Friday, January 30, 2009

gem hunter presents: crystal bliss



///gem hunter - crystal bliss
---------------------------------------------------------
findings from the AC research archive unearthed in preparation
for the upcoming vena cava fashion show on Valentine's Day. 
sounds of glowing souls, white winds, angels & demons at play.

///file under: interstellar elevator music, the crystallarium
---------------------------------------------------------
andreas vollenweider - caverna magica
amorphous androgynous - mountain goat
harold budd - flowered knife shadows
brian eno - an ending (ascent)
linda perhacs - chimacum rain
claire hamill - sleep
cocteau twins - donimo
laurie anderson - big science
phil collins - droned
andy summers & robert fripp - bewitched
david bowie - warsawa
tangerine dream - exit
ash ra tempel - ocean of tenderness
vangelis - alpha
deuter - crystal pearls crystal

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

equinox - change of seasons



equinox - change of seasons

last night my friend casey were chatting online and trading youtube clips of smoothness and new ageness. following the rabbit-hole of video links, casey came across this jam. an incredible find. it's posted by someone running the 'ambient music collective' out of montreal canada. it sounds like a daft punk sample. literally it's some amazing digital lazer euro lite-funk complete with dope 808 tom thuds. I'm stunned. if you have any leads on this, please, come forward.

Monday, January 26, 2009

until further notice



the weekly riding high podcast is suspended until further notice, while I do things like have a life. please don't go kathy bates on me.  be on the look-out for special mixes in the interim, followed by a podcast relaunch in the near future. yay. 


sun ra - saga of resistance (theo parrish remix)


sun ra - saga of resistance (theo parrish remix)

-----------------------------------------------
sun ra remix! by theo parrish! 

ra wants to make love in this club: nerds rejoice. 

seriously though, if only more dance music was this hip-shaking but gloriously eccentric at the same time. wonky, out of tune horn loops, frog-voiced guttural mutterisms. I like tracks that sound like the Tattoine bar scene in "Star Wars." 

so deep. unfortunately there's no one singing "space is the place!!! outttter spaaacce..." and no upside-down laser organ solos. don't let that dissuade you from riding the smoothed-out afro-groove submarine all the way to the deep-house ocean floor. 

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Brian Jones Presents: Pipes of Pan at Jajouka



Brian Jones Presents - Pipes of Pan at Jajouka
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
If AC were a seminar, which it is, we would devote an entire week just to this record. Actually if there was any justice in this world, which there isn't, this record would be either the alpha or the omega of AC blog posts. But just like the world, which more often than not is a confused jumble of events lacking in both inaugurations and consummations, this record appears instead in media res. 
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Brian Jones was invited by Brion Gysin in 1968 to go to Jajouka, a small village in Morocco. There he made tapes of the local musicians, who have a highly localized musical tradition, going back thousands of years. Then he went back to England and studio manipulized them, adding serious dub effects, accidentally inventing the remix (not Puff Daddy). History is like that, very chancy. Like Manuel Goettsching, who helped to accidentally invent techno by recording E2-E4 in a single afternoon. 

Pipes of Pan is an extremely psychedelized field recording of deep moroccan bug-outs, and a mind-blower regardless of your musical attunement and/or general blown-mind skill level. 
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Tales of Grift: Music Hunted, Never Found #2

When I studied in Prague my friend Mike and I were obsessed with this record, in the way that young minds can ascribe certain things with talismanic intensity, and hold them close like blessed weapons in foreign lands.  At some point it became clear to us that with our fairly light course-loads we could fly to Morocco and spend a week there, with little academic consequence. Why my parents ever consented to this is still a mystery to me. Knowing the various fine messes and fool-headed quests that I myself have gotten into in my so-far short stay on this earth, I am going to lock up my children in a closet until they are eighteen. 

Mike and I flew to Morocco because we wanted to go to Jajouka. We never found anyone who recognized the name, which we were probably not pronouncing right. But like most griftorial adventures, it was the experiences along the way, while searching for the eternal Mecca of free noise-nerds, which remain eternal stars of my own soul's innermost constellation. Morocco is sensually overwhelming, a dreamworld in the desert, enveloped in hallucinations and secret symbols. Brion Gysin's "The Process" is the best book on the matter. 

We road a midnight bus from Casablanca to Marrakesh. In the back of the bus we gave two upper-snorting bootleg-hat wearing grifters a tape to play on their boombox, everyone head-nodding to "Shimmy Shimmy Yaw" in the desert darkness. We drank the freshest orange juice in the world. We brought tape recorders and recorded numerous street bands. At night the food stalls in Marrakesh would set up and we would sit and devour kebab, while steam from the grill rose in the hot air across a field of hanging lanterns. We explored Fez's labyrinthine medina. We rented bikes and rode them aimlessly. We both got the shits after the first and only time we ever ate in the French Quarter instead of the medina, although in hindsight it could have been because of the room-temperature yogurt we had earlier on the train. We took a taxi from the Meknes train station to Volubilis, a site of Roman ruins, the Westernmost tip of the Roman Empire, columns still standing in the African hills. Scorcese filmed "The Last Temptation of Christ" there, and George C. Scott walked on the stones as Patton, dreaming aloud of his past lives. We met Aziz, a young goatherd, while traversing a small hill behind the Fez medina, near a crashed car. We recorded all three of us throwing rocks at the car, then Aziz got inside and found some shoe polish and a bit of newspaper, and painted his goat-bone cane brown. Then we drum-circled on some car parts, Aziz having to tone things down for his two whitey bandmates. We gave him some stickers with fish on them. We stayed up all night in Rabat while waiting for the train back to Casablanca, drinking tea with a highly articulate, professorial grifter in a djellaba, who pontificated and seemed to have no place to go. Everywhere we asked for Jajouka. 



Monday, January 19, 2009

Circlesquare



Circlesquare - Dancers


Circlesquare's new album is called Songs About Dancing and Drugs.  It has that moody handmade electronic vibe, half techno half rock, that you find on Colder or Thomas Brinkmann's last album When Horses Die. Call it bedroom Joy Division.  It's excellent if you like shadowy synthetic sounds but also Leonard Cohen. The song 'Dancers' is my jam. There's a number of album tracks where the lyrics are positive but they're weirdly undercut by minor-key chords and deadpan singing..so when you hear "now we're all dancers.." it sounds oddly alienated. 

The key word in the title actually is 'about', it's all about the about. It's not songs for dancing and drugs, but about them. The whole record feels like you went out clubbing and partying and there was a big rush of sensations and you stayed out very very late and all your friends went home, and now you're back at your laptop with a midi board, and maybe the sun is coming up, and you should drink some water, and all the loud pulsing sounds, with firebomb bass and siren swirl, are still echoing somewhere in the back of your skull.

here's a mix from Circlesquare as well, more downtempo gothic beats for your solo trek home through the neon wilderness.


Circlesquare- "Super Late Night Music For People In The Dark" DJ Mix
This Mortal Coil- Thais II (excerpt)
Glass Candy- Lovin Machine
This Mortal Coil- Thais II (excerpt)
October- Doxa
Circlesquare- Dancers (Konrad Black Remix)
This Mortal Coil- Thais II (excerpt)
Jefferson Airplane- Lather
Aphex Twin- Mookid
The 6ths- The Sailor In Love With The Sea
Circlesquare- Ten To One
Tones On Tail- Rain
Matias Aguavo- De Papel
October- Listen, Move, Dance
David Bowie- Up The Hill Backwards
This Mortal Coil- Thais II (excerpt)
Circlesquare- Music For Satellites
This Mortal Coil- Thais II (excerpt)

Sunday, January 18, 2009

boozoo bajou



Some sweet California dreaming. For their new album Grains, the duo Boozoo Bajou have put together an organic, gentle take on the Laurel Canyon sound that influenced the making of the album.  “We didn’t try to make an authentic West Coast album, it’s just that laidback California thing was in the back of our minds,” Florian explains. “It coloured the whole thing.”  To highlight the reference points, see an inspiration mix below.

Grains will be released March 3rd on !K7 records.  A single for "Same Sun" featuring mixes from Prins Thomas and Andy Votel will be released digitally on February 10th.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
if you want to stream an extremely smooth track by these guys, and considering it's a snow-capped Sunday afternoon I can't see how you could possibly not, then go here:


Boozoo Bajou- Grains Inspiration Mix

Stillness - Sergio Mendes
Everybody's Talkin - Crosby, Still, Nash & Young
Grains - Boozoo Bajou
Edith And The Kingpin - Joni Mitchell
Jamaica Say You Will - Jackson Browne
Same Sun - Boozoo Bajou
The Old Laughing Lady - Neil Young
Tonschraube - Boozoo Bajou
Rashida - Jon Lucien
The Sun In California - Autumn Defense
Traction In The Rain - David Crosby
Messengers - Boozoo Bajou
4 + 20 - Stephen Stills
Wichita Lineman - Dennis Brown
-----
Boozoo Bajou US DJ Tour
01/22 Santa Monica, CA - Zanzibar
01/23 San Francisco, CA - Poleng Lounge
01/24 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club
01/26 New York, NY - Cielo

Thursday, January 15, 2009

telepathe - drugged



////telepathe - drugged

Telepathe are a brooklyn duo whose new album Dance Mother is produced by Dave Sitek, so it has that glowing electro-shoegaze vibe on it. I know this might sound uncharacteristic of me, but it turns out that the jam on Dance Mother that I ride for is called 'drugged.' Now, the whole record is real solid but alot doesn't strike at my core because it's skittery. There's a lot of skitting and shifting going on. It doesn't surprise me that the jam here that's most focused is also the most narcotized. 

'Drugged' has trippy, heavenly melodies and that sort of divinely altered feeling that comes when you're out of your mind, and sensations seem to be beaming in through your midnight window from a distant psychic satellite, the kind that you can only hear on very special occasions but which is always raining truth down around us. The song also has dirty-south type beats because apparently these girls like Hot 97 and stuff. 

The Mole People - Break Night



the mole people - break night

Armand van Helden released this trailblazing long-form monster under the Mole People pseudonym on Strictly Rhythm in 1995. It's an acknowledged deep house classic. Rudimentary tribal drums and two endlessly unspoiling laser loops, glowing with phaser swirl and traversing a shimmering expanse, opening up an endless void like in "Tomorrow Never Knows."
-----------------------------
I was speaking with brave about the latest Shed record and he said "it sounds great if I'm driving, but if I'm IMing people it just sounds like some beats." Which pretty well sums up the two kinds of attention you can pay to music, especially the heavily rhythmic minimal-beat kind. but it's not like one form is better than other form. Walter Benjamin (the implicit or maybe not so implicit forefather of AC) made a point of stressing how important distraction is in modern life as a form of experience. 

distraction is valuable in modern life because there's a lot of it. there's suddenly alot of things coming at you and most of the time you're not zoomed in on them, they appear in this shifting thicket of sensation, and when images or sounds or words sensed in distraction pass into your psychic self and begin to live there, they will be not as things you really remember or can identify, but as lurking, immortal ghosts.

so pay close attention to 'break night'. or put it on while you gchat. see if I care.

Captain Beefheart's 10 Commandments for Guitarists



at AC we ride for Turzi. if you're not clued in to these Parisians' blistering hawkwind/gates of dawn psych jams, we can recommend you do so. Their guitarist has a blog and on this blog he posted Captain Beefheart's 10 commandments for guitarists. For example:

"1. LISTEN TO THE BIRDS...That's where all the music comes from. Birds know everything about how it should sound and where that sound should come from. And watch hummingbirds. They fly really fast, but a lot of times they aren't going anywhere."

the rest are viewable on Clemens' blog, !!!Korrect!!!

UND of course props to dj slow for the find.


Monday, January 12, 2009

ridin high podcast: 01.13.09: adrath bey



download link
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
file under: cosmic africa, tribal deepness, beats of no country
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
adrath bey - ankh dub
carla bley - A.I.R.
starlight - mao mao
lula cortes e ze ramalho - pedra templo anima
coconot - tao
Kamphopo  - TVB(Esau Mwamwaya & Radioclit) 
orchestra poly rythmo - dis moi la verite
dan boadi and the african internationals - money is the root of all evil
animal collective - lion in a coma
petro loa - no rada no rada
lee jones - safari
la pena - A1
voyage - kechak fantasy
fleetwood mac - tusk
vetiver - been so long (neighbours remix)
ghost note - holy jungle (mark e pressure dub)
ozo - anambra (long version)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
one of the most solid ridin' high podcasts yet, a heady soundscape of deep ethno-tribal weirdness. but who is adrath bey? what does he want? what is his real name? why does his heavily dubbed-out mix of out-jazz, ethno-tinged indie jams, minimal house and extreme beardness come scrawled with the phrase "ceremony of minerval?"
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
track commentary by adrath bey

"This podcast contains a doctrine of substantial occult significance. The listener before admission is bound by an obligation in which he recognizes the DJ as the Supreme Authority. This represents the free choice of a free will to submit itself to the magical formula represented by the DJ. The listener is seized, blindfolded and bound head and foot. This represents the first operation of this formula. The soul is drawn within the planetary current and its sight and freedom of action are immediately taken from it. the carla blay jam is courtesy of an acquaintance I made while home in Austin over Christmas; Ryan allowed me to pick through a box of used LPs he'd gained for free during some donut socializing - bley's jazz opera "escalator over the hill" was the yield. starlight is another jean-pierre massiera concoction, extremely bugged. coconot is el guincho's band, equally sun-dazed and tropicalistic. money is the root of all evil. don't put the lion in a coma. petro loa comes from a possible hoax compilation called "extreme music from africa" and sounds like an animal collective song being beamed across a secret satellite. "Tusk" is Fleetwood going native, together with the USC Trojan marching band. Vetiver remixed himself. The last ten minutes of this mix are so bearded, they're methusalahean. Anambra is a Mancuso-era classic, its magical flutes giving a misty incantatory ending to another night at the loft. Also it always reminds me of Joe Versus the Volcano for some reason."

glacial lakes dj set: thurs @ savalas


glacial lakes - festival
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

UR invited: this thursday @ Savalas in Brooklyn: 285 Bedford Ave. 10PM. 

jonathan & billy are glacial lakes. at Savalas they will be playing:

deep kicks
balearic bliss
robot disco
cosmic beats

as well as some original productions and exclusive re-edits of stuff like  'long train running' by the doobie brothers. counteract winter climes and their concurrent affective disorders with activities such as: pleasant conversation, good-natured socializing with friends and well-meaning strangers, drinking, dancing, and giving your favorite glacial lake DJ a hug. 

and check out a GL track just for you, the sun-dappled 'festival,' recorded on location during j & b's visit to the african nation of balearia.

related podcast material: ridin' high w/glacial lakes






Sunday, January 11, 2009

playgroup - dj kicks



playgroup - dj kicks
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

1. maurice fulton presents boof - we
2. ana rago - you're god (I: cube remix)
3. material - ciquri (discomix)
4. harlequin 4's - set it off
5. impedance - tainted love
6. random factor - broken mirror
7. cultural vibe - ma boom bey (love chant version)
8. metro area - caught up 
9. tiny trendies - the sky is not crying
10. smith n hack - to our disco friends
11. zongamin - tunnel music
12. charles schillings - no communication, no love
13. nigo - march of general (chicken lips conquest dub)
14. j-walk - buggin' becky (tim 'love' lee fully bearded mix)
15. kc flightt - let's get jazzy (dope dub mix)
16. Human League - Do or die (dub)
17. the parallax corporation - anti-social tendencies
18. playgroup - behind the wheel (dj kicks electroca$h radio mix)
19. ralphi rosario - get up, get out
20. bobby o - still hott 4 U
21. dexter - i don't care
22. wanda dee - gonna make you sweat (acapella)
23. the rapture - house of jealous lovers
24. the flying lizards - money b
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
this is one of my favorite mixes ever. it first taught me what weird dance music could be. Trevor Jackson, the legendary UK DJ, put it out under his Playgroup moniker in 2002, right during the revival of 80's electro. It sounds like it would appeal to tastes at the time but it's way too singular and inspired to have its energies completely dissolve in the tides of cultural flux.  

it's one of those favorite-ever things that you can actually forget about for a long time. I remembered it because bret and I went to broadway east the other day to see lovefingers dj, and he played "mah boom bey" by cultural vibe and I kicked myself for a day or two trying to remember where I'd heard it, and then it hit me, back on this playgroup mix on which I know every single note by heart. spare, weird, captivating, it's full of sweet tunes you've never heard of but sound instantly good. like the harvey 'moonshadow' mixes that are some balearic deepness before most people got around to it, jackson's dj kicks is weirdo disco before such dancefloor oddness became jams du jour. a top-shelf eye opener that can take you down the rabbithole of occult electro-disco mysteries. let's hope you don't come back.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

jonathan - li song


jonathan - li song
---------------------------------
An acknowledged classic exclusive.  On the heels of Heldon, it's some extremely rare, awesome seventies German deep scifi-prog, with a powerful head-nodding drum groove that's very DJ Shadow-worthy. On top of the solid Bonham pound there's heavenly shimmering organ chords like on Popol Vuh and cheerful analog flutes.  I really want to hear this song with hip-hop scratches. Remember how on Endtroducing there's a part that uses the break from "Sunday Bloody Sunday"? You could do something like that with this. Look out for an exclusive "808s and Drum Breaks" remix here soon. 
---------------------------------
here is the backstory of finding this album. two summers ago my glacial lakes partner jonathan came to visit brave and I in Berlin, where as is our custom we were holded up for the season, practicing in Prenzlauer Berg, spieling fahrrads, hanging with falcon, and drinking beer on the streets. there's a good story involving being a hero goose that is too long to attend to here. Suffice to say one weekend afternoon we were scouting around the Mauer flea market, poking through records, when I handed a copy of the Jonathan album to its namesake, and we beheld its lovely serendipity - you see the music of Jonathan is performed by a keys & drums duo, which is exactly the same lineup of my band with brave. The coincision of these elements had a near astral intensity. J, however, in an odd move, put the record back, noting its high price tag. Curiously, that was only one of two magic flea market finds that day which would fail to make it back to the States with us - brave later procured a fantastic druid garment that quickly became an inofficial band outfit, truly coronating him as the homeless wizard he is. That find too somehow missed rescue, cosigned to the absurdly spacious sublet apartment we left behind in Kreuzberg. 

Needless to say, it's not hard to regret passing up purchasing a tantalizing obscure record that bears your own name, especially when the cover art is your name in huge stone letters on the moon, and there's a kind of apple that's also your name floating above it. Also, trying googling this album. We all thought it lost to the dustbins of time, until one day stina and I were in a random East Village record store and spied it, there, hanging on the wall! the Jonathan record! 

The End




Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Heldon - Interface



Heldon - Interface
- - - - - - - - - - - -
legendary lazer-rock face-melter from Richard Pinhas' 70s experimental trio Heldon. Trippy electronics, barrelling, careening drums and siren-squall feedback guitar, it sounds like Sonic Youth jamming with Suicide. no, really, that's what it sounds like, like the sky has cracked and light from the future is shooting down, blinding people. 
- - - - - - - - - - - -
sometimes it pays to judge a record by its cover. I was at Kim's, digging around in the psych rock section, and pulled this martian jedi pilot out from among the dusty sleeves, and bought the thing on sight. You see, I have an excessive faith in the unpredictable. I take alot of hard left-turns. sometimes this means I wind up in the hidden cave of Aladdin, surrounded by spectral, bosomy virgins and occult scrolls, other times I find myself on the wrong end of the rabbit-hole, cast onto a frozen desert, wandering shelterless in the dark. in this case my faith was rewarded - interface is a real mind-blower, one whose first listen can pack enough wallop to shake any nerdic genealogical tree of twentieth-century music.  

riding high podcast 1.06.09: glacial lakes


download mediafire (re-up)
download divshare

jonathan forgang and william rauscher reconvene as glacial lakes for 2009, sending you more echoey downtempo bliss, cooked with brazilian nuts and marinaded in dub, but this time beginning with a little AM radio muscle. as is the GL tradition, the real gems here are some exclusive jams borne on the backs of smooth grooves, which take flight under a glowing moon before finally leaving you face down on the beach at sunrise. you know, we just can't help ourselves - we try to stay on the shore, but when the oceanic birds of paradise begin to call, the synth solos and echo chambers come out and it's all over. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

file under: balearic twilight, infinite smoothness, so bearded 

tracks:

doobie brothers - long train runnin' (gl edit)
kongas - tattoo woman
tim buckley - sweet surrender (gl edit)
glacial lakes - deep release (south beach demo)
henrik schwartz, ame and dixon  - D.P.O.M.B. (version 2)
glacial lakes - carla
michel hoeullebecq depresses the shit out of me
edu lobo - feira de santarem
caetano veloso - canto do povo de um lugar (gl epic edit)
glacial lakes - raindance

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

as we're dealing with a lot of original material here, in lieu of track commentary, some things should be noted:

FIRST, don't bother trying to edit the doobie brothers sober. you're going to need one, maybe two brooklyn brown ales in you at least before you can even approach the doobies' wavelength. 

SECOND, if you screw up and accidentally record yourselves talking trash about contemporary european fiction while digitizing vinyl, leave it in. 

THIRD, if you're composing spacey shoreline tunes, don't restrict yourself to test-running them in your drab apartment in a frozen northeastern metropolis. in this case, jonathan personally went all the way to florida just so he could be absolutely certain that these new glacial lake jams are the real deal. he literally floated in a saltwater pool and listened to them coming out of speakers hidden in palm trees while babes walked by. scientific proof.  

Friday, January 2, 2009

dj harvey - moon shadow mixes




dj harvey - moon shadow part one
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



Dj Harvey

these are the best easily-available mixes from harvey. The other recordings you can find with little difficulty are the black cock edits, which are widely credited as reviving interest in the disco edit as an art form but aren't that exceptionally rewarding as home listening, or the late night sessions, which harv oversaw during his residency at ministry of sound in the UK, but which sound like some generic jazz-lounge house. The kind of generic jazz-lounge house that reminds me of that place Radost FX that we used to eat at all the time when we studied abroad in Prague. Remember that place? It was severely euro-trash and had a faux-harem interior and great vegetarian food. They must have hated our guts except for the part where we dropped heavy USD every day. 




Radost FX, where we used to eat all the time, remember that?

Harvey's moon shadow mixes are deeply chilled-out, 3am outer-space epics. they involve smooth robots making love on the beach. They are great if you are interested in such activities as riding high, playing piano under the stars on LSD, and traveling to other planets in a cruise ship while drinking free mimosas. These mixes can easily serve to demonstrate everything important about being a good DJ. Here's the list: play good songs, play songs no one's ever heard before but are awesome, play songs in a good order. that's it.



Mollino polaroid

on a related note, I was explaining Carlo Mollino to a friend, and said that in addition to being an architect, designer, race car driver and pilot, Mollino had a home called Casa Mollino that was full of amazing furniture and artefacts, but in which he never slept, instead using it as a spot to bring prostitutes which he then photographed in highly elaborate and visually stunning polaroids. My friend remarked, "yes, a masturbatorium. this is what all men, consciously or not, are striving for." I said that one of my musical goals was to provide the imaginary soundtrack to Carlo's Casa - consider these mixes as Harvey's unknowing contribution. Oh, and go see him at his regular gig at Love in Greenwich Village. 
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

There's no complete tracklisting for either mix. If you look on DJHistory you see some partial reconstructions at best. I'll help out with this: the last track on mix one is...Dreams by Fleetwood Mac, the best song ever made.

thanks to simply good music for posting these.

zip password: simplygoodmusic



Thursday, January 1, 2009

electronic signals from videoland

the deal with a limitless resource like youtube is that there are long spells where it is a infinite wasteland of boredom, but then there are moments when you strike a deep well of links and related videos and you're down the media-archive rabbithole. My report on some latest findings of the synth-pop variety:


1. Jo Lemaire - Je Suis Venue Te Dire Que Je M'en Vais



Awesome haunting cover of a Serge Gainsbourg tune. You'll notice that the track is entirely synthesizers but the backing band is...some dudes on bass and drums. The tune has a wispy electronic sheen similar to "Take My Breath Away" by Berlin, which is the best song ever made. It's also surprising that you've never heard this before, considering how much you like 80's music. I hadn't either, and I thank the angels for letting rare gems like this come to light.

Here's the track so you can listen along at home.

Jo Lemaire - Je Suis Venue Te Dire Que Je M'en Vais

2. The Passions - I'm in love with a German film star



Icy melancholy fantasy of a 'glamorous world.' You know, I would argue that if Severin, the protagonist of Sacher von Masoch's Venus in Furs and the literary source for the psychoanalytic concept of masochism, were alive today, he would be an 80's synth-pop fan, and he would ride for this song. You can just see Dietrich in furs, and Severin espousing her aloof, icy allure.

and guess what? Sam Taylor-Wood, one of the Young British Artists of the Sensation era, recently recorded a cover version. It's produced by the Pet Shop Boys and released on the German label Kompakt - in a sort of heavenly alignment of conceptual art, British pop and Teutonic electronics.

3. The Droids - The Force






Inexplicably, I didn't post this video when I posted the Droids record. This tv clip for their song The Force is a minor theatrical triumph. As a friend remarked, it could be described as "Space Egyptians in the Chamber of Cabinets." Everything in this clip is perfect, including extremely hammy keyboard 'playing,' weird aluminum costumes, and a ballet dancer. A mesmerizing artefact that represents one of those weird off-roads on the highway of culture that no one ever really followed up on.