Wednesday 30 July 2008

Milosh - Iii


Milosh – Iii

Underneath the odd name and rather unpleasant artwork of this record lies a fairly beautiful interior. Coming across as a sort of Electro-folk artist, with the emphasis heavy on the electronic side of things as the folkishness of it is created through soundscapes rather than some bearded hippy with a guitar.

Each track seems to build, dream-like, slowly and progressively until it reaches a state of pure electronic ambience that is so delicate one almost hesitates to breath in case the spell it weaves is broken. A nice change for these times of brash electro, offensive punk, drab indie and worse… well, stadium sized bands (you know who you are), bringing a small piece of tranquillity into our busy lives as a lush oasis bursting out of a harsh, sand laded desert.

Not, perhaps, the most essential output of the year, however, well worth a look in for anyone who has ever enjoyed Air at any point of their life, or perhaps Boards of Canada and their ilk. To me though, it smacks of being a record with a delicate touch and subtlety that your average persons “chill out” band, The Postal Service, Could only dream of and will always chase, but never reach as very few people have the ability to weave the understated and fragile melodies Milosh has here. A beautiful piece, for darker times.

One Day As A Lion




One Day As A Lion – s/t

Having endured seven years of rumours and hearsay about Zach de la Rocha’s new musical project we were finally, last year greeted with… a Rage Against the machine reunion. Not quite what we were expecting I have to say and having not yet witnessed one of these reunion shows I’m not sure if it’s a welcome either.

Now, however, we finally have some ‘solo’ material from Zach. Though it’s not strictly a solo project, rather a collaboration between him and one of the great drummers of the modern age, John Theodore, previously of The Mars Volta.

As it is, one could be forgiven for expecting something quite special, sprawling yet taught and fuelled by righteous anger. This is not quite what we’ve got. Instead we have something that sounds like Rage Against The Machine with more electronics and less funk, in a nutshell.

Each track is filled with faintly complex rhythms from Theodore and distorted synth lines, replacing the hook and funk laden licks of Tom Morello whilst underneath a bass line rumbles in that (r)age old tradition of playing the same riff as the guitar line, which in this case makes it hard to distinguish. All the while Zach’s vocals, while still clearly angry, have evolved somewhat from the simple rap verses he used in his earlier days. If You Fear Dying, rocks this trend by sounding distinctly Rage-like in the verse.

However, I don’t mean any of this in a negative way. We already (again) have one Rage Against The Machine, we do not need another though, god help us, enough people have tried, so it’s good to hear Zach trying his hand at something new and evolving his sound, though comparisons were inevitable as he was THE voice of a generation of rock fans with that oh-so-distinctive voice.

So, fuelled by distortion loaded synths, complex drum rhythms and Zach’s distinctive, yet mutated, vocals we have the sound of something new, and brutal. Not the greatest record of all time, but this debut EP oozes potential and pulsates with venom. I think we have not heard the last of One Day As A Lion.

Friday 25 July 2008

Kue it



Been checking out this guy recently, DJ Kue, who come to us all the way from San Jose. Bringing an interesting sound and a fresh take on the current wave of house and electro we'r all rocking over here at the moment. Seemingly he's only been producing since 2004 and has come up with some serious trump cards in the shape of "Lovers Break" and his remix of "Low Rider" entitled, "Riding Low". Very cool stuff with huge, grimey synths running through it but all with a really upbeat and poppy melody at the centre as well. We like!


DJ Kue - Riding Low



DJ Kue - Lover's Break


On a completely unrelated note, i saw the funniest road rage incident ever last week, as a taxi stopped in the middle of the road in Muswell Hill so his passenger could use an ATM. Some white van man couldn't take the 30 second wait though, climbed out of his van and started smacking the driver in the face through the window before heading back to his vehicle. At this point the taxi driver decided it would be a good idea to leave his cab (and passenger) in the middle of the road and call the police while standing in front of the van, leaving it unable to move and resulting in HUGE tailbacks on both sides of the road.

Of course, being the good citizen that i am, i simply stood back and laughed at the ridiculous of the situation and at how pathetic people can be about staying still for the shortest periods of time. Oh, and the idiocy of the cab driver in the first place..

What strange times we live in.


Love,

James

X

Monday 21 July 2008

Lovebox...


Just heard the new Guns n' Bombs single. Sounds ace, possibly better than the "Nothing is Getting Us Anywhere/Crossover Appeal" split. It's out September, keep your eyes open.

Was a weird one. for starters there was the pretty poor lineup, but as it finished at around 10 or so on both days and started at... well, i'm not sure, but the afternoons seemed to go pretty quick, meaning that it was easy enough to pass the day watching decent artists.

Saturday was a bit dry as i was deeply hungover, having drunk far too much before dollop and housed a small aferparty round mine and Thick As Thieves were staying sober for the Lovebox DJ competition at The End that night. We caught a bit of Mylo, who rocked some good tunes and was followed by Beardyman's beatboxing antics. Anyone who can get a tent full of people singing the Home And Away theme at 6 in the evening gets my vote! Eventually they were followed by Midnight Juggernauts who were pretty late due to one of their number ending up at the wrong airport. Disappointingly, the Institubes trio are a bit poor this evening. The sound isn't great and the tunes seem to lack any real low-end and feel very flat. Maybe another day.

After that we decided to skip Young Blood Brass Band and head off to get some food before hitting the end for the Lovebox DJ competition. Saw some interesting DJs and The Glimmers. Thick As Thieves rocked it much harder than anyone, really getting the dancefloor going. They didn't win, however, some might say it was quite literally robbed from them. I have a feeling things are going to work out for the best anyway. Watch this space...

Sunday was a different matter all together, as there was no hangover/competitions to wory about that evening, so that called for vodka and a few beers on the way and i think we'd put away a full bottle about fifteen minutes after walking through the gates whilst rocking out to Mehdi in some large-ass tent. That single set totally won me over (as i've not been a fan of Mehdi since seeing seeing him very much drop the ball at Fresh Out Of Death a couple of years ago).
Post my faith-restoration, Aussies Pnau take the stage and are everything Midnight Juggernauts should have been. Big electro songs are jacked out to the crowd in the live band format (though you'd be hard pushed to tell it was a band if you kept your eyes closed, things didn't quite seem to add up on the live front.. but who knows), either way they rocked it hard. Which set the stage nicely for Herve to come and batter us into submission with plenty of incredibly nasty jacking house.

So far so good... However, The Flaming Lips was a bit of a disappointment as the sound was terrible and their stage show looked mad, but doesn't work in the daytime (that'll be a big gripe with the London day festivals, they all finish so early the headliners always play in the light which more or less ruins the effect all the lighting may have had etc). Yoshimi Battles Pink Robots was cool though.

It was bhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifack to the Lovebunny arena after that where we caught some Talking Heads being pumped out and ran into Herve who quickly introduced us to Drop the Lime and Drums Of Death. A trio of true gentlemen. So much love t them for being very sound guys, keeping us laughing for over an hour and inviting us to come out with them (alas we were too poor) and a night in the notorious Dolphin pub ensued. Not a shabby weekend by anyone's standards.



As for some tunage, well... Thick As Thieves banged this out o Saturday evening and it was possibly my favourite moment of the evening (other than that immense build in D.I.M.'s "My People" mix).


Little Boots - Stuck On Repeat (Fake Blood Remix)

Hopefully much more to come this week, as i seem to have collected a whole bunch of stuff that i rather like last week.


Out,

James.

Tuesday 15 July 2008

WEEKEND!


Was big! Then really quiet, but whatever. We did Voodoo on Friday at The Last Days Of Decadence which, i think, went pretty well. Jac the disco and Plimsouls started things of nicely with laid back electro-tech sets that kept the spirits upbeat until Adam Kesher finally opened up the main room downstairs. I heard "Local Girl" coming up through the floor boards and bolted downstairs in time to catch most of the song. It was awesome and the band pretty much nailed the rest of the set, despite having to play without a drummer which i can only assume is a little unnatural for them.

With that coming to an end, Youth Attack!! picked things up on the ground floor playing a nice set of dark electro, including Proxy's "Dance in the Dark" and their remix of Late Of the Pier's "Focker" which had me jumping around like the fool that i am. We like these guys a lot and hope to have them down again soon! All the while Thick As Thiees are doing their usual thing and slaying the dancefloor with bangers left, right and center. Meaning that i was quite surprised people had any energy left by the time Foamo came on. They did, however, and things only got more insane as Master gibbon proceeded to destroy the dancefloor with an unnerving ability for one so young!

Then we got Andy George closing up the main room, words aren't really needed to describe this gentlemen as there's nothing to say that i haven't said before. Andy brought the lace to it's knees, and rarely will you see so many people so happy to have been pushed to dance that hard for that long!

Bizarely, while all this was going on downstairs, upstairs was doing it's own little line in revelations, a line not even we could could have predicted. Mystery Jets were doing their thing as usual and generally having a good time when someone rather special rolled in and decided to get involved in a spot of mixing. It was Erol Alkan.

A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.

Not only did he really top off the night, but he was an absolute gentleman as well and a pleasure to talk to. Coming with him was Faley, of LOTP fame, and i haven't seen that fellow since about October, so it was good to be able to catch up with him to, before Med Damon cosed the night in his usual style, loudly. TO put it bluntly, it was fucking good and i can't wait for the next Voodoo on 15th August. I'll shout you the line up as soon as i'm sure it's for public release, safe to say that's it's, feasibly, even better.

The only downside of the night really was a poor soundsystem, but that is hopefully going to be fixed ext time round and things will be even better then. Nice.

Thick As Thieves July Mix

Tracklist:


1. The Black Ghosts - I Want Nothing (Jackbeats' Miami Vice Mix)
2. Fake Blood - Mars
3. Don Rimini - Let Me Back Up (Crookers Remix)
4. Altern-8 - Frequency (Hostage Remix)
5. Foamo - Moving it over here
6. The Proxy - Dancing In The Dack
7. Machines Don't Care - Afrojacker
8. Jape - Floating (D.I.M Remix)
9. Ladyhawke - Paris Is Burning (Peaches Remix)
10. Boy 8-Bit - Bulbs Burn Out
11. Outlander - Vamp
12. Idiotproof - The Decon (Duke Dumont Remix)
13. Shadow Dancer - Cowbois
14. Space - Magic Fly

Boom!



The rest of the weekend was reasonably uneventful. Saw Kung-Fu Panda at the cinema and it's as typically average and watchable as you'd expect a Dreamworks animation to be. So, it's basically all about Wall-E now, which is going to be very cool. I'm excited, i may even break my trend of waiting a week or two so i can have the cinema more or less to myself and head off to watch it on the opening weekend.
Yesterday, however, i went of to Water Rats to catch Lovvers and Fucked Up. I petty much missed Lovvers (as i went down a bit late because, as usual, no one wants to come and see a hardcore band because you're all lame, yep, all of you, and i didn't want to sit on my own for ours as it gets very tedious) but the last track sounded cool and the inensity of the performance looked impressive to. But what would you expect from ex-members of Murder of Rosa Luxembourg?

Fucked Up lived up to their reputation and destroyed the place with tracks like "Two Snakes" that are serious hardcore anthems. The highlights probably being them running "David comes to Life" into "Invisible Leader" as per on the on their last album and everyone going so nuts i'm pretty certain i had my face squashed on the stage about twenty times. It's a good thing. Also watchng a very large man(Pink Eyes the vocalist) beig picked up and carried b the crowd. It's not every day a very large, very topless, very hairy man http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifwill enrapture people to the point they spontaneously pick him up of the stage and carry him about. That and one of the three guitarists throing himself into th mellee, landing on his back on outstreched hands and staying there for a few minutes without missing a note. Oh, and some kid asking, "Have you done "David comes to Life?"
"I'm afraid we played that one already, sorry."
"Can you do it again?"

Cue much ammusement.

Yeah, Fucked Up are incredible. I thought we'd got away with a bloodless show this time as well, until i got home and found one side of brand new dunks covered in someone else's blood. Yummy.

Fucked Up - David Come's To Life

Fucked Up - Ivisible Leader


Hope that read's ok. feels like a while since a wrote a longer piece...

Oh, and while we're on the topic of Fucked Up, i rather like this piece NME did baout them as part of their Tales Of The Jackalope festival last year. I feel they knew how to deal with them about as well as te security they mention...

"In the dying moments of their aborted gig, brick-outhouse-shaped Fucked Up singer Damian Abraham makes the sign of the cross to the baying crowd, holds a slab of chipboard at his forehead, and in one brutal movement brains it in two, just before he’s hustled from the stage, as an angry rain of bottles fall on security. Three songs in, Fucked Up have fucked-out, the plug pulled, we hear, because of noise complaints from Jackalope’s fucking-miles-away neighbours. Headbutting the front row and clambering into the pit probably didn’t help his cause. In terms of hardcore hardcore bands, Fucked Up make Gallows look like S Club Juniors."



Out.


Love,


James.

X

Wednesday 9 July 2008

Mightyfools


Yo!

So, today... that post i mentioned about Mightyfools is going up! Woop. I have to admit, i can't give you a detailed background on the lovely Dutch duo. I can tell you that they used to mix under the moniker, "Man Eat Dj & Jizm ", which is utterly delightful. I think i'm a little more down with the Mightyfools name under which they're now playing. Other than that, they make wicked tunes, which they describe as "Idol/Flamenco/Chinese Traditional" I'd disagree and opt for something ore along the lines of jacking house. But, whatever works for you, you know?


So, if you enjoyed yesterday's bits and pieces, these two will definitely be worth looking into. First we have DMX getting twisted up with jumping house beats. So you get DMX shouting as loudly as usual then, as well as some massive basslines.

DMX - Up In Here (Mightyfools Remix)


and a slightly more techy take on the genre with their Kelis do-over.

Kelis - Milkshake (Man Eat DJ & Jizm Remix)


Which leaves one more for tomorrow. Nicely done.



Voodoo in two days and i am excited. Very excited, especially as Adam Kesher are now confirmed as the live special guests. Go have a listen to Local Girl on their Myspace player.


Also, if anyone's still walking after friday, there's Last One In Is A rotten Egg at 333 on the Saturday as well. It's hosted by Jac The Disco who are going to opening up Voodoo from 9:00 - 9:45. They've also kindly donated this mix for Plastic Cowboys.

Jac The Disco Mix (Zshare i'm afraid)

TRACKLIST HERE

01 Intro
02 Duke Dumont -Feltham
03 DJ Sega - Be
04 Bobmo - Legally Dead for 4'31
05 Crookers - Love to Edit
06 Mr Oizo - M-Seq
07 Samantha Fu - Theme from Discotheque
08 Strip Steve - Tommy Boy
09 Giorgio Moroder - I Wanna Rock You

Find out more about them here:

Jac The Disco


and their clubnight here:

Last One In Is A Rotten Egg




Until then,

Chuck.


X

Tuesday 8 July 2008

Focker




Everyone loves Late Of The Pier right? Probably. Focker doesn't seem to have been remixed in too many shapes and sizes, which i find slightly odd due to the nature of it being very awesome. A few have slippd by though, including a Youth Attack!! on i put up, but has since expired so must upload that again i suppose.

I also know that Boys Noize has done something with it as i seem to remember it being on Digitalism's new Kistsune mix tape (yep, Kitsune have started a mixtape series), but haven't got a copy of it yet. Aside from that, Pete Carvell has done a weird, slightly techy mix that makes good use of the breakdown from the end of the original, which it slams fairly hard into after a decent build up.


Late Of the Pier - Focker (Pete Carvell's Focking Gash remix)



(Mighty Fools go to party, drink too much, get lost and someone takes a photo...)

Other than that, i've been listening to some interesting new house stuff over the last week, the best of which is probably Math Head, though i haven't got round to picking up any of his stuff yet. Rest assured, it's bordering on insane!

Stuff i have picked up is that ammusing and fun remix of Bad Boy for Life by La Mode. Good summer time tune i think. As well as some stuff by Mighty fools, who may just go on to big things, after this remix of Oh Snap!'s 'I'm Too Fat To Be A Hipster". It's not bad at all.

Oh Snap! - I'm Too fat To Be A Hipster (Mighty Fools Remix)


and we also have a hostage remix of another Oh Snap! track,"Bill Cosby Sweater, (worth it for the title alone, no?) big, BIG song!

Oh Snap! - Bill Cosby Sweater (Hostage remix)

Um, that's it for now, other than to say, go check the Voodoo post and pick up all the stuff from there so you know what's coming on Friday. Exciting stuff! Well, i'm excited anyway.

Big weekend behind Plastic cowboys right now, going to need about a week to recover...

So more tomorrow!


Love,


Chuck.

X

Wednesday 2 July 2008

TOUCH this.


So tomorrow (that's Thursday 3rd July folks) is going to be the biggest Thursday in AAAAAges.

Touch is opening up at SIN club in central, by Tottenham Court Road tube, and has a line up some of the best DJs around right now! Looking top in my books though is room 2 which has Deadly Rhythm coming up trumps again.

This time they have Duke Dumont, Jack Beats (!!!!!), FOOD soundsystem and more. Amazing. You couldn't ask for more over the weekend, let alone on the weekend, so get Friday off and start early. Oh yeah.

See you there.


X

Going Nowhere.


We ain't.

Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Diddy. Whatever you call him it's stupid, and he's a bit shit, right?

Almost. I did always like Bad Boys for Life, mainly because it's actually good. So when i heard Fresh Out Of Death Soundsystem play it in 333 a few weeks ago i was a smiling young chap, then realised it was a remix and set out to get, when i remembered... which turned out to be only a few days ago.

Turns out La Mode have given it an wicked makeover, with a two minute fidget intro before it slows down and things kick off in, i suppose, spectacular fashion. While it may not exactly be up with Andy George and Lee Mortimer in terms of quality, i think it makes up for this in sheer fun factor as it's guaranteed to bring a grin to your face.

P. Diddy - Bad Boys for Life (La Mode's Bad Motherfuckers Fuck Up)

alsohttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif good on my playlsit right now is, well... lots, but this too...

Crookers - Sveglia (Oh Snap! Booty Alarm Mix)


Check La Mode and Oh Snap! at their relative myspace pages for more tunes. Including one about being too fat to be a hipster. Which i like.

(We are trying a new policy on Plastic Cowboys of helping you download faster, thus helping you get out to the shops faster to buy tracks when you hear how good they are. Now, you should simply have to right click and save as. If it doesn't work, send me abuse at the usual address).

Bye.



Chuck.

X