIR - So & Slow It Goes (Orb Mix) (Mute)
6 2 In A Room - Do What You Want (Remixes) (SBK)
7 Various - House Of Bazic Grooves (Flying)
8 La Banderita - Mediterranean (Inlite)
9 Natural Life - Strange World/Def n’ Duff (H’wood)
10 DJ Energetic - Energetic (BMG)
11 Fish - Can U Feel It (US Cutting Records)
12 Pacific - Compassion (Remix) (EMI)
13 Fabi Paras - Together/People (White)
14 Timbal - Loca (Flying/Nation)
15 B Rich - Salvation (White)
16 Oblique - Fall Down On Me (Trapshut)
17 Al Hambra - Al Hambra (B Tech)
18 Marina Van Roy - Let You Go (Remix) (Deconstruction)
19 Fini Tribe - Ace Love Deuce (White/One Little Indian)
20 Pacha - One Kiss (Z)
21 The Grid - Boom (Virgin)
22 Audio Deluxe - 60 Seconds (Volante)
23 DJ Cisky - Sequence Time (Flying)
24 DBM - Real Dream (umm)
25 Syko - Sex Talk (Hype)

From Northern Lights - No 1 Sept 1991

Songs To Learn & Sing

Mass Order - Take Me Away
Kim Syms - Too Blind To See It
Vitamino - What I’ve Got
Gypsy Men - Daylight/Stopping Us
Finitribe - Ace-Love-Deuce (Robertson Mix)
M1 - Dynomite
Little Louie Vega - Ride On The Rhythm
Dance Advisory Commission - Free Your Mind
East Side Beat - Ride Like The Wind
Leroy Burgess - Miss Thang
Ce Ce Penistone - Finally
Prince - Gett Off
Butcher Sam - Piano Passions
Photon Inc feat Paula Brion - Generate Power
Moodswings - Works Of Atreus
For Djs Only Vol2 - Burnin’ Up Philly
Beat masters - Boulevard Of Broken Dreams
Gina Stewart - Dance All Night
Cookie Watkins - I’m Attracted To You
Groove Committee - I Want To Know
F.K.W - Romeo & Juliet
Patrick Hernandez - Born To Be Alive
Formula 4/4 - Throw Down The Madness
Dupree Brass Disk
Irving & Romeo - Brighter Day

From Sunnyside Up, No 1 1991

Mike Pickering’s Tunes for Oct/Nov 92

Funky Guitar - TC1992
Heart - Kathy Sledge
Doing Doing Boogie - Afro Kid Dubtown Disco
It Will Make Me Crazy - Felix
Just Us - Joey Washington
Love Vibration - Cusa
Temple Of Love - A Homeboy, A Hippy & A Funky Dread
Let Me Be Your Underwear - Club 69
Francisca - Espiritu
We We - Angelique Kidjo
Who Can Make Me Feel Good - Bassheads
Lost In The Groove - Groove Patrol
Da Rydim - Da Ridym
Aint No Mountain - KXP
Children Of The World - Yolanda Reynolds
Work In Progress EP - Rejuvenation
Don’t Give Up - Pig City
Everything I Do - Cynthia M
Understand This Groove - UFI
Muzik - DJ Pierre
The Music Is Movin - Fargetta
Sereno - Brat Foundation
Music Is So Wonderful - Vivian Lee
Day & Night - Novecento
Lake Of Dreams - The Infinite Wheel
One Day - Tyrrel Corporation
Verba Del Diablo - Datura
One Nation - Supereal
Soul Freedom - Degrees Of Motion
Sunshine - Unit 2

From Ace Of Clubs No 2, 1992

Friday 1 February 2008

Phil Mison - Pen Portrait

Best known for his uncanny ability to produce flawless Balearic sets as a DJ, as a remixer par excellence as one half of Reverso 68 and for his own subtle moodscapes as Cantoma, Phil Mison is widely regarded as one of the nicest men in the known universe. Rather than ask the great man a load of bullshit questions about music n’ stuff however, we thought it’d be far more revealing to find out what makes Phil tick by asking a load of trivial nonsense in the style of a Shoot player's profile instead.

Favourite netball position
WING ATTACK

Favourite soup
KNORRS CHICKEN NOODLE

Favourite marsupial
KOALA

Favourite french actor/actress
JEAN ROCHEFORT

Favourite coin of the realm
TWENTY PENCE

Favourite film starring Doug McClure
WARLORDS OF ATLANTIS

Favourite stretch of sand
WORMS HEAD

Favourite forest
AALBORG PARK

Favourite mountain range
ALPS

Favourite brand of washing up powder
DAZ

Favourite theme park
KNOTTS BERRY FARM

Favourite pope
PIUS X

Favourite athletic discipline
JAVELIN

Favourite personal injury claim advert
THE ONE WHERE THE WOMAN SLIPS ON THE FLOOR

Favourite neo-realist film director
FRANCIS PEYRAT

Favourite bodily function
SNEEZING

Favourite waterproof clothing label
CANDELAS WINDCHEATER

Favourite book by a footballer
TOUGH AT THE TOP- ALAN DEVONSHIRE

Favourite book by a former-cellist
MY WAY- JAQUELINE DU PRE

Favourite character from It Aint Half Hot Mum
GUNNER GRAEME

Phil is appearing as Alladin at The Big Chill Pie n' Mash Cafe til March 23rd