Daft 'n' defunct: it's the end of Daft Punk

Daft Punk broke.

I figured their batteries would never run out, or maybe they were eternally powered by Nile Rogers' electric guitar licks. Alas not. Daft Punk are no more. The duo has split up.

Their split announcement came in the form of a video in which one of them explodes in a desert and the other one's all like "hey, you just exploded in a desert so I'm gonna walk off now". Even though it's just a clip from their 2006 film Daft Punk's Electroma, it's a pretty devastating watch.

Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter formed Daft Punk in 1993 after becoming disillusioned with guitar music. They got their name from a Melody Maker review that slammed their crappy rock band as "daft punky thrash".

The pair cemented their electronic music foundations when they hooked up with Stuart from Glasgow techno legends Slam, who signed them to his Soma Records and put out Da Funk. When Virgin Records came sniffing around, stratospheric success beckoned: platinum albums, oodles of Grammies, producing Kanye West, becoming actual French knights.

Maybe their greatest legacy is comedian Limmy's oft-repeated tweet "Check out Daft Punk's new single 'Get Lucky' if you get the chance. Sound of the summer." A gentle dig at their commerciality from a man who obviously knows the band's true origins: he has a pilled-up character whose catchphrase is "where's the Slam tent?", a reference to the aforementioned techno Glaswegians who discovered Daft Punk.

Daft Punk are responsible for one of my strangest clubbing experiences, as recounted in this blog post:

"When I saw Daft Punk DJ at Sankeys Soap back in the 1990s, a French stranger tried to roll my torso like plasticine while saying 'wide boy, wide boy'."

In all fairness to the glad-handed Gaul, he looked absolutely mortified. He bumbled off pretty promptly, no doubt in search of that elusive Slam tent.

Daft Punk's output was one of diminishing returns. At one end of their career, Homework was astonishing, an abrasive analogue assault with crowd-pleasing sass. At the other end of their career, Random Access Memories was pretty rank. In 2013 I criticised its "awful MOR pop" and the "horrible, horrible rest". 

It gave them their only number one single and studio album, indeed one of the best-selling singles in UK chart history, but it dented their reputation forever. Which is saying something considering their commerciality had never been a problem previously, such as getting sponsored to only wear Gap clothing, or hawking Star Wars merch for Adidas, or having Coca Cola launch something called Daft Coke (!).

Despite this slow eroding of their underground cool, they delivered a career highlight in 2010 with their superb Tron Legacy soundtrack, an album I once cautiously predicted would be "at least ten per cent better than the Moomins film". No, I don't remember a Moomins film either. It's most probably my favourite film soundtrack, despite the movie itself being rather eggy.

Here's something else you might not remember: Thomas Bangalter gave us Music Sounds Better with You as Stardust, a top ten smash from 1998. Not only that, with his work on Bob Sinclair's workout-sampling Gym Tonic, later covered with great success by Spacedust (no relation), he's partially responsible for a zillion house music videos with lycra-clad dancers. Put those leg warmers away, Madonna.

Daft Punk lit a tricolour touchpaper under the backside of dance music, showing that you could produce club-credible tracks and still appeal to a mass audience. Although they didn't quite roll and scratch as they used to, I'm gutted about their demise. Salut, boys.

Best electronic albums of 2020: eight

8 – The Flashbulb ‎– Our Simulacra (Alphabasic)

The Flashbulb, or Flash to his friends, is a jazz composer, advert soundtracker, film scorer, martial arts practitioner, and an electronic music programmer who runs a neat line in squirrelly IDM. 

Catch him at a party and he'll probably bang on about all these things. Jeez, Mr Bulb, give it a BREAK.

I'm guilty of neglecting The Flashbulb's work for a long time. He last got a mention on this website in 2006. ‎So the cinematic, perfectly programmed and endlessly creative Our Simulacra came as something of a revelation. 

The sheer range of ideas wins the day. The choral and darkly comic Stabmyself is worth the album price alone. The title track sounds like recent Daft Punk caught in a malfunctioning Faraday cage. And he's not afraid of a bit of cheese either, as the liquid piano in Ez God Library shows. Very well played cheese.

Hi, I'm Flash. I fly helicopters, I can bench press 12 tonnes and I once liberated Milton Keynes. Yeah but can you write an end-of-year blog series under pressure while eating seven full Viennettas? Pfffrt.

 

Browse the rest of the Best Electronic Albums of 2020

Best electronic albums of 2020: fourteen

14 – Against All Logic – 2017–2019 (Other People)

Nicolas Jaar, who has previously had two albums mentioned in this countdown, is already known for warping 1970s soul and disco into something thoroughly techno under this Against All Logic guise. 2017-2019, however, takes it to a new level.

He's taken all that lovely dance music you love, then shoved it through a waste disposal, attacked it with a sander, and bashed any remaining bits with a hammer. It distorts, it belches, it scrapes, it thrills. It's the red-peaking bit of early Daft Punk but, y'know, forever.

It's way rougher than you'd expect from a Jaar album. It's like your smooth Uncle Thackery, the one with the Lambo and the winning smile, turning up at your door in a half-open dressing gown, sweet wrappers stuck in his lockdown hair. Not the Thackery you expect, but certainly a Thackery you'll come to like.

2017-2019 also contains... and I'm going to whisper this because we don't want everyone knowing ... it also contains, in opening track Fantasy, the best Beyoncé song you'll hear in 2020. There, I said it. Uncle Thackery, can you please put on some pants? Jeez.

 

Browse the rest of the Best Electronic Albums of 2020

Daft Punk not living up to either part of their name

I love this photograph of mid-1990s Daft Punk.

They look like they're about to record a cool skateboard fails video but their mate with the camcorder hasn't turned up yet.

They look like an N*Sync tribute act just after the other band members quit.

Guy-Manuel looks like he's asking for his ball back, and Thomas is so over with Guy-Manuel always kicking the ball into other people's gardens.

They look like they're filming a Breakfast Club sequel. Or if you squint, they could be a pre-pubescent Jay and Silent Bob.

They look like they've just finished a particularly coordinated graffiti session in which they perfected the logos of Sun Records, Motown and, right at the edge of frame, the Beatles.

They look like, and is final, two unassuming DJs who had just knocked out one of the most revolutionary debut albums in dance music history. I mean, wowsers, I know this is stating the obvious 25 years too late, but how damn good was Homework?

Whatever they look like here, they are neither daft nor punk. And I quite like it.

Shortly after this picture was taken, the pair had their veins replaced with iron tubing in their first transition into all-conquering robots. You can see more pre-helmet Daft Punk pics at Daft Bootlegs, which includes Thomas wearing a Back To The Future t-shirt at Manchester's Bugged Out.

Lapse dancing: the stories of Manchester clubbers

Maps are great. You can get big paper ones that are difficult to fold, and digital ones that ask you to rate places you've been nowhere near.

The Lapsed Clubber Audio Map is a crowd-sourced map that was launched a few years ago by the Manchester Digital Music Archive. The great thing about this map is it talks to you.

The Map contains audio and text memories of Greater Manchester ravers of their clubbing experiences between 1985 and 1995, easily covering the peak years of rave culture.

I had a pleasant trawl through some of the stories uploaded to the site. Here are some highlights from various clubbers in various venues, appended with my comments because I'm a blabbermouth who wants to make everything about me.

808 State at G-Mex: "It was a hell of a gig for us coming from out of town, us small country people... we heard all the same music that we listened to in the clubs of the back and beyond, but on a massive sound system and with a massive crowd of people."

Growing up in Manchester, it's easy to forget that the city was a bit of a Mecca for people out in the sticks. I went to the Hacienda because it was just down the road – albeit quite a long road. My earliest gig memories were at G-Mex: Radiohead supporting James comes to mind, mainly because it makes me sound cool. I probably went to awful gigs there too.

Tangled at the Phoenix: "It was small and it was dingy and there was sweat dropping off the ceilings... Everyone would end up at the garage at East Lancs getting Ribena, the king of all drinks. That was pretty much my life for about five or six years."

The Phoenix was very sweaty. We're talking Piers Morgan's armpits when he has the guilty sweats, which is all the time. I did my first ever DJing gig in their bar – I was terrible – and I remember grubby acid techno bashes in the club. I worked near the Phoenix and watched its building get knocked down. It's shops now. On warm summer nights, you can still smell the perspiration.

Daft Punk’s first UK live gig: "Daft Punk played live for the first ever time in Britain and played that song [Da Funk]... Still to this day, the B-side Rollin’ & Scratchin’ is the only song I can never listen to without vomiting."

When I saw Daft Punk DJ at Sankeys Soap back in the 1990s, a French stranger tried to roll my torso like plasticine while saying "wide boy, wide boy". I have nothing more to say about Daft Punk.

Devils Dancing: "I had this strange-shaped pill I bought, which actually turned out to be ketamine... These lights were making red shadows and all I could see were these weird devils dancing, in this weird, satanic fire dance, and my friend took me home."

I've always stayed away from the more hallucinogenic end of the drugs spectrum. My imagination has always been vivid and strange: my silly creative activities are my way of pressure-cooking that intensity out of my brain. If I didn't have that kind of release, I really would be seeing red devils all over my walls. For now, I just have slightly muted woodchip.

Dancing at Sankeys Soap: "I felt this body come up behind me and start dancing in the same rhythm as me. It got a little bit too close and so I turned round, not forgetting that I’m off me chops, and it was Zammo from Grange Hill."

So many good nights at Sankeys. And a bad trip that nearly destroyed me. Easy come, easy go. When I took on the name 'Fat Roland', I didn't even think of the Grange Hill connection. I should have gone for something different. Wide Boy, maybe. The forward Frenchman was right. Dammit.

I've plenty of memories of clubbing back in the day, so I really should upload something to the Lapsed Clubber Audio Map. Have a browse, why dontcha.

Further Fats: Store Street blues: waddling with the scrotes, the clubbers and the tokers (2007)

Further Fats: There goes the hear: Manchester has enough gigs (2011) 

Happy 909 day

Happy 909 day, everyone. Here's a pair of hands singing cutely over some Roland TR-909 rhythms.



And if that's not enough, here's a video of someone jamming on the 909, posted earlier today.



What do you mean you want more? Oh alright then. Here's Daft Punk's 1998 single Revolution 909, which missed out on the top 40 in the week Brimful Of Asha made its debut at the top of the charts. Good track, but it's no Revolution 909.



Photo: VintageSynth.com

Google autocomplete taught me some important things about electronic music

I had a mild brain fart the other day and forgot everything I had known about electronic music. Thankfully, Google was there to educate me.

I began to enter things into its search box, and Google helpfully completed my sentence for me. For example:

Turns out Aphex Twin might be Irish or a genius. There's a fine line between the two. I learnt he might be in a Die Antwoord video and possibly uses a Digital Audio Workstation. I'm learning fast here.

According to this, Daft Punk might be French androids or bespectacled Scots. There seems to be some uncertainty as to whether they're still making music, or indeed still alive. It's sweet that people think they might be married because they wear matching helmets.

A fair bit of homophobia on display here. What even is "gay music"? Still, at least I learned that Depeche Mode were goths. Or emo. Or new wave. This really isn't helping. Let's move on.

I widened out my search and decided to learn about electronic music. It left me worried for my brain but encouraged about my studies. A supplementary Google search sent me to a forum thread in which someone declared music to be prohibited by Islam. Someone replied with something along the lines of 'but what about all the Muslim musicians?' It didn't get a response.

Surely I can learn about rave from Google autocomplete? The results were vague. Rave might not be a word, and may get you in trouble in India. What the heck's rave hairspray and rave tobacco? Is that what all the kids are into these days?

Back to the bands, and my all-time favourite. Although only one of these suggested searches references the actual band Orbital. Due to sporadic break-ups, it seems their star has waned. When I turn up to their gig in December, I'm either going to be faced by the world's best techno band or a scuffed old DIY tool. Whatever journey their career is on, they seem to be travelling in a very strange elevator.

One more try. How about one of the biggest names in dance music? Surely I can dig up something on Calvin Harris.

Is that it? Oh forget it.

Further Fats: If it goes bleep, it may or may not be EDM (2013)

Further Fats: Is Tales From Fat Tulip's Garden responsible for the rave boom? (2017)

1997: what the flip was going on?

Someone tweeted about 1997 being an incredible year for music. Can't remember who. (Cool story, Fats.)

And yeah, there was Daft Punk and Propellerheads and Prodigy and Chemical Brothers and Roni Size. You were right, tweety person, you were right. 1997 was a great year for music.

It's good to measure these things so let's get specific. I decided to look at the singles chart exactly 20 years ago. 23rd June 1997. Let's wallow in a memorable year of fantastic tunes, shall we?

1. Puff Daddy's mawkish I'll Be Missing You was number one. Okay. Not so great. But all the good songs get to number two, right?

2. Bitter Sweet Symphony. And there's the good number two. Never did make it to the top of the charts. THANKS, Puff.

3. Mmm Bop by Hanson.  Three flesh muppets talking nonsense. Oh dear.

4. Ocean Colour Scene? Bog off. I'd drain the oceans and watch all aqua life writhe and die before listening to this shambles again.

I'm not convinced this is really working. Let's speed things up. Time to skip some numbers and get to the real meat of this burger of musical joy.

9. Guiding Star by Cast. Possibly the most annoying band of the 90s, and the band I have heckled the loudest. Make them stop.

11. Celine Dion? Crumbs. I'd forgotten about the boat-mouthed siren that was Celine. Ouch.

18. Savage Garden?! Worst S-band name ever. Apart from Shed Seven. And Salad.

22. The Friends theme tune that was in the charts forever. I'd rather have the clap clap clap clap.

This is terrible. This week in 1997 was a travesty. Jon Bon Jovi, Sarah Brightman, Brand New Heavies, Wet Wet Wet. All this chart proves is that 1997 was a verruca on the foot of the 1990s - and even then it's not a foot, it's just some weeping stump on the diseased leg of the 20th century.

No wait. I've found something.

87. The Saint by Orbital. Not their most remembered track, but with 11 weeks in the chart and a high point of number 3, it remains their best charting single. Kept off the top spot in April 1997 by I Believe I Can Fly and Song 2.

Yay! Told you 1997 was good.

Yeesh.

Review: Daft Punk's Random Access Memories

There are parts of Daft Punk's new album Random Access Memories I want to store in my RAM forever... but this is only part of the story.

Let's get some context. For a band that has only released three albums, Daft Punk's effect on dance music has been stratosflippingpheric. Every French house band from Cassius to Letherette gets a Daft comparison.

However their output over time, as they've moved from Revolution 909 to Aerodynamic to Robot Rock, has lost traction. You could argue their nadir was the Tron Legacy soundtrack, and even though the album itself it's much better than you think it is, the movie did translate as some kind of weird Bangalter-Christo vanity project.

Arse

The problem with Daft Punk releasing a new studio album after all this time is the Justice Imperative. The Justice Imperative is where a great Parisian electronic music act - let's for argument's sake say, er, Justice  - feels the need to fall so in love with their own arse, they prog themselves until they disappear completely. Except it's not prog: it's more "The Who teaming up with David Guetta". Have Daft Punk fallen into the Justice trap?

Tragically, yes. At least, to some extent.

The clue is in the epic riff that opens Give Back to Music. The riff disappears quickly and we're into a disco jangle ripped straight from Get Lucky, which is also here in (thankfully) extended form. But remember that opening few seconds. It will return.

Panda

Let's start with the positive. Doin' It Right featuring Panda Bear is exactly what you'd want a DP / Animal Collective collaboration to sound like and it's brilliant. Slow, teasing, melodic and glorious. Lose Yourself In Dance is utter disco singalong, lifted by Pharrell Williams's vocals against the robots' cheerleading him with "come on, come on".

Giorgio By Moroder starts, literally incredibly, with Moroder himself waffling at length about singing in discotheques and his lovely Moogs before launching into a spiralling, string-laden emotive nine minutes - a theme which is, incidentally, revisted on final track Contact. They spoil Moroder though with a bit of jazz noodling, but the track is pulled back with hi-hat-abusing live drumming that rises into a distorted acid shred climax.

The rest of the album is either bold experimentation or .. well...

Muppets

Touch is bonkers. We find ourselves in a Doctor Who horror hell, which then inexplicably morphs into Michael Ball in Phantom-mode, sinister strings and oodles of expansive trip hop. Vocals are by Paul Williams, who wrote the Muppets' Rainbow Connection, and that kind of makes sense and it's kind of brilliant or, more worryingly, it's something else. Parts of this track can be coupled thematically with Motherboard, which comes across as an ambient rhythmic UNKLE, its arpeggios the only clue as to it being Daft Punk track.

And now the rest. The horrible, horrible rest.

It's either bold experimentation or... this. That's what the opening riff alluded too. You're expecting 80s hair and flares and anything but a touch of Sade or Warren G, but there it is on Beyond which g-funks it up so much it's almost a total steal of Michael McDonald's I Keep Forgettin'. And The Game Of Love's guitar harmonic MOR barely sticks its head above 90bpm and it is smooth. Not just smooth, but Sade-smooth. We're talking Smooth Operator smooth. Okay, let's cut the crap: it's basically Smooth Operator.

Instant Crush, an obvious single, could be an Avril Lavigne track when it starts out but it gives in to Europop territory with light Royksopp or Mew vocals. Utter cheese... but they've softened us up with Get Lucky, so it's less of a shock. Still. This is Daft Punk and they've lost da funk.

Awful

Fragments of Time is awful MOR pop - Todd Edwards should stay on the other side of the microphone - and the line on ballad Within which says "there are so many things that I don't understand" will seep into your subconscious all track long until you are diving for Teachers (the track and the drink) to make everything okay again.

On Random Access Memories, the experimentation is sometimes brilliant, but it is all-too-often the sound of a band losing their confidence and losing their sound. There are parts of Daft Punk's new album I want to store in my RAM forever and some parts I'm going to need an anti-virus programme to purge.

There is enough here to make this their biggest album to date. They've gained traction again - but at what cost?

Further Fats: Please spell Freeland versus Daft Punk. "OBAMA." (2009)

Top ten best electronica albums of 2010: part one of four

This is part one. Please do read the other parts of this blog post: part two, part three and part four
To read last year's top ten best electronica albums, click here.

10 - Lorn – Nothing Else

Marcus 'Lorn' Ortega teased us with the track Until There Is No End on Fat City Records some time ago, a deeply moving slice of apocalypto-funk. Clark, the recipient of my Best Album Of 2010, then went on to master his debut album Nothing Else. You know it because every city in the UK has been plastered top to bottom with stickers promoting the record. In the process, the Brainfeeder sound (crunchy cut-paste J Dilla beats) was quickly knocked several days left of Tuesday with the label's first signing outside of Los Angeles.

It was also Brainfeeder's second album proper, and with Lorn quoting Milton all about the place, you knew it would be something special. Before now, I have praised his testosterone retro and made comparisons to Animal Farm and Bladerunner. The album sounds like Knight Rider having a breakdown: maybe it takes itself too seriously, but Nothing Else soaks you like tears and rain with a sound defined by no-one else but Lorn.

Embrace the synth melancholy. Buy Lorn's Nothing else from Bleep or Boomkat or Piccadilly.

9 - Venetian Snares - My So-Called Life

Like a naughty boy, Aaron Funk ventured away from his natural home at Planet Mu and set up Timesig Records for the (arguably) 22nd studio album from his interior decor / percussion-inspired moniker. Because it was recorded quickly - Snares sees this more of a diary entry than a year's work - My So-Called Life shifted the game somewhat. Well. Slightly. Its still a (detri)mentalist cavalcade of dirty junglism.

The quick recording process lightened the music by precisely nought-point-seven degrees: for example, pastoral string-picking gives way to a beautifully melodic 8bit 'n' bass on title track My So Called Life. But it's the vocal samples that are leaned on more heavily than usual here - and what horrible vocals. Grossly non-PC Welfare Wednesday contains a hilarious jibe at Planet Mu label boss Mike Paradinas, while Who Wants Cake? and Posers And Camera Phones say things that would make Jerry Sadowitz blush.

The most accessible and disgusting Venetian Snares album for a while. Buy it from Bleep or Boomkat or Piccadilly.

8 - Caribou – Swim

Caribou doesn't need any more praise heaped on his handsome locks. Resident Advisor has already pronounced Swim as the album of the year (please don't look at that list too much: mine is horribly and coincidentally similar). And Sun's dizzying refrain ("sun, sun, sun, sun...") loomed heavily over 2010.

I have an entirely personal reason for including Swim here. Opening track Odessa was playing in the bar in which I was getting drunk after my blog awards win, and it kind of became my soundtrack. That's not to downplay the rest of the LP though: crisp, driving house music, chiming hypnotica on Bowls and a nod towards indie pop on Kaili. But really, it's all about Odessa and it's all about the Sun. Sun. Sun. Sun. Dammit, there I go again.

Hunt yourself a Caribou: buy Swim from Bleep or Boomkat or Piccadilly.

Not quite in the top ten (part one)

I will not pretend my list - or indeed any element of my blog - is comprehensive. I also don't think this has been a classic year for electronica, nor that all of these artists are electronica. Crikes. This is like a minefield. Anyhoo, here are some of the albums that didn't pass muster.

I'm astonished at how commercial some of my top ten is this year, although Magnetic Man's eponymous debut album pushed the pop too far to be included, despite MAD and despite it being one of the most important electronic music collaborations of recent times. The same goes for Plastic Beach by the Gorillaz, although that was still a glorious album.

Daft Punk's Tron Legacy soundtrack came very close; maybe it would have helped if I'd bothered seeing the film. I found Darkstar's slow mosh-hopping North difficult to love, while Salem's King Knight didn't tug the earstrings enough for a top placing. Meanwhile, UNKLE bored me to sleep with Where Did The Night Fall.

I was gutted not to include two albums at the opposite end of the electronic sonic spectrum: Ikonika's gamer-baiting Contact Want Love Hate and Brian Eno / Jon Hopkins' Small Craft On A Milk Sea (which is not a great ambient album: it is a great techno album). Any top ten without them would be a crime. It's a fair cop, guv.

This is part one. Please do read the other parts of this blog post: part two, part three and part four
To read last year's top ten best electronica albums, click here.

Ultra-funkulent new band from Squarepusher

Squarepusher's got his funk on with his new project, Shobaleader One.

This ultra-violet super-funkulent video gives us mortals a taste of the eternal bassmasher's new sound  A mini-album with nine tracks (d'Emonstration) is due for release in mid-October. He won't tell us who's in his new band other than to say they are "a bunch of kids" who are "pretty frightening players".

Meanwhile, he has hopped over to Ed Banger Records to release the first track from d'Emonstration: Cryptic Motion is a Daft Punk work-out backed with a sharp-as-hedgehogs Mr Ozio remix.

'Pusher wanted this project to be a "clean break" from his past sound, which may be a relief to some concerned at his inexorable decline into terminal jazz. See what you think. Here's the track list, and snuggled below that is an album preview along with clickable play-bar of Cryptic Motion.

1. Plug Me In
2. Smash Unreason
3. Into the Blue
4. Frisco Wave
5. Megazine
6. Abstract Love
7. Endless Night
8. Cryptic Motion
9. Maximum Planck

Chosen Words: H is for House

a.k.a. World Cup Distraction Exercise: Fat Roland's A-Z guide to the most important words or phrases in electronica and their associated "facts"

House music exists because it is easy for DJs to mix.

House has often dominated dance music because it is a massive genre encompassing Josh Wink, Donna Summer, Deadmau5, Urban Cookie Collective, Tiësto and M People.

Some people say it was invented by Hugh Laurie when he realised his medical career was going nowhere. Some people say it died when Doop got to number one, although they did everyone a favour when they knocked Mariah Carey off the top spot.

Trance and acid house are good versions of house music, although the likes of Daft Punk, Justice and, more recently, Dam-Funk have reclaimed the mainstream genre for greater good.

According to Official Chart Company regulations section 47 paragraph 973, it is compulsory to have a house remix on your single.

Top five house music rhymes:

- Dmitri From Paris / Calvin Harris
- 808 State / Sven Väth
- K-Klass / Timo Mass
- Black Box / Carl Cox
- Anything ending in "Project" tends to rhyme with other things ending in "Project" and believe me there are a lot of them

For more Chosen Words, click the tag at the bottom of this post.

Chosen Words: B is for Boss Drum

a.k.a. World Cup Distraction Exercise: Fat Roland's A-Z guide to the most important words or phrases in electronica and associated "facts"

Boss Drum is term of worship for the transcendence achieved through the bass drum.

Repetiton and loops are important elements of dance music, and bands like The Shamen and Drum Club utilised hypnotic, rhythmic bass drums in their music.

The most famous loopy band, Orbital, named themselves after the M25. The M25 is the only motorway which forms a mobeus loop, much to the annoyance of those whose cars are unable to drive upside down and/or drive forever.

After the poll tax riots of 1990, the Conservative government tried to trap all the world's repetitive beats in the Tower Of London. Following protests from ravers, headed by bands like Orbital, Dreadzone and Phil Collins, the loathed Criminal Justice Bill became a firm act of law and everyone has been miserable since.

The boss drum is the most important button on a drum machine. All other drum noises are simply weak variations.

Top five most repetitive songs:

- Badger Badger Badger by Weebl
- Daft Punk's Around The World (man, it goes on forever)
- Doop by Doop
- I Know A Song That'll Get On Your Nerves
- There's a Hole in My Bucket

For more Chosen Words, click the tag at the bottom of this post.

Aphex Twin + Britney + Beastie Boys + 808 State + anything, really

If you mashed-up this blog with a successful blog, the internet would probably explode.

Some things shouldn't be mixed. I remain convinced that most MTV mash-ups were a calamitous waste of cathode rays and I have heard too many DJs ruin two separate tracks by smashing them together until the clubbers were sliced to death from airborne shards of shattered vinyl.

I always beatmixed until I started DJing my particular brand of electronic complexity some years ago. I then boasted that my record collection was beyond any sensible time signature and tracks could not be mixed or mashed into each other without the result sounding like some elephant in chainmail parkouring over corrugated shed roofs.

But that hasn't stopped people trying, particularly with the Cornish king of electronica, Mr Aphex Twin. Let's have a look at some of them, shall we?

Aphex Twin mash-ups
This MIA versus Aphex Twin mash-up sounds impressive at first, but it's a little muddy and the Aphex track, Windowlicker, inevitably ends up drowning out the genre-hopping vocalist.

This AFX  mash-up with classic jam-pumpin' house band Technotronic really is just a DJ finding the right BPM and making sure the audio train stays on a very narrow track. Same for this mix with Daft Punk.

When you throw Aphex's Windowlicker (again) with Vanilla Ice, Missy Elliot and Britney Spears, the result is a lot more pleasing. Especially when there's a cut-up video to go with it. My gosh, though, it doesn't half look dated now.

Someone has melded Aphex Twin with the Beastie Boys and Tokyo electro-popper De De Mouse to produce a track that has a higher feelgood factor than if the entire cast of Glee got pilled up and spent a night sweating and hugging and gurning at Sankey's Soap.

Jack Conte has done his own mash-up of Aphex Twin and Bright Eyes, but to my purist ears, it is ever-so-slightly spoilt by the Bright Eyes bit. And the Jack Conte bit.

Never mind all that. The bestest Aphex Twin mash-up I can find is this shaky mobile clip of Tim Exile blending AFX and 808 State. If I had heard this in a club, I would have been riding his back in seconds shouting "ride 'em cowboy" whilst dribbling all down his hairy back like a mentalist.

DJing at its best. Do you know any better mash-ups (or "mashups" as Wikipedia would have it)?

Edit: As seen in the comments below this post, I missed something pretty obvious. 100dbs take on Aphex Twin versus Snoop Dogg, Q Tip and plenty more is worth a (NSFW) look-in.

Fat Roland's 2010 electronica preview, part two: The Official BBC Electronica DJs In Need Medley

This is part two of my 2010 preview. Here is the link for part one.

Writing a preview for 2010 is easy for earlier in the year. Once you get into spring onwards, it all gets a little fuzzy. So here's my attempt at a preview of electronic music in the rest of 2010, but it may look a little like a blind man punching at the wind.

April - December: "boom bang a bang"

In yesterday's preview, I missed the somewhat tribal Nice Nice and their See Waves single in February. But what I can say is, in April they will give us Extra Wow, an album advertised by their label as a "sprawling psychedelic monolith." I also missed Soma 2010, the Glaswegian techno label's slightly delayed annual compilation bonanza.

Flying Lotus's DJ Kicks CD, mentioned yesterday, should get an mid-April release. Meanwhile, in May, Venetian Snares will win the Eurovision song contest with his version of Boom Bang A Bang. Okay, I lied about that bit.

As summer bears its sweaty heat down upon us, you should go and see Orbital: they'll be touring again, in particular at the Isle Of Wight festival in the middle of June.

LFO collaborator Bjork will appear on the soundtrack to summer 2010’s guaranteed blockbuster movie Moomins And The Comet Chase. Yep. That’s right. The Moomins. Imagine Moon, but replace all the Sam Rockwells with talking marshmallows. This is going to be a classic.

And I can bring your more information about Battles. The band called a ceasefire while Tyondai Braxton worked through some solo stuff, but it’s back to war again in 2010 – well, at least, in the second half of 2010 when their new album is due.

And finally, for scheduled releases in 2010, it's time to get Parisian on yo ass. Daft Punk have been leaking Tron Legacy images on their Twitter feed. The duo have recorded the soundtrack to the film, although it’s not due for release until Christmas 2010. I reckon this will at least ten per cent better than the Moomins film.

Other electronica releases in 2010: "glitchy wonkiness"

Like an unwashed Top Gear fan, I am severely lacking in dates. But this much I know is true:

Eclectic 2-stepper FaltyDL, who delivered Love Is a Liability for Planet Mu this year, is working on a disco album. In less exciting news, "crazy” beat jugglers The Avalanches are in the process of clearing samples for an album supposedly due out in '10 – but don’t hold your breath.

I read somewhere that Boards of Canada have been working on material for three years and it should hit in 2010, but I that’s all I know. And while I'm speculating, Bibio released about 42,000 albums in 2009, so don’t be too surprised to see more material in 2010.

Ikonika will be hopping from Planet Mu to the excellent Hyperdub label to produce a soulful dubstep album without all the wobbly basslines. Hyperdub is not only due to release material from London rookie DVA and long-time grime producer Terror Danjah - they're also promising a debut single from a new artist they're refusing to name.

The glitchy wonkiness foisted on us by Glasgow's LuckyMe crew should continue to be a highlight for 2010. The most anticipated album of 2010, for my money, is the one by Rustie. Assuming he gets round to recording one. And Hudson Mohawke is working on material with Olivier Daysoul – whether it means another album, we’ll have to wait and see.

Expect an album from De Tropix, whose Adeyhey joint has been smearing dancefloors this year. De Tropix is aa London duo that bridges the gap between Prince Buster and Neneh Cherry,

You can also expect something from Gold Panda, with his lovely mix of techno wandering and folktronic meandering. Broadcast will produce an album in 2010, following up their amazingly entitled 2009 production Broadcast And The Focus Group Investigate Witch Cults of the Radio Age.

Oh and there's Manchester band's Everything Everything's debut album too. And the Klaxons maybe. And lots of stuff from the Outkast boys. And Floating Points. And Tiefschwarz. And Beak, a.k.a. that bloke from Portishead.

Let me leave you with a final thought from the greatest dance band of all time.

The Vengaboys recently started touring again and are working on a new single to be released soon. Their producers Danski and Delmundo have released a statement that possibly summarises 2010's potential musical legacy. The Vengaboys say:

"2010 is the year! Look out for the new hit! It's the most gay song we've ever made."

Actual quote. Brilliant. That's enough blogging for a couple of days. I'm off for a lie down and a pint of whisky.

This is part two of my 2010 preview. Here is the link for part one.

Boycott Kanye West

Following Kanye West's outburst during the acceptance speech of a mind-dribblingly bland country singer at a ceremony about which no-one gives a flying puppy, I would like to call my blog readers to take direct action.

It's time to boycott Kanye West.

That UK#22 single Heard 'Em Say with dog-faced Maroon 5 crooner Adam Levine? Put it in the bin right away. I know you've been listening to it. Stop it.

You know Can't Tell Me Nothing? Remember? It reached #107 in the charts in 2007? Stop listening to that right now. Boycott it. Never listen to it again.

I know as a faithful Fat Roland On Electronica reader, you've been following Kanye's production career with great interest. Well, it's time to do some boycotting. If he's twiddled the knobs, in the bin it goes.

That means no more listening to:

- Cam'ron
- Mariah Carey;
- Trina and Tamara;
- Jin (that must be the dog from Britain's Got Talent);
- Beanie Sigel;
- Mashonda.

I know what you're thinking. Is there any music left? Shockingly, I haven't finished.

You should also boycott Roc-A-Fella Records, where he cut his production teeth. That means no more Alicia Keys singles. Hear that Alicia Keys warble trinkling out of your i-pod speakers right now? Stop that. You can cut out Keys, thank you very much.

That'll teach the pound-shop-spectacled one to mangle Daft Punk records. Together, we can bring down the music industry one drunken blog post at a time.

Next week: boycott Timmy Mallett.

Edit: Kanye, um, answers me back here [link since expired].

Please spell Freeland versus Daft Punk. "OBAMA." You are correct

Just for one day, hide your cynical Private Eye brain in your sock drawer and celebrate a sparkling slice of political history.  In tribute to the USA's most listenable president since, er, well, George W Bush, here is coastal breaker Adam Freeland's reworking of Daft Punk's Aerodynamic, set to an energetic cut-and-paste video by a bucketful of sickeningly talented visual artists.

Oh and while I'm here, in the comments under my Stefan Betke's Pole piece, you'll spot a top tip from Go Flying Turtle's Steve.  Go to Last FM and download tracks from the Wasted Magic In The Sand compilation for free.  (See the 'free' button in the grey box, top right.) Recommended for fans of Proem, Lackluster and Boards Of Canada.

"I am the trigger for your gun" suggests a relationship that isn't exactly balanced*

Pancake Day, National Novel Writing Month, Healthy Eating Day, National Ketamine Month.

These are events to be respected and celebrated. Especially the last one.

That's why I'm standing on the steps of my palace, gleaming trumpet in hand, and declaring March the National Month Of The Whip.

I caught their barnstormer Trash on XFM whilst me and a few chums were bombing it down to Wales this weekend. Whilst there is every excuse to gnash teeth and rip clothes at the demise of a great radio station, there is every reason to be optimistic for The Whip.

The Whip are the best thing to come out of Manchester since Doves. They're like Gary Numan and Underworld falling into a blender, being poured into Apollo 440's cup, topped with Daft Punk's nuts, and drunk by New Order's Peter Hook.

You can boogie with them at The Warehouse Project on March 21st or buy their debut long-player X Marks Destination two weeks today.

Or you can ogle them in a cracking performance (whip, crack, geddit?) at last year's DPercussion in this here video link here.

I really should buy some fancier robes for announcements of national significance. These are covered in cat hairs.

*the actual line is "I have become the trigger for your gun" but this didn't fit into the space. Editorial decision. Or summat.

DEEPER FRIED FAT: RIP TONY, GRAAH UM

Brian Eno's garter, a lack of gurning mentalism, and Kraftwerk transvestites

A decade of pushing buttons for Bjork, including shaping sound on the stunning Dancer In The Dark, has not done Valgeir Sigurdsson (pictured) any harm.

Quite the opposite. He has stepped from behind the knobs to produce Ekvílibríum, his debut album on his own Bedroom Community label.

His LP starts with feet on safe glitchy chill-out land, but he eventually hoists himself up onto Brian Eno's garter and catapults high into heavenly string-laden non-anthems, especially on the spacious Equilibrium Is Restored.

Sigurdsson can't tell eerie from airy, so some of this album lacks the intended atmosphere, but it works if you like Bjork and Sigur Ros' more ethereal moods.

And while we're on an Icelandic tip, I'll get round to reviewing múm's Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy when I can be bothered to get out of my curry-stained threadbare armchair. I bet they can't beat Finally We Are No-One.

High on a cloud somewhere, just above Eno's flying garter, is a surprisingly chilled out Mu-Ziq and his new record Duntisbourne Abbots Soulmate Devastation Technique.

He has locked away his gabba-gabba-hardcore-wherez-me-light-stick breakcore of previous offerings in favour of a sound that made me as sick as my cat (see past post) within three tracks.

The album's suffocated in detuned Boards-style melodies, which creates a see-saw effect right where your dinner's settling. Each track induces a sense of nostalgia, but only it sounded just like the last one.

Bring back the gurning mentalism, please Mr Ziq, because you're making us, er, siq.

It seems a little late to be reviewing Simian Mobile Disco's Attack Decay Sustain Release, but I need to up the tempo somehow. And it damn well should get the blood pumping thanks to more than a slight nod towards the jacking acid of Daft Punk and the energetic nerdiness of !!!.

I shudder at the thought of being A. N. Anonymous 4-pill clubber sweating over Mixmag on the bus going to my office job in the morning, so I avoid this kind of obvious house music party fodder.

However, it is simply addictive.

Plugged into the mains and with more quirky savvy than Kraftwerk transvestites, Simian's album of hurricane-force dance funkers deserves to have sex with every festive celebration's mp3 player this Christmas.