A thunderous applause bursts from the stands of the ancient arena. With his head drenched in sweat from the simmering Spanish sun, the matador deftly shifts in place as the bull passes like a hostile freight train. Securing his stance on the vibrating sand, he subdues the beast with a stroke of his satin cape. His sword rests heavy on his waist, and the volume from the crowd seems suddenly cruel.
Unlike any other veteran rap act, the idea of rating the Digable Planets current output against that of their heyday is hardly laughable. Just as their easily digestible debut gave way to a more intricate and enduring sophomore release, the group’s afterlife has been riding a similar tide.
Not that negotiating this post-Planets output has been easy. Ish “Butterfly” Butler seems to be deliberately keeping his comeback a secret, with the music press curiously playing along. 2004’s Cherrywine project spawned a grimy basement funk session that should have blown-up like a disenfranchised teenager in the Middle East, but went all but unnoticed. I then must have blinked during last year’s release of the lurid and unstructured Shabazz Palaces, which emerged as more aggressive and, true to form, more challenging than the music that paved its way.
Arranging this selection of Digable Planets remixes and rarities against highlights of Ishmael’s subsequent projects presents the same progression from accessibility to experimentalism that marked those first two albums, with the recent output comfortably standing on the same footing as anything the group did before and above anything anybody else does now.
Digable Planets – Intro from Amsterdam Reunion Tour Digable Planets – Nickel Bags of Bites (Excerpt) Digable Planets – Dedicated Digable Planets – Where I’m From (Aural G Ride 12”) Digable Planets – Rebirth of Slick (Cool Like That) (Crashing Giant Step Mix) Digable Planets – Excerpt from CurrentTV Interview Digable Planets – Nickel Bags (Sneak A Beshu Mix) Digable Planets – Appointment at the Fat Clinic Digable Planets – Califlower (Spiddyocks Go West) Digable Planets – Three Slim’s Dynamite Digable Planets feat Guru – Borough Check Digable Planets feat. Jeru – Graffiti (Noise) Digable Planets – Dial 7 (Axioms of Creamy Spies) Digable Planets – 9th Wonder (Amina Remix) Tek 9 feat. Butterfly – Gettin’ Down Again Camp Lo feat. Butterfly – Swing Cherrywine – See For Miles King Britt feat. Cherrywine – The Sound Cherrywine – Dazzlement Shabazz Palaces – N. Splendored/ Find Out Shabazz Palaces – Capital 5, Recorded After Hrs at the Gun Ballad Resource Centre Cherrywine – 16th Minute Cherrywine – Sleep Pretty Girl Digable Planets feat. Lester Bowie and Melvin Watson – Flying High in the Brooklyn Sky Digable Planets – Where I’m From (DJ Bonus Beats) Digable Planets – Excerpt from CurrentTV Interview Digable Planets – Marvin, You’re the Man
Based on the single and a dramatic new video referencing Charles Burnett’s remarkable film, Killer of Sheep, I’d suggest Shabazz Places is poised to turn things upside down had I not made similar claims about Blowout Comb and Bright Black just before hip-hop devolved into genre of ring-tones. This time I’ll at least put my oar in the water with some bonus material taken from the group’s appearance on Seattle’s KEXP radio.
Shabazz Palaces – Live on KEXP(right click to download) 20:00 mins/ 320 kbps/ 45.8MB
As hip-hop heads know, the habit of producers and DJs saying their name, usually the year, and various ‘uh’ and ‘uh yeah’s, throughout a track has been as longstanding a tradition in the genre as date rape is in college fraternities.
On one end of the spectrum is the DJ Clue approach which, for those that aren’t familiar, involves yelling shout-outs over the entire track with an echo effect apparently designed by black business-owners to keep white people from loitering outside. At the other end, Pete Rock takes a less invasive approach, and as far as I know invented the practice, with stoned and subtle flourishes that tend to add more than they subtract. Saying that, when asked to remix the new, Beatlesesque Yo La Tengo single, you’d think he could have taken the cue from producers like Brian Wilson or Martin Hannett and left the mic off on this one.
After spending several days confined to a squalid motel off a disused highway, waiting for the phone call that was supposed to end this nightmare, you’ve ignored his advice and left your room in search of cheap cigarettes and something to drink. Exiting the corner store, you notice a man emerge from the shadows of the parking lot, too thin and well-dressed to be so unafraid in such a dangerous neighborhood.
You race to your car, your shaking hands struggling to unlock the door. A shot rings out, and your windshield explodes with a hailstorm of cubed glass. You reach under your seat- in place of your father’s pistol you find a note from her, which contains the word “sorry”, but couldn’t be less of an apology. Another shot rings out.
In aid of getting the locals hyped about his appearance in Vancouver Saturday night, here’s the titular track from Dave Aju’s lovely 2007 Ep. Dedicated readers will fondly remember the inclusion of Aju’s “Crazy Place” in our best of the decade mix.
Dave Aju – Love Always(right click to download) 6:57 mins/ 320 kbps/ 15.9MB
You’ve been at the wheel for as long as it takes to see the sun rise then fall, and to have your exhaustion turn to a peaceful complacency. The perfection of the song on the radio prompts you to wake your friends in the backseat, now asleep in a nest made of Taco Bell packaging, comfortable sweatshirts, and each others limbs and shoulders. Riding shotgun, even your best friend has broken her promise to stay awake and keep you company. Having shared so much over the last few days, you take the private moment as the last of several highlights on what you will eventually describe as the best roadtrip ever.
Using no more beats per minute than it takes to make ones shoulders move, this tribal burner from the recent Guillaume & the Coutu Dumontsalbum induces an irreverent state of mind that might prompt you to crack a beer with breakfast, skip work to take photographs of clouds, or tell that certain someone how you really feel about them and not give a fuck if they break your heart.
The single from the album presents another highlight in the form of the duet with Electric Adolescence favorite Dop, which was included in last month’s mix.
Guillaume & the Coutu Dumonts – Radio Novella(right click to download) 4:58 mins/ 320 kbps/ 11.3MB
With vinyl aptly regarded for its sonic warmth and potential for album art, cassettes never gained the same fetishistic regard, regarded by many as an inferior stopgap between the adoption of records and compact disks. That said, this conventional wisdom is currently under siege by the growing trend of lo-fi bands running their recordings through analog tape as a means to remove the pristine polish and sharp edges that have dominated production since the personal computer became our generation’s electric guitar.
If the jury is still out on the issue of sound quality, it has surely adjourned on the fact that cassettes remain the greatest media for compilations, differentiating itself from digital mixes in the same way an original painting differentiates itself from a print. I’ve been lazily bridging this gap by creating digital mixes then dubbing them to cassette. My recent session has amounted to a schizophrenic bedroom mix, reflecting the severe extent to which my musical tastes are currently lost at sea.
How To Dress Well – How Could This Have Happened? Atlas Sound – Reminder (Excerpt)
WU LYF – Concrete Gold
Cults – Go Outside
E and E – Gate
Shabazz Palaces – N. Spendored/ Find Out
Grand Puba – Get It (Caspa’s 80Eighties Remix)
War – Junk Yard (MTY Re-edit)
Guillaume & the Coutu Dumonts & Dop – Can’t Have Everything
Narcotic Syntax – Romantic Infinity
Onze – Bambam
Bobby Kondors – The Poem
Blunted Dummies – House For All (House 4 All Robots Mix)
Matthew Herbert – Manchester
Thomas Bjerring feat. David Skog – 2.45
Pogo – Lost
The Knife – Tomorrow In a Year
Time For Dreams – Breathlessly (demo)
Farah – Gay Boy (Vocal Mix)
Microphones – Mt. Eerie
Diamond Vampires – Friday Nights
Instra:mental – Let’s Talk
Boswell – Escape
Coyote Clean Up – Can’t Shake the Full Moon
Double Dee & Steinski – Message To Young People
Double Dee & Steinski – We’re In a Lot of Trouble
El Michels Affair – Mystery of Chessboxin’
Public Enemy – Contract On the World Love Jam
Junior Mafia – Get Money (Remix)
Erykah Badu – Turn Me Away (Get Munny)
Trus’ Me – Can We Pretend?
Warpaint – Billie Holiday
Wildbirds & Peacedrums – Today/ Tomorrow
Color of Clouds – Haunts Me (Acoustic)
Consequence – Farewell (Excerpt)
Cryo – Guantanamo Bay (Excerpt)
Dragging on Ox Through Water – Lilacs Sprang From These Apes
The Books – Beautiful People
Paul White – Anchor Records
The Wind-up Birds – There Won’t Always Be an England
Dr. Octagon – Blue Flowers (Instrumental)
Martin Buttrich – You Got That Vibe
Spiritualized – Angels Sigh (Alternate Mix 2)
Microphones – Do Not Be Afraid (Side B)
Electric Adolescence – Raised on Cassettes(right click to download) 80:00 mins/ 320 kbps/ 183 MB
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