Maybe only a hand full of you have this release marked on your calendar, maybe even less than that but I doubt it, this release no matter how good it sounds musically to anyone its a piece of electronic music history and one of the most thought out gestures you could ever give to your fans. As a record label owner this project is the pinnacle of all releases and especially during a time where digital sales have almost equaled the same amount as physical sales. The Warp20 (Box Set) contains:
– Warp20 (1989-2009) The Complete Catalogue (192 page book)
– Warp20 (Chosen): Double CD album (Ten songs chosen by you (Warp20.net), ten songs chosen by Warp co-founder Steve Beckett)
– Warp20 (Recreated): Double CD album (Twenty brand new cover versions of Warp songs by Warp artists past and present)
– Warp20 (Unheard): Triple 10” Vinyl (Completely unheard tracks by Boards of Canada, Autechre and Broadcast)
– Warp20 (Elemental): CD album (re-edits from Osymyso, made from sections, samples, & fragments of Warp music from the last 20 years)
– Warp20 (Infinite): Double 10” Vinyl (hand-picked locked-groove loops from Warp tracks)
One song that i’ve waiting to hear was Bibio’s cover of Boards of Canada, wow okay just say that out loud, now that just makes my ears smile. The man can do no wrong in my mind, he grabs the melodies from the original and I can tell from the start he has heard this song more than 100 times before, I can hear how this song is probably really close to his heart, its such a confident cover with such contrast in style and small amounts of unique character sprinkled lightly all the way thru it.
This piano piece by Leila covering Aphex Twin to me rips away at the original and gets to the core of it all, almost like a psycho analytical reinterpretation of how Richard D. James felt when he made the basic parts for the original song. One thing Leila did which is hard to match it that the tensity is almost matched to the original which would make any drill n’ bass fan fall to their knees and it was all done here by only piano.
Pivot was one of the highlights for me during the Warp 20 year show, their live show was consistently innovative and kept my attention. They picked a hard cover to mess up, its Grizzly Bear’s Colorado which has a great vocals in it, the synths they added at the 3 min mark are a complete treat and really takes this song to a new level compared to the original.
My boss/friend Sam Valenti IV is a big supporter of Gravenhurst and turned me onto them back when I worked in the actual Ghostly Office years ago, I think he’d fully support this cover of Broadcast, it has all the signature Gravenhurst elements of guitar picking accompanied by a soft voice.
Ira Glass describes the importance of producing a lot of work to endeavor through the frustrating early stages of a creative career. The first two minutes of this video should be required viewing for anyone and everyone getting into a creative field. In his case, he’s talking about video production, but his points are easily applied to any other realm. Definitely one of the most inspiring (or illuminating) pieces of advice I’ve come across.
The first couple years that you’re making stuff, what you’re making isn’t so good — it’s not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it’s not quite that good. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, your taste is still killer and your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you. A lot of people never get past that phase and a lot of people at that point quit.
And the thing I would just like say to you with all my heart is that most everybody I know who does interesting creative work, they went through a phase of years where they had really good taste and they could tell what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be. We knew that it didn’t have the special thing that we wanted it to have and the thing to do is — everybody goes through that. And for you to go through it, if you’re going through it right now, if you’re just getting out of that phase or if you’re just starting off and you’re entering into that phase, you’ve got to know it’s totally normal and the most important possible thing you can do is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work.
Since the success of the first exclusive FREE EP that we did on ISO50 I asked for some musicians for more tracks of covers and edits.
Synth Pop guru D. Gookin takes our middle school favorite teen classic single 1979 by Smashing Pumpkins to a raw fantasy land of where Dan Deacon, Luke Vibert and Tortoise collaborate to do our bidding.
The Worst Friends duo take the gentler side of M83 and nudge it just enough to open up the track a tiny bit more, kind of like a bright break in the clouds to the originals cloudy day.
Everyone knows Snap, if you haven’t then go to a gym or club and give it about an hour during peak time and it will come on the speakers, I promise. Mux Mool switches gears and takes this roller skating rink classic and runs it thru the arcade and struts down the street with it while saying hi to all the ladies, a definite head nodder for the underground collectors.
Jerome Covington is new to the blog, a musician that I met at a bar while I was djing over a year ago, he did this cover for us at Moodgadget and its still a favorite to put on because it might be one of my favorite songs from when I was a little. The tempo of the original will always feel a bit too fast after you hear this, he added that touch that makes you want sway while you drive down the ocean coast.
If you brought your attention span today then this cover might be one of the more relaxing and rewarding ones, A Setting Sun aka Guardian does a number on Air’s Le Soleil Est Pres de Moi. The dusty howl gradually disperses while the recognizable sounds slowly creep in, it would make any Air fan smile.
I had to scan this Home Entertainment Center out of a vintage magazine for you all, imagine just having that control panel to drool over and look at or it just being part of your interior architecture of your home. I love that there is soo much space used with beige panels, buttons, reels, and wall design, thats what makes a ton of the design in the past more admirable to me sometimes.
Sébastien Hayez’s Designers Books blog has a great post on Lettering Art In Modern Use and various other design-related books. I love that last one; I was at the printers the other day looking at some samples and they showed me a letter-pressed wedding invitation with that same script style. It was embossed into the paper with inlaid gold leaf, so nice.
Continuing our Dubstep Essential Series which has been exclusively for the blog we have part 2 from Guardian coming in at just over 54 minutes and about 37 tracks which keeps the flow of the mix really fresh.
I love the tempo of Dubstep even if I play it for a friend that doesn’t like electronic at all they always react in a positive/surprised way towards the tracks as something completely new, I mean who doesn’t like good heavy low end and dark spacey sounds that you’ve never heard before every once in a while.
Tomorrow a few friends and I are going for the first time to see BBC Radio 1’s Mary Ann Hobbs DJ some Dubstep at Dub Wars which should be killer. A little about Guardian, he is one of the best Dubstep producers I know, he’s from Detroit but lives now in Brooklyn, he is one of the best Dubstep DJ’s i’ve heard out too because of his range and he peaks out into rowdy tracks at perfect times but doesn’t rely on it and its more about track selection for him, hope to see him play around the US/UK this year.
TRACKLIST A Setting Sun – En el Mes de Agosto (Moodgadget) The Others – Hear Dis Style (Boka) James Blake – Air & Lack Thereof (Hemlock) Ramadanman – Blimey (Hessle Audio) Ike Release – Jenova (Infrasonics) Spatial – 90121 (Infrasonics) Millie & Andrea – Black Hammer (Daphne) Cyrus – Bounty (Tectonic) Loefah – It’s Yours (White Label) Pinch – Gangstaz (Tectonic) Headhunter – Prototypes (Tempa) Skream – Chest Boxing (Tempa) The Bug – Jah War (Loefah Remix) (Ninja Tune) The Bug – Jah War (Ninja Tune) Pressure – Money Honey (Hyperdub) MRK1 – Revolution 909 (Earwax) Guardian – Charm Dub (unreleased) Joker – Untitled_rsn (Tectonic) Martyn – Vancouver (2562 Puur Natuur Dub) (3024) TRG – Harajuku (Tempa) Ramadanman – Humber (Apple Pips) Spatial – 81012 (Infrasonics) Sully – Duke St Dub (Mata-Syn) Ramadanman – Carla (Soul Jazz) Martyn – Everything About You (Tempa) Pinch – Motion Sickness (Tempa) Martyn – Velvet (~scape) Untold – I Can’t Stop This Feeling (Hessle Audio) Ramadanman – Revenue (2nd Drop) Ramadanman – Revenue (Untold Remix) (2nd Drop) 2562 – Love In Outer Space (Tectonic) MRK1 – Borderline (Contagious) DJ Mujava – Township Funk (Skream Remix) (White Label) Pinch – Punisher (Skream Remix) (Planet Mu) Pinch – Punisher (Planet Mu) Pinch – Punisher (V.I.P.) (Planet Mu) Shigeto – Beat It Up (forthcoming Moodgadget)
In honor of the currently unfolding (ha) Fashion Week in NYC, I thought I’d post on some of the terrific typography at work in the fashion world. When I first got into design, I used to think the typeface for the Louis Vuitton logo was the epitome of graphic design. I remember writing everything in Futura Medium for a good month (even research papers, nothing was spared). These days, I still to pick up the occasional GQ or etc just for the ads — usually can pick up a few interesting things. There are always a number of logos that catch my eye, continue reading to see some of the marks that resonate most.
The mark for The Fashion Center (above) is perfectly simple. How brilliant to utilize the button holes to form the F! This is probably one of my favorite logos of all time. What it comes down to for me is that the 5th button hole is slightly smaller than the rest — this subtle scale shift makes the whole thing. Developed at Pentagram.
I never know if the newer generations of music fans like The Police as something other than a drinking game song band. They’re my favorite band of all time, I even kind of have a small little shrine in my room involving Synchronicity vinyl, Sting shirts, DVDs/VHS’s, and 7 inch vinyl, I have no shame. The 1:09 intro in Secret Journey always grabbed me especially when it hit the 0:40 sec mark and I knew the guitar loop was coming.
Little Dragon’s song Feather has be this year’s most dark magic/fantasy sounding indie pop song of 2009, the girls voice has this early 90’s grungy girl voice that has points where she just sounds like she doesn’t care at all about anyone and it comes off almost cold then other times it sounds like she has David Bowie arm on her shoulder and she’s singing to make it on the Labyrinth 2 soundtrack which would be amazing!
Without ever hearing J Dilla or Dabrye things like Taken By Trees song structure would never make sense to me but now I love this kind of Jacob’s Ladder unraveling sound, if you need another visual then try this its like watching some vintage cartoon with a car driven by a hippo with a tiny hat with the X band-aid on the tire rolling over each rock on a bumpy road.
I’m not sure if the “dance mix” will ever go away in the indie world or if its even frowned upon yet, it definitely helps if you want to play a song that you like to a group of friends that want to go out but don’t want them to be bumped out by your good yet sad music.
The Police – Secret Journey
[audio:policesecret.mp3]
Little Dragon – Feather
[audio:featherdragon.mp3]
Taken By Trees – My Boys (Animal Collective Cover)
