Download: "Departure" by KODAK TO GRAPH

Kodak to Graph's track-a-month project begins with "Departure" via the wonderful Bad Panda. Kodak to Graph is from Pensacola! This is audio dynamite imho. I'm lovin' it.

DOWNLOAD: ∜♡MDISCS 2K13

 What can you say about the massive 71 track free ∜♡MDISCS 2K13 compilation LP? Someone called it "a clusterfuck", and I was like 'Well what part of 3 and a half hours of free new underground music do you not like?' Is it too much? Hell no! It is a great deal of music to digest, and it can't be done at one listen. This is a set that will be in my stack of current discs for months to come. AMDISCS Soundcloud says they're based in London, their Facebook says Santa Cruz CA, but I always thought they were from Prague. No matter, the label's earned its' bona fides as a consistent purveyor of post-witch house, post-chillwave [Did I say that?] net-music. AMDISCS 2013 is an encyclopedic report on the state of the DIY underground. This is the right stuff, too - the outer edge; non-conformist, unhyped, real-deal shit. The 'authenticity levels' are in the red. Featuring new tracks by the likes of AyGeeTee, Party Trash, Shisa, a i r s p o r t s, Dreams, the collection includes representative tracks from the full spectrum of contemporary net-pop, from cloud rap to noise pop, damaged glitchy instrumental hip-hop to witch-rave drones. Some highlights are Quiltland's "Time Phrase", ROMCOM's "とても滑らか", Go Dugong's rework of Giraffage's "Computer City", Gunge's "Hot Dog", Matthew Dotson's incredible "Don’t Want to Hold on to Never", of course AyGeeTee's pair of tracks, Shisa's "Flowers", and the track the most likely to be a hit - made right here in the dirty South by Knoxville TN based Heatstroke and SORTAHUMAN of Huntsville AL; "Blowin' My Mind". The massive set is in free to download in two zipped files. Get this!
 

Download: James Deen Remix of "Video" by India Arie

Track: "Love Grows" by VERACOM

Download: REID "Wake"

                                                         Reid is from Cork, Ireland.

Download: COYOTE CLEAN UP "Totally Tube'n"

                                                            This is the jam. 10/10.

Video: Tyree Cooper "Turn Up The Bass" 1989

Tyree Cooper was one of the OG Chicago house music producers, and he broadened his work to include rapping, calling it hip-house. He was by far the most successful purveyor the style, and came close to the big-time with the club hit "Turn Up The Bass", which verged on mainstream radio acceptability, but was a little too early. The track contains many samples that will be familiar. This may not be the very first time the James Brown, Lyn Collins "Think" two beat "aw! Yeah" sample was used, but it was one of the first. Each of the many samples used was fresh when the track came out. The beat and rhythm, and even the samples were much copied and reused. Two years later Marky Mark Wahlberg rode a vastly inferior but very similar track to an international number one hit. And I think it holds up to time pretty well; the propulsive rhythm still makes me want to move my body all these years later. It just flat out kicks ass. This is the original mix. There are many remixes, but this is the one.

This is an illustration of cultural diffusion; of how cultural currents are spread from a source, a root. I can tell you, when this song came out, it was one of the freshest and most startlingly original records I had ever heard. And the same for Chicago house in general: it was so new, so out-of-the-ordinary as to seem like it just appeared out of nowhere, fully formed. For listeners like me, who were still stuck in a post punk / new wave / Industrial kinda mode, the vitality and originality of Chicago house quickly swept away all other interests completely. It was a paradigm shift. I don't think that any of the many derivatives of house, including drum & bass and dubstep, and 'garage' (which is really just house), have or had anywhere near the originality, or vitality, of the pure true original Chicago (and Detroit) house music, and that each of those sub-genres is as an echo of that original impulse, radiating in diminishing waves from that very special time and place.

The video is quite interesting in itself, as it features real Chicago locations and a little school footwork.

Download: BLOWN - GODS HOUSE REMIXES

                         
                                                                           Download

 

Download: Bummer Pop Remixes by James and Evander

                           
                                 August was a fucked up month and I missed this. I love it.

Download: Winter We Won by Alligator Indian

A remix album collection similar to last weeks post about the Nomadic Firs WILD , Alligator Indian's Winter We Won provides those of us addicted to remixes an easy point of entry into the Asheville, North Carolina band's work.

Track: "Contact" by RxGibbs

                                                 
                  Downtempo new age magic. The CONTACT Ep is set for April 2 on Cascine.