Jun 6, 2020
On my mind: The Guardian's 100 greatest UK No 1s
Sep 5, 2010
Ultra-funkulent new band from Squarepusher
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
Nov 15, 2009
It's like... um... like... er... um... like Flying Lotus covering Lil Wayne
What's Flying Lotus doing covering Lil Wayne?
Lil Wayne (pictured), for those who don't know, is a gun-toting cough syrup-slurping MTV Man Of The Year rap artist who, in his own words, is "lick, like a lollipop".
Bizarre similes aside, Lil Wayne once recorded I Feel Like Dying. This is a Mary Jane toking piece of rap whimsy where Lil (can I call you Lilly?) muses on playing basketball with the moon, and when it's played backwards it seems to throw up the line "without the trousers, we are nude".
Flying Lotus has done his own version of I Feel Like Dying, which is even more blunted than the original. You can hear it on his MySpace page. It's not the first time he's covered Lil Wayne, and I'm all in favour of electronica artists doing other people's tracks.
I'd especially like Venetian Snares to cover the Benny Hill theme tune. Are you reading, Mr Snares? Will you do it? Just for me?
Back to the MySpace tracks. There's another good Flying Lotus track on there too: Prince is a very short tune that sounds like Mr Ozio dropping like it's hot on a Nintendo. Like a sexy Pacman popping blue pills instead of yellow ones.
Put that in your simile pipe and toke it, Lil Wayne.
Sep 11, 2009
Mixin' ma tunesies: Flying Lotus, Rustie and The Black Dog
I've had a strange mixture of two songs stabbing my eardrums all day. The first is Getting Away With It, the melancholic Pet Shop Boys-sprinkled pop song from Electronic. The second is My Humps, the paean to road calming measures by the Black Eyed Peas.
The result is an insistent and disturbing image of Johnny Marr rubbing me all over with his strangely misshapen mammaries. Like being tickled with rubber bags full of gerbils, only in a bad way.
All of which is distracting me from some important record releases about which you, my newly disturbed reader, should know. Each of these feature remixes and are 47% more successful than anything offered by an Electronic / Peas combo.
Last year, Flying Lotus was basking in the glory of his album Los Angeles when he offered us a 12" of strange remixes. If you're quick, you can still pick up copies of Shhhh! It includes, among others, a dirty snare-smacking version of Mr Oizo's Stunts ($tunt$ is the most immediate track here), a drastic scratch mix of J Dilla's Lightwork and a seriously widescreen bass-wobbling Promiscuous Girl by queenzilla of the perfect pout Nelly Furtado.
Rustie's Bad Science EP (Rustie pictured above) is further evidence this young whipperbleeper should be a lot more famous than he is. Bad Science offers up bubbly 8-bit hip hop mentalism, including a reconfiguration of one of the best tracks of 2008, Zig Zag, while still being breathy and prowling like a robot stalker. The whole thing pretty much sounds like Zig Zag, so if you've got that, get this.
And finally, there's an EP from The Black Dog called We Are Sheffield which pours remixes over your speakers until you'll be mopping up massive basslines, glitch techno and warm mellowness from your newly shampooed carpet. It's worth it alone (sadly alone, if I'm honest) for the epic yet moody Autechre remix.


