Dilated Choonz: > p*soul

In Honour of the Passing of Mrs T...

Hal Berstram — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 13:15:00 +0100

Morrissey – Margaret On The Guillotine

I think it’s fair to say that few musicians are as polarising as ex-Smiths lead singer and long time soloist Morrissey. There seems to be relatively little middle ground – people either love the guy or think he is a piece of shit. This is from his first solo LP “Viva Hate”, released in 1988 when Margaret Thatcher was still Prime Minister, and really sums up what a substantial part of the British population felt at the time. And probably still do. It’s not a great song, but then I get the feeling it wasn’t meant to be.

Interesting 25-year retrospective :: on "Viva Hate" at The Quietus
Original vinyl release :: at Discogs - something disconcerting about the idea of Morrissey on CD...

File Download (3:40 min / 5 MB)

Song for a man found in a car park

Hal Berstram — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 21:49:00 +0000

Billy Bragg – Richard
Following recent electronic explorations it’s Back to Basics with perhaps the best songwriter of the 1980s. Billy Bragg appeared in 1983 with the extraordinarily titled mini-LP Life’s A Riot With Spy vs Spy on ex-Pink Floyd manager Peter Jenner’s Utility records, repackaged with second album Brewing Up with Billy Bragg on the soon-to-be-ironically titled Back To Basics a couple of years later, in which form it remains available. Soon to be ironic because Bragg was – and is – partial to a left-wing song; whereas the phrase “Back To Basics” was taken up in the early 1990s by the UK’s Conservative Prime Minister John Major, with farcical results.

The first two Bragg albums feature just voice and electric guitar – with songs recorded just as he played them in his one-man live set of the time. With the sound stripped down that far, everything hinges on whether the songs are any good, and fortunately Billy had some of the best ones going: pretty much everything on the debut is a classic – “The Milkman Of Human Kindness”, “A New England” (covered soon after by Kirsty MacColl) and “The Man In the Iron Mask”. The next album went ever better IMHO with songs like “It Says Here” (an attack on the Murdoch-dominated right-wing UK press), “Love Gets Dangerous”, “From a Vauxhall Velox” and “This Guitar Says Sorry”.

So why “Richard”? Mainly because the skeleton found in a Leicester car park has been identified fairly conclusively as that of the infamous King Richard III of England, whose death brought to an end the Wars of the Roses and led to the formation of the Tudor dynasty. Richard was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485, but outrageously, historians never realised before that the battle was fought in a car park. But now we know better.

Buy "Life's A Riot With Spy vs Spy" :: excellently available in 2-CD remastered form from the Billy Bragg website

File Download (2:50 min / 4 MB)

Dave's First

Hal Berstram — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 20:34:00 +0000

David Bowie and the Lower Third – Can’t Help Thinking About Me

As a long-term David Bowie fan, the last few years have seen pretty lean pickings. Bowie had a hectic schedule in the early 2000s, with two pretty good albums in quick succession – Heathen and Reality, and a lot of touring. That era came to an end after he suffered a heart attack backstage after a gig in 2004, and since then he’s hardly been seen in public.

So it was a pleasant surprise, to say the least, when I heard that Bowie had released a new single, “Where Are We Now?” It’s a pleasant enough downtempo listen, very much in the mould of his 1999 LP “hours…”, but I wanted to take you back almost 50 years to Bowie’s first ever solo release under the Bowie moniker (previous to that he was recording under his real name David Jones but was suffering confusion with Davy Jones of the Monkees). For this release, inexplicably, he’s backed by “The Lower Third” – what kind of a name for a backing group is that? Sounds like a school class.

“Can’t Help Thinking About Me” is probably the best 1960s single not to become a hit, although there is stiff competition from the High Numbers (aka The Who)’s debut single “I’m The Face”. Classic mid-60s pop and very economical with it, clocking in at under 2-and-a-half minutes. He even namechecks himself, ferchrissakes… “my girl calls my name… Hi Dave!” and also “Question Time” is mentioned, 13 years before the programme actually started on the BBC. This is a bloody time traveller record, and a stunning debut. Sadly Bowie abandoned the mid-60s pop-mod sound soon afterwards, although he continued to be informed by the mid-60s all through the 70s (most obviously on Pin Ups, although arguably the whole Ziggy Stardust thing was just mid-60s beat group rock with the guitars turned up well loud. But then all the best early 70s glamrockers were in that zone (Bolan, Slade, etc.)

Not sure if this is currently available on CD but it’s pretty easy to get 2nd hand or with a Spotify search. My copy came with one of those free CDs that you get with Mojo magazine – this one was called “Maximum ‘65” and was just about the best CD that Mojo has ever put out, worth several times the cover price of the mag in my book. Probably appearing at a charity shop near you as we speak.

More unusual Bowie gems and related stuff over the next few weeks. Dust off the pinstripe suits…

2nd hand at Discogs :: is your best bet for a hard copy of this - the "1966" compilation seems most reasonable, although "I Dig Everything - the 1966 Pye Singles" is another option

File Download (2:26 min / 5 MB)

"Raucous, monotonous heavy metal..."

Hal Berstram — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 18:22:00 +0000

Paris – Religion

2012 saw far too many great musicians kick the bucket, and one of those was ex-Fleetwood Mac lead guitarist Bob Welch. Welch
held Mac together between its two most commercial periods – the late-60s blues-rock phase with Peter Green and the late-70s mega-successful California phase with Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. He was on 5 Mac LPs between 1971 and 1974 but then left because he felt the group wasn’t getting anywhere and he wanted to try something with a heavier sound – and promptly formed the hard-rock trio Paris with bassist Glenn Cornick (an early member of Jethro Tull) and drummer Thom Mooney.

Paris’s eponymous 1975 debut LP owes a huge debt chucks out the soft-rock stylings that Welch had spent 4 years cultivating with the Mac and instead presents a studio-slick approximation of the Led Zeppelin sound, although with less raucous vocals. It’s an all-time classic, which was not well received by the Rolling Stone Record Guide (1979 edition):

“Paris was raucous, monotonous heavy metal… self-righteous songs and noisy playing.”

But remember that this was the same publication that gave the first 4 AC/DC albums zero out of 5 stars and you’ll realise just how wildly off-beam these guys were.

Paris sadly only lasted 2 albums (and their 2nd LP, the bizarrely titled Big Towne, 2061 was a lot less heavy than the debut, although still good) but at their best they were up there with Zeppelin, Sabbath, The Groundhogs and UFO as fine practitioners of 70s metal. Pass the Flying V! And RIP Bob Welch – a sadly missed rocker.

Brilliantly available :: on 24-bit digital remaster for the first time, as befits an album of this quality
Nice tribute article ::

File Download (5:20 min / 7 MB)

Alboy's Best of 2011: #3

The Mighty Alboy — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 23:48:00 +0100

Ghost Poet – “Survive it”

Just a beautiful track this, from South London (Tooting Bec!) lad Obaro Ejimiwe, aka Ghost Poet.

If you havent got his LP peanut butter blues and melancholy jam, then you’re missing out- like Ghost Poet missed out on the Mercury Prize in 2011. Shoulda been his…

Cool video too:

ghost poet homepage ::
buy it from rough trade ::

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Alboy's Best of 2011: #9

The Mighty Alboy — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 12:00:00 +0000

LCD Soundsystem- “I Can Change” (London Session)

Thought this was from 2011, but dammit, it was released in Nov 2010.

This is just a great tune- James Murphy’s lyrics are splendid, and musically it’s highly reminiscent of Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (who are still going, can you believe?). This from the London Sessions recordings, which are particularly fine- found it hard to choose between this and all my friends.

2011 was a poignant year for LCD Soundsystem. Frontman James Murphy had turned 40, and he had previously said “I’ll just do this until I’m 40, and then I’ll do something else” which he duly did- so 2011 saw LCD play their last gig- at Madison Square Garden NYC. The place was packed out, and a friend of mine told me he left at the end of the set to beat the rush. This was after the first hour or so- only to find out on the way home that the show had gone on for another two hours. Strictly no re-admissions, unfortunately…

Here’s a live performance of this tune on Jools Holland

OMG, it's OMD! ::

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Love is Everywhere

The Mighty Alboy — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 21:00:00 +0000

Pharoah Sanders – “Love is Everywhere”

A beautiful piece of melodic free jazz here from Sun Ra protege Pharoah Sanders, from the 1973 (very good year) love in us all album.

I first heard this on a madlib blue note mix years ago, but only sourced the track thanks to the magic of Shazam. Damned clever stuff.

So I never heard it in its full 19’54” glory. Showing more of the influence of John Coltrane, less of the more difficult Sun Ra- though he’s in there too.

Hope you enjoy.

Next up- my long awaited “best of 2011”. Didn’t want it to get lost in the flurry of retrospectives in January

pharoah sanders homepage :: check 'im out!
wiki entry ::

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Happy Birthday Mr Bowie

Hal Berstram — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 09:12:00 +0000

David Bowie – John I’m Only Dancing (Again) 1975

Sorry for prolonged absence from this blog… I’ve returned to mark the occasion of David Bowie’s 65th birthday with a little tune from 1975, which (I think) was an outtake from the sessions for Young Americans. It’s essentially a funk remake of the 1972 single “John I’m Only Dancing”, and the basic musical structure was used with different lyrics and an additional main two-chord theme as “Stay” on Bowie’s 1976 Station To Station LP.

“John I’m Only Dancing (Again) 1975” was issued as a single in 1979 (in 7” and 12” versions – the version uploaded here is the 7 inch mix, largely because I didn’t have any mp3 copy of the 12 inch mix to hand, and my old 12 inch single of it is in storage at the moment). The 12” version was also an extra track on the early 90s CD reissues of Bowie’s back catalogue on Rykodisc (sadly the newer EMI reissues don’t have any extra tracks on them). I own it on an early 80s compilation called (strangely enough) “Rare Bowie” from which I might post another oddity soon…) Anyway I am to be more active here this year, so see yon soon.

note: the mp3 file begins with about 5 seconds of silence due to poor editing by me. Sorry.

David Bowie's website ::
Buy the track :: on the "Best of Bowie 1974-79" compilation

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Nexus 21 - Real Love(Obsession) [1990]

T Pot — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 22:35:00 +0000

Just digging through my old CDs. Found this old one from Network Records 1990. ‘Real Love’ by Nexus 21.

Quite a nice old skool cut. Nice strings.

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Completely awesome

The Mighty Alboy — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 00:20:00 +0100

Tune Yards – “Lions”

Am at a bit of a loss selecting the genre categories on this one, so I’ve just gone for “completely awesome”.

The Tune Yards- Merrill Garbus.

Kind of hard to describe, so you’ll just have to listen to it. Drums, bass, vocals- she has the most incredibly dynamic range, a voice of amazing subtlety and power- and of course, ukelele’s.

Not usual fare for DC but I stumbled across this on the weekend, and I’ve been listening to everything i can get my hands on all week, and it’s been a brilliant melange of lo fi pop, hip hop, indie, funk, african (and usually I instinctively mislike anything that could be described as “fusion”). Guess you’d have to say challenging too, cos it’s pretty in your face, a lot of it.

This is from the first album Bird Brains, released in 2008 originally recorded on cassette via a dicatphone (seriously), but then remastered still lo fi via a single mike and using top quality open source recording software Audacity when Tune Yards signed to 4AD- good to see they still have their ears out for great new music (even in DC’s appear to be 3 years out of date). New album who kill came out in April and is equally awesome.

So I thought it was all rather nicely produced in a garagey studio, in a lo-fi sounding kind of way, but there’s no chance it could be done live, with all the overdubbing and complicated progness of some of the tracks.

But lord was I wrong about that…

Just looked up some of the tracks on YouTube, and it’s live- the overdubbing and looping is all done ingeniously live, and the performance is draw-dropping. Just being able to sing and play the drums at the same time (see J Live below) is amazing, but- and it’s not so surprising, as she was formerly and may well still be a puppeteer- Merrill Garbus is something else.

[And that’s not to mention the bass player (Jermaine- sorry, Nate Brenner- also amazing)]

Check the performances below.

Seriously.

A puppeteer pulling strings of a different kind out there.

Absolutely no idea where the lyrics or the melodies come from, but sure it’s all way deep. And it’s Jazz, man…it really is!

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Samooo - Wreckd

Big J — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 15:00:00 +0100

Bassline.

ahem…
How is everyone?
I’ve been buried knee deep in fatherhood and work.

Glad to report Hurricane Irene wasn’t angry with us here in Brooklyn.

Remix by Samooo on G.A.M.M. an extremely reliable label…

G.A.M.M Myspace ::
Turntable Lab MP3 store :: Buy pretty much anything by G.A.M.M Enterprises

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New Order anticipate the Vickers Commission by 30 years

Hal Berstram — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:54:00 +0100

New Order – ICB

Apologies for such a long time since my previous posting… only just getting back into some semblance of normal work/life balance after working flat out for about 6 months.

It was this week’s publication of the interim report from the Independent Commission on Banking, chaired by Sir John Vickers, that spurred me into posting action after a long layoff. I realised that the acronym for the commission, “ICB”, was the same as a song off New Order’s first album Movement. I have posted before from Movement, which is a much underrated album, and insofar as I can understand the lyrics (which are mixed low) they don’t seem to have much to do with banking, but here it is nonetheless.

For many of us, New Order’s 1984 single “Thieves Like Us” is perhaps a more appropriate ode to the commercial banking sector… but that is perhaps more an argument for a political blog.

If they ain’t got ya one way, they’ve got ya the other.

Buy New Order's "Movement" :: brilliantly reissued on double CD (from the Rough Trade shop)
ICB interim report :: featuring a foreword by Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook (if only!)

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2:30 Minutes

T Pot — Sat, 12 Mar 2011 15:26:00 +0000

Populous – Bottom 01

Here is a nice ambient slice from ‘Populous’. The LP is called ‘Quipo’ from 2002. I love this tune despite it being so short….nice dope beat, guitars, glitches & I read somewhere that the other sample is a clarinet….anyway sounds nice to my ears. Production is crisp.

If you are going to purchase one of his records, I would probably get ‘Queue for Love’ (2005) as overall its a better LP than ‘Quipo’

His later LP ‘Drawn in Basic’ is slightly different in style and more song based – also interesting in my opinion.

Buy ‘Queue For Love’ from Amazon

nice one. T-pot

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leetle peegs

The Mighty Alboy — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 23:40:00 +0000

little dragon- “blinking pigs”

Lovely little tune here, from Swedish outfit little dragon.

This quote from their website bio captures the effect- to begin with it sounds quite lame and twee, but as it goes on, it grows on you until you realise it’s really quite good:

“From the city of Gothenburg grew the birth of tiny creature- its breath full of fire, passion, death and dreams.
It lived in a fantasy called the electric forest.
This forest was thick with rustling secrets and infinite amounts of pine trees.
On occasional full moons the pine trees would light up in neon auras of lime and turquoise and the ground would shake with a steady rumble.
The tiny creature grew into a little dragon.
It wrestled with the large wind sometimes. The heat of its breath would weave in with the cool air and make patterns in the sky.
Although the creature was a powerful little beast, it was light as a feather and would often sleep on the leaf flowing in the breeze.
And there it would dream in a dream.
These dreams were without visuals and haunted by sounds. Electric sounds and beats would pump her little heart and make her sleep walk around the forest like a ghost dancing in the night.
And the aching of this lonely creature’s heart would be reflected in bittersweet melodies, both haunting and happy.”

Or not…!

There are a few other fine numbers on themachine dreams album- twice, feather and never never in particular- well worth checking it out.

little dragon website ::

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New Year Soul (3)

The Mighty Alboy — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 15:20:00 +0000

Mayer Hawthorne- “The Ills”

Completing (belatedly) the trio of soul for 2011, is this new school number from Stonesthrow’s Mayer Hawthorne.

Born and raised in Michigan, his sound is rooted in Motown soul. With his falsetto vocals and multiple-instrumental talents, he’s part Smokey, part Curtis and part Stevie, but although he’s real old school, and draws from the same well, he’s got his own style and sensibility too.

I strongly recommend getting his album A Strange Arrangement (see Stonesthrow link below).

He’s also something of a vinyl junkie and purveyor of soul rarities- if you can find it, I also recommend his Soul with a Hole mix.

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Some Lush New Ambient House

The Double K — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 11:36:00 +0000

Timo Camillo and Alevol – Tea Stories #000

I’d like to point you in the direction of a couple of lovely tracks from Timo Camillo and Alevol, released on their new label 26 Tea Drops. They’re ambient house guaranteed to soften your mood, incredibly laid back and with a large pinch of KDJ influence.

Timo Camillo’s A New Day grows gradually from the opening synth strings with the addition of chunky piano chords and bongos, eventually building beautifully into a subtle house groove. Alveol’s epic Blue Lips continues in the same mood with a super-subtle but insistent beat backed by mellow chords and layered with darting little snatches of synth twiddles.

Both tracks are beautifully and thoughtfully produced to give some of the nicest chill-out music you’re likely to hear. Check them out on SoundCloud, and if you like them it’s got to be worth supportiung the artists by buying the mp3s – only £2.29 for the pair, cheaper than almost anything these days!

26TDi000 VA – TeaStories #000 24.12.2010 by 26 teadrops international

26 Tea Drops :: Loads to listen to here - check the 'Podcasts'!
Listen on SoundCloud :: You can also buy from Beatport here.
Buy from Juno :: It's slightly cheaper than Beatport.

New Year Soul (2)

The Mighty Alboy — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 10:05:00 +0000

Naomi Shelton and The Gospel Queens – “What Have You Done, My Brother?”

Not much time to write, but wanted to whack this up to keep to my new year’s “once a week, minimum” posting resolution.

Fortunately, this track from Alabama-born gospel veteran Naomi Shelton speaks rousingly for itself- and the pedigree of the artists involved, some of whom performed in the early days with James Brown and Wilson Pickett, is fully evident.

Daptone Records have signed her/them, and the What have you done LP, released in 2009 was their first major release. Get over there and check ‘em out!

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New Year Soul (1)

The Mighty Alboy — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 23:10:00 +0000

Superlatives – “Don’t know how (to say ‘I love you’)”

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

It seems I have the honour of opening DC for 2011 with the first in a triptych of soulful earfuls that have been keeping me feeling toasty and warm in recent months.

This first one took me a good few years to track down- I heard it first on an amazing mix Pete Rock did on Radio 1 world service about 5 years ago, where he just played his favourite breaks, and as you would expect, it was belter after belter. I finally got a name for this particular number and tracked it down at the end of last year

There’s so much to recommend this fine motown jam- it really has got everything. The arrangement is especially amazing- I love the breakdown at at 1’05”- the brass fanfare and spine tingling cry of “BABY!”, and the way those tight and heavy drums drop back in is just awesome.

So- my opener for 2011, hope you can dig it!

buy it from northern soul direct ::

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This one goes out to the Pope: welcome to our 3rd world country

Hal Berstram — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 06:54:00 +0100

BTSM – (We’ll Arrest You) When You Step Off The Plane

A little something topical for the kids now… those of you not on the Richard Branson space program probably know that the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the Pope, is visiting the UK over the next few days.

Last month, three members of the Burning Lodge immersion composition group entered a rehearsal studio in Bermondsey to record a selection of freeform jams, sonic experiments and in-jokes. In other words it was very similar to the recording sessions for Guns’n’Roses’s “Chinese Democracy” album but took about a billionth of the time.

Around 2 and a half hours of material emerged from the sessions – ranging from in the sweet spot to 1-bit unlistenable. This 8-minute effort, excerpted from a longer 34-minute track, was the most topical ‘song’ of the day (with the exception of a track about 25 per cent spending cuts and odes to the late Tony Wilson and Mr Dave Smith, creator of the Evolver synth).

My colleagues Ben and Martin (aka Brothers Buffalo and Sewing Machine) acquit themselves wonderfully. Ben delivers the lyrics with considerable elan: it’s the best delivery since Hunter S Thompson’s story about 1972 presidential candidate George McGovern who went up to a heckler, put his arm round the bastard, and said “I have a secret for you… kiss my ass.”

The music is a fractured groove – a bit messy, but certainly something that could be worked on. I’m particularly proud of the mighty irritating synth arpeggiation that comes in at about 5 minutes in – funky funky. The weird Hawkwind-style background noises are courtesy of the Dave Smith Evolver – a truly untameable beast.

If you want to read a good article about the true purpose of the pope’s visit, Andrew Brown in the Guardian has a go(o)d hypothesis.

I was going to go on the demo this Saturday but not sure if I’ll have enough time. But maybe.

longer version of this track :: (probably only online for a month or so)
hilarious article :: about tacky Pope souvenirs - "Benedictaphone", anyone?

File Download (8:00 min / 9 MB)

To the Max

The Mighty Alboy — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 12:08:00 +0100

Gil Scott Heron vs DJ Asparagus- “Your Daddy Loves You”

A further tribute to the youngest addition to Dilated Choonz, young Max Shooter- this one perhaps more up Squeaker’s alley than the ruffness from Double K…

A smooth jazz house edit of Gil Scott Heron’s your daddy loves you by Stockholm’s DJ Asparagus. In this case a moving message of love to Gil’s young daughter, but I’m sure the sentiment applies to the Max Daddy n’all

Congratulations to mother and father- and to baby Max for finding such a fine family to be born into! Love to all…

discogs profile ::
myspace page ::

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