Monday, November 30, 2009



Dr Bozo is an eclectic sort, with a good many years of music-loving, producing, live performance, and DJing under his belt. This means that his DJing is holistic - he brings all those hours fiddling with samplers and experimenting with sound design to the decks, and the result is always exciting. The latest mix he's given me is on the indie/disco side of things, and there are some absolute rubies...

Dr Bozo's Mix

1. Empire of the Sun- Standing On The Shore (Loosers mix)
2. Who Made Who- Raveo
3. Ladyhawke- Magic (the Swiss mix)
4. Lost Valentinos- Serio (Knife Machine mix)
5. Royksopp- The Girl and the Robot (Joakim mix)
6. Friendly Fires- Paris (Aeroplane mix)
7. Lost Valentinos- Thief (Nile Delta mix)
8. The Juan Maclean- One Day (the Emperor Machine mix)
9. Laurent Garnier-Pay Tv (Emperor Machine mix)
10.Phoenix- Lisztomania (Yuksek mix)
11.Emperor Machine- What You Want

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Erast aka Nikakoi


I just got back from the magical land of Adelaide, overcast and thick with summer humidity. We went to the Taj Tandoor for the most delicious Chicken Madras and then headed to Cuckoo, where the 12 inch Phildo was playing some of his slightly more upbeat selections, including a new track by Pépé Bradock. He's put out some very groovy and bass-led tracks through BBE, and well worth some investigation if you like house music with intelligent rhythms and a bit of funk influence. He's also remixed some respected names in the darker avenues of house - Charles Webster, Manuel Tur (Freerange), and, in a more leftfield vein, Pete Namlook.
Otherwise it's been a quiet week of sonic experiments. I've been putting a lot of work into a new track called "Magnum", that's based around a microkorg arpeggio. It's a beautiful creature and I hope it will be the first of many bits of hardware that I can work into compositions and bring along to DJ sets.
There have also been some nice musical discoveries - a charming couple who call themselves The Long Lost, and specialise in indie pop with an electronic influence and a lot of soul. The other discovery is Erast, who also goes by the name of Nikakoi (his real name is Nika Machaidze, and he's from Georgia). He's signed to Laboratory Instinct - check out laboratoryinstinct.com - and his artistic focus is film direction, which makes for some fascinating and unique composition. His latest album, "Selected", is a crunchy and diverse experience that spans 30 tracks. There's conventional chillout reminiscent of Afterlife (City Lights [Tutta2]), but also experimental electronica - Krasnagorsky Dream is a rich, organic piece with textures that recall The Field. He's also comfortable with string arrangement - you can get a taste of this on "My Right Hand". The rhythmic elements reminded me of Apparat (from BPitch Control), but the production was a little more satisfying.

You can check out one of his more delicate tracks here

Tin Soldier

and there's much more to be had on myspace and the regular online stores.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Declaration of Dependence



After listening to their third album, it's tempting to say that Kings of Convenience have come a long way since "Riot on an Empty Street". But that expression implies improvement, and "Declaration of Dependence" isn't so much an improvement on Eirik and Erlend's first recording as a very natural and organic development. They've grown older, and the subject matter of their lyrics has widened to incorporate politics and morality ("Rule my World"); life-philosophy, complete with a reference to Plato's Cave Allegory ("Freedom and its Owner); and something more indefinable and mystical that used to stop at actually permeating the duo's lyrics ("Scars on Land"). They're also more comfortable playing with silence and sparse arrangements - "My Ship isn't Pretty" is more understated than anything from the past two albums. But there's nothing in this development that jars with the spirit of their earlier work. Eirik's innocently vulnerable voice makes as much sense in this bleaker, older territory as it did in the thwarted love songs from "Riot", and the guitar composition is typical Kings of Convenience (you get the feeling they could keep this up for several more albums without repeating themselves). In short, "Declaration of Dependence" is an extremely satisfying and delicate album that somehow manages to flow seamlessly out of KOC's previous work whilst taking on new musical and conceptual concerns. It's also my favourite album in quite a long time.

Check them out at:
http://www.myspace.com/kingsofconvenience

You can also get their albums at JB HI-FI and all the mainstream online stores.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009



Another blog specialising in deep house and techno, disco, indie, art, philosophy, and the twenty-foot reticulated shetland pony? But why? Has this niche not been adequately addressed for many years? A little bit - and here I heartily endorse adultartsclub.com - but there's a pretty endless source of good music, and only a slighly less endless supply of interesting ideas. Exciting artists - spotty teenaged moog afficionados pushing electronic music to places it wouldn't otherwise have been for another decade, and haggard disco wizards with their three million rare disco gems from before I was born - slip through the spidery fingers of Old Father Internet, and it would take more than a few fresh blogs to undo this great evil. (Note the subtle shift of focus away from philosophy and squarely onto music - I think this will be more of a music blog). To undo the great evil, I'm going to be putting up snippets from the artists I discover in my weekly quest for something that actually affects me, and snippets from old ones if they're really special. I'm also hoping to host some work by locals, so hit me up with tracks, mixes, philosophical musings, poems, whatever, and they might end up on here. The only criterion is that you have to be a bit obscure, possibly 26 and still living in your mum's house so you could pay off all those synths and sequencers. I won't tolerate anyone who's actually making it.
Farewell! I'm looking forward to this.