Shpongle - Ineffable Mysteries from Shpongleland (2009)
Genre: Electronic, Psytrance
Year: 2009

Nothing Lasts... but Nothing is Lost is the one album that people associate with me more than any other. I've probably turned 20-30 people onto Shpongle thanks to its awesomeness. I flew halfway across the world to see Shpongle live last year. Naturally, this is my most anticipated album in god knows how long. How is it?

Pretty damn good. As good as Nothing Lasts? Nah. But what is? Nothing Lasts featured 20 tracks that were all five minutes or less, while this album -- hereby referred to as Shpongle 4 because this title is stupid -- only has 8, many of which break 10 minutes. Each song is a lot more varied than your standard song, though, with each song featuring several musical ideas that blend together quite nicely. I often am like 'is this even the same song?'

Shpongle 4 features a good amount of vocal work, at least compared to previous albums. I Am You and No Turn Unstoned are the standouts here thanks to some nice choruses that repeat throughout the song. Even those without vocals tend to feature some sort of crazy chanting. My favourite song though is the vocal-less third track, Nothing Is Something Worth Doing. It's serene and features a hang drum, an instrument I've been obsessed with since I saw them play it live last year. Damn, those things are cool. I'd buy one if I randomly had thousands of dollars I didn't want anymore.

So yeah, Shpongle 4. It's real. It actually exists. Listen to it.

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To celebrate the beautiful union of funk and psychedelia throughout the ages, I put together this weird little mix of stuff new and old. It's kinda trippy, I hope you enjoy it.

+ Toggle Tracklisting

SIDE A:
Intro (Chester P)
Shafiq Hussayn - Nirvana
Os Mutantes - Teclar
Staff Benda Bilili - Avramandole
The Natural Yogurt Band - Soft Cheese
Klaus Weiss - Research
Ananda Shankar - Dancing Drums (Edit 1)
The Village Soul Choir - The Cat Walk
Nacho Patrol - Mind World
The Upsetters - Dollar In The Teeth
Madlib - J's Day Theme 3
Egg - Fugue In D Minor
The Poppy Family - No Blood In Bone
Klaus Block - Slow Motion

SIDE B:
Os Mutantes - Tempo Perdido
Ananda Shankar - Streets Of Calcutta
Ananda Shankar - Dancing Drums (Edit 2)
Gong - Flying Teapot (James Pants Mix)
MRR/ADM - Untitled (Track 2)
Can - Halleluhwah (Edit)
The Soft Machine - Why Are We Sleeping?
Oh No - The Funk
Biddu - Qurbani Bonus Beats
The New Apocalypse - Junkshop
Lloyd Miller - Elude In The Iranian Mode Shur
Travis Biggs - Tibetian Serenity (Edit)
The Natural Yogurt Band - Chit Chat
Funkadelic - I'll Bet You (1969 Version)
The New Rotary Connection - I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun

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Various Artists - Psych Funk 101: A Global Psychedelic Funk Curriculum
Genre: Psychedelic / Funk / World / Jazz / Arabic / All over the fucking place
Released: 2009

Recently released on StonesThrow, this bizarre compilation attempts to piece together a "global movement" of psychedelia and funk-inspired madness from the late 60's onwards to the early 80's. It's a round-the world journey which shows how far psychedelia travelled in a short amount of time. The destinations range from the far and wide, with Nigeria, Iran, Turkey, Russia and South Korea all helping to join up the musical dots. The sounds vary from acid-tinged traditional world music, to the truly ridiculous and experimental (tracks like "The Feed Back" and "The Big Search" are the main highlights for me). The chicken-and-the-egg question though is What hit their shores first: The music or the LSD?

The files are 320/VBR mp3, but I still can't vouch much for the audio quality because you have to consider these are songs taken from old, dusty and most likely quite hard to find records. They may sound fuzzy and crackled, but just be thankful you're able to hear them at all!

Try it
Buy it
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Artist: Various
Genre(s): Dubstep/Electronic
Released: 2009

What exactly is dubstep? I'm not entirely sure. Wikipedia offers this:

"Dubstep is a genre of electronic music that has its roots in London's early 2000s UK garage scene. Musically, dubstep is distinguished by its 2step rhythm, or use of snare sounds similar to 2step garage and grime, and an emphasis on bass, often producing "dark" sounds, but just as frequently producing sounds reminiscent of dub reggae or funky US garage. Dubstep tracks are generally produced at a tempo of around 140 beats per minute and in recent years have developed signature half time rhythms, often heavily shuffled or syncopated, and usually, though not exclusively, including only one snare drum hit per bar, often on the third beat. Such factors make dubstep rhythms markedly different from four-to-the-floor rhythms used in other styles of electronic dance music such as house music, which usually have two snare hits accompanying the second and fourth kick drum. Often, the sense of rhythm in dubstep is propelled more by the bassline than by the percussive content."

That sounds very accurate based on what's offered in this compilation from London label Hyperdub. If you are unfamiliar with the label, you have probably at least heard of Burial -- a band I often confuse with Battles for reasons unclear other than similar names, 'cause lord knows they don't sound the same -- and possibly Tombs-favourite Zomby. Hyperdub was started two years ago by Kode9.

Unfortunately that's as much information as I, an outsider to the genre, can offer. Hyperdub release a shitton of stuff, mostly 12', and this compilation featuring 30 songs from artists such as Burial, Kode9, Darkstar, Zomby, Samiyam and much more seems to be an excellent introduction not only to the label Hyperdub but the genre of dubstep as a whole. It's a very solid comp that really flows well, beats and melodies chugging along to a brilliant conclusion on many of the offerings. So try it.

Artist - Felix Mendelssohn - Hebrides Overture (Fingal's Cave)
Genre - Classical
Release Year - 1827

- Felix Medelssohn, a musical prodigy and synaesthesite, was famously so struck by the strange and ominous rock shapes surrounding his visit to Fingal's Cave that it forced music into his genius little brain and he jotted down a sample of sheet music for it to send in a letter to his sister describing how instense his trip was. And now to describe how intense the Hebrides Overture is, I'm writing a blog entry with a link to a recording of it, because I was so struck by the strange and ominous shapes of it. This internet thing just makes it all come full circle, doesn't it?

(Note: This recording is by the Utah Symphony Orchestra, which to my knowledge has no official artwork - the picture above is actually Fingal's Cave.)

link

All Natural - Second Nature

Genre: Hip-Hop

Released: 2001

This album kinda brought Hip-Hop forward into the new decade for me, despite the fact that at the time, there were lots of albums coming out which were far more experimental and wide-reaching. It just seemed like Hip-Hop had suffered an indentity crisis somewhere around the new millenium, unsure whether it should be about Hype Williams videos and R&B singers on every chorus, or complex metaphorical madness over disjointed beats. In trying to be so many things at once, it pulled itself apart and needed something to sew it back up. I'm getting a bit too deep here though, because to be fair, Second Nature didn't exactly fix Hip-Hop by any means. At the time it just went somewhat ignored (except among a handfull of underground enthusiasts), and is now being touted about on ebay as a "rare" LP. What I guess it did do though, was prove that in the emerging information age of cross-breeding genres and bullshit sub-genres, it was still possible for some really fucking good, no-bullshit Hip-Hop to be made! There was a moment where if an MC were to craft some art into his wordplay, it would mean he was "consious", and if a DJ wanted to bring something new to the table, they'd need to smash two opposing genres together on some wacky mash-up mixtape.

Second Nature just gets straight to the point, refusing to bend over to a new emerging style on the basis that what it's already got is good enough to last, and no, it doesn't bore you with cheesy nostalgic tracks about how "boy I wish it was '86 again" either. Listening to it 8 years later, it still sounds just as refreshing and exciting. If you've accidentally overdosed on synthetic beats and velcro-texture vocals (we're living in a world of Love Lock Down and Flashing Lights here), i'd prescribe this album as the perfect antidote.

Tracks like Elements Of Style, Ill Advisory and Stellar are immensely potent in that mystical, most supernatural of forces they call dopeness. If these don't make you want to throw on a Kangol hat and start doing windmills in the street, then there's something wrong with you.

"The Stick Up" opens the album up with some straight rowdy shit,

"You keep your Nikon 'n Canon camera's

Focused on the icon cats that's slammin' ya

Over the banister, 

The B-Boy barrister, embarrass the, 

Phonies on Sony, Def Jam and Arista..."

...and the album pretty much continues in that vein, with almost every beat and every verse reminding you of why you love Hip-Hop.

Before I finish, I have to throw in a mention of that beat on Queen's Get The Money somewhere, just because it's amazing.

Second Nature (192kbps)

Keep it natural.

and now for something completely different

Manufactura - Precognitive Dissonance
Genre: Power Noise, Industrial
Year: 2003





This is about the most aggressive, unsettling, violent music I listen to. It is pulverizing and painful, the content is flat-out offensive and I often feel bad for listening to it. I can feel my blood pressure rise whenever I listen to this.

I have to be in the right mood for something this intense (I can only take so many samples of people getting killed and raped), but sometimes it's a nice change of pace. It's great for tuning out the world.

and not much else!

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