Kohwi - Blindlights Mix

So this is a mix that I started at least a few months back, but it had to take a back seat to some more pressing projects for a while.  School ended, I found myself with some more free time on my hands, and finally got around to finishing this little set.

Today I bring you Tweaking Trays' second mixtape: Kohwi - Blindlights Mix.

A 30-minute set that strives for variety similar to that of a freeform radio show ala my weekly bit on WCBN here in Ann Arbor.  These are all tracks that have really hit me hard over the past year, mostly recent stuff, but there's also some songs that are a little older, tracks that I've recently discovered, or tunes that I just feel never got enough love.  So get yourself in bed, turn on some trippy mood lighting, crank this through your A grade studio headphones, and enjoy the BlindLights.

Tracklist:

1. DM Stith - Abraham's Song (Bibio remix)

2. Mount Kimbie - Vertical

3. Luke Vibert - Porn Shirtwee

4. Mobius Band - The Loving Sounds Of Static (Junior Boys RMX)

5. MillionYoung - Chlorophyl

6. Andre Nickatina - Killa Whale

7. Venetian Snares - Eurocore MVP

8. Static - Untitled

9. Toro Y Moi - Lissoms

10. New Villager - Genghis On

11. Machinedrum - Freshkids (Fresh Edit)

12. Dan Deacon - Snake Mistakes

13. of Montreal - Id Engager (Diplo Mad Decent Mix)

14. Fizzy Dino Pop - Space

15. Alice Russel - Universe (Dave Da Gatos F_uck-up The Festivals Bounce)

16. Dizzee Rascal & Armand Van Helden - Bonkers (Doorly Dubstep Remix)

17. Modem - Three-Year-Old Slug

18. Ernest Gonzales - When You Are Lost I Will Find You

Kohwi - BlindLights Mix

Ps. The new spring schedule begins tomorrow for WCBN.  My show, The Magical Mystery Hour, will be Monday's 3-5:30 from now through the end of June, and fellow tweaker Gargamell will also be storming the airwaves Wednesday nights 11pm-1am right after the Local Music Show.  You can stream 'cbn online ALL THE TIME!

Now I'm out to listen to a live broadcast of Toro Y Moi & Caribou in DC via NPR.  Check it out -- 

-djdrbegone

wishes Chairman were here.

     

Ann Arbor, MI

oh em gee its out its out its out

Ladies and Gents, long time no see.

I apologize for my long absence, but you see...I had more important things to do. Well, that may not be true, but regardless, I come bearing exciting news and gifts.

The new Ratatat album, appropriately named LP4, is scheduled to release soon and it is fantastic. How do I know? There was a leak. some dutch guy put it up on /mu/. Those dutchmen are crafty in their ways, y'know. So here's a mediafire link to download the tracks. Unfortunately, you're gonna have to download the tracks individually, but trust me it's well worth it.

LP4

I must say, I've never been disappointed in Ratatat. They are some of the finest and most unique musicians I have heard and their following is constantly expanding. So now, be one of the first to have the new LP4 album. You're welcome.

Interview with Boas

A few weeks ago I spoke on the phone with the art-savvy, melodic IDM powerhouse that is Boas. Known as Tyler Newbold to his mom, this producer hails from Richmond, VA--which as he assures me (and as you can see), is a hotspot for crazy/awesome/original music acts these days.

His latest self-titled LP release is a fluid, ever-rippling work, held together by synth patches you could only dream of and 'pasted together' broken dance beats. Along the lines of an acid tripping Thom Yorke, his songs manage to break into intricate grooves while still maintaining emotionally driving melodies. I'm not kidding when I say that he has truly made something completely original.


While reading the interview, why not play this track? It's trippy, it's mathy, awesome. (You need headphones to fully enjoy the intricate craziness)


Boas - Dipole

Q: Your name is Boas, but how do you pronounce it? Is it like 'Boas' as in multiple snakes?

A: Yes, exactly. [laughs] A friend of mine said that same exact thing and he asked me something--it was something 'like multiple snakes?' he said those exact words, it was hilarious.

Q: Where does it come from?

A: It's kind of embarrassing but I was doodling--mostly just doodling--with street art, graffiti style-stuff and that was something that I was writing a lot, just because I liked the word, how it looked. I never really did anything with it really, I mean you know, it was just something I was doing in sketchbooks and it was just this weird thing. There's absolutely nothing behind it really, other than that. Naming a project is a torturous process.

Q: I think it fits your music pretty well. Okay, so what were you doing musically before Boas?

A: I play in a band in Richmond called Cold Toast and we were doing that for a while--just like three people--and we're still doing it. So I've been playing in Cold Toast for several years, since I moved to Richmond basically. Even before that I was recording solo stuff. I've been recording solo stuff for a really long time. But I never released anything and I dunno, I was always just kinda waiting until I was perfectly satisfied with my efforts I guess.

Q: All of the visually artistic aspects (the album art, the myspace, everything else) were done by you?

A: Yeah

Q: Okay, so can you tell me about your artistic endeavors?

A: Well I went to art school. I just graduated last August in illustration, communication arts, and I also majored in English. I learned a lot in art school, as kinda bullshit as it was in ways. I still learned a lot about design and that's sort of another career that I'm sort of a beginner in.
In the future, I wouldn't necessarily do it myself, but I feel like it's interesting when musicians do their own art, gives them a lot of control. But I think an element of collaboration is really important, so I think in the future I might outsource that stuff because I know some really interesting artists who would be really cool for that. So I think it's gonna be a one-time-thing for the most part. But who knows.

Q: As an artist/musician, who or what would you say your biggest influences are? Specifically for the album?

A: I feel like the bands I listen to are probably pretty 'clear', clear as far as anybody else would think, on this album at least. But I go through phases when I don't listen to much music, like when I'm working on stuff I sometimes keep clear of conscious external influence. But in those other phases, I am really into new music that I feel is changing things. Specifically on this album, there was a wanting to sound very contemporary, and even urgent. Like most could assume, there's influence from Clark, Animal Collective, Dosh, The Books, people who I really stand behind. But there's a lot of influence on an immediate local level too, like my friends from the Chocolate Milk Collective, here in Richmond, who are some just flourishing and inspiring djs/beatmakers. Vocally, it's sort of a different ballgame, harmonies and stuff. I love Crosby, Stills, and Nash. Sorta like folky music with really really nice tight harmonies. Vocally, I also really adore Bjork. Whenever I'm in a situation where there's a song that needs this appropriate and specific melody, which is sometimes so hard to conjure, I think of what Bjork would do!

Q: Is there anything in particular that attracts you to sacred geometry?

A: Yeah, well I mean, it's a big influence--not like musically or specific 'artist-wise'--but it's sort of this new age stuff that I've been into for a while as far as like conspiracy theories and ET--ET life--and sort of this realm of consciousness that you can pull into your daily life. I saw this documentary about crop circles called 'Star Dreams,' a while ago, and that really turned me on to the intrinsic power of geometry, harmonics, energy. There's very much an urgency feeling around the world, you know, like it's sort of an insanity. But with the understanding of some of these ideas, I think you can break through some barriers, socially, spiritually, and live a little more viscerally. It's just like a synthesis of that stuff, I guess.

Q: Do you have a process when you make songs or do they just kind of work themselves out when you make them?

A: [There are] typically long processes on the songs that you could probably assume would be such. But sometimes there are tracks that I'll do most of the legwork in like a day, and others that will take months and months. But basically it's just like sometimes a long process is like sculpting something. It usually starts off very very basic, ya know, in terms of letting one thing lead to another in terms of what you can hear. You're sort of forming sounds then all the sudden you start hearing things that like [come to you.] In that sense, it's sort of a spontaneous thing in terms of melodies and vocals and stuff. A lot of times the producing/mixing process is a pretty big chunk of the song writing even--in terms of cutting things up and using a collage-y element as opposed to a one shot performance. 

Q: Can Boas songs be played live?

A: Yeah, ya know it all comes down to whether or not I want to do it so soon without wanting to get it right. They can be done live, I could play them off my laptop and sing over them, which I've done very rarely. With Cold Toast we were actually playing some of that stuff. Cold Toast is a bit more poppy, I guess, and more straightforward in terms of performance and things. But yeah, we are playing them live. A few tracks off this album I play with Cold Toast. So it's a mix of laptop and live drums (sort of a deconstructed drum kit.) So yeah, it's pretty interesting to do [laughs]. But I am currently  in the process of brainstorming a live band, both with instruments and electronics, to perform the Boas stuff properly.

Q: About your album, it sounds like there's something conceptual about it, kinda like it's taking you on a journey. Did you do this intentionally? What kind of trip were you trying to take us on?

A: [laughs] That's great, that's super. Yeah, I definitely love that aspect of listening to an album. It is conceptual--there was a lot of thought put into the flow, and giving you very defined plot points in the album that are very dynamic--parts that are really really sort of heavy. And all in the span of two or three songs, and then having two or three songs that are a complete escape from that. So that inevitably keeps you attached in some way; you can hopefully think that's conceptual.

Q: So about that, about halfway through the album, I think the song is called 'Dipole,' the album undergoes a sort of a transformation. What is the idea behind that?

A: The idea was for it to be a big turning point on the album, to depart from vocals and get into some more sonic territory. I think that point of transformation is complete when the song itself undergoes its own change, exactly halfway through the song. I liked it because it felt like a release from the previous four songs. Like you can just sit back, not worry about a focus in the sound, but more the ambience of multiple parts working together. That was just a process of a song--that's actually a really old song--and yeah, that had been through so much time and sort of remixing over and over as I grew a lot in working with that gear. I think that the way that song started was me, pretty early on, trying to figure how to use software and stuff, and so I think that song started as sort of an experiment doing what was sort of uncomfortable at the time like trying to sequence and stuff like that, and I was trying to make a song out of like a pretty coherent thing, even as simple as it was, then it sort of got regurgitated many many times. I sort of grew with that song. I like it because you're sort of thinking that it's going to be sort of another like "acidy weird gargly mess," but it does shift around, and I like those moments of release, you know, where it goes into the ambient realm, because ambient I feel, is a very universal way of musical communication.

Q: How do you do your synths? Software, hardware, both?

A: Yeah it's a mix of both. My studio is really really modest--there's really not much--but I was able to get a Juno 102.  But the thing is totally glitched out and it sounds insane. You can hear it all over the album. Certain notes will hold, go into overdrive a bit, starts screaming. It's used on a lot of songs, it's got a really really extreme personality and that's really the only hardsynth that I used, but I did use it a lot in terms of sequencing. And then a lot of it is stuff that tends to be more sculpted digitally using a softsynth. Which there's a lot of that, too.

Q: Kinda on a different note, can you tell me about your work with Galt?

A: Yeah, he's a good friend of mine. He's a songwriter and I've liked his music for a while. I've been producing other people's songs here and there, different songwriters and JOR producing, And then I started getting into electronic music and then he wanted me to produce his album and record it. So we've been working on that for way too long actually, we're getting really eager to get it done because it sounds really great. But yeah, basically, we're just trying to get this album done. He's gonna try to promote it, so hopefully it'll be good.

So yeah, be sure to check out the Richmond scene--between his other band and Galt, you can get a glimpse of the diverse sounds emanating from this southern hotspot.

Be sure to listen to the other music he's produced--hell, have him do a remix for you! (you can email Tyler at newboldtv [at] gmail.com)

Dubstep these days

I'm really torn with dubstep these days. I feel like I've been with dubstep since it first made waves in the US when Rusko put out cockney thug (cuz let's face it, that's when dubstep really took off) but these days it's been brought into the ever-genre-fucking light of the MAINSTREAM~~~~

This isn't all bad. We're seeing stuff like the luvstep mixtape which pushes dubstep into different vibes (trading violent gargling wobble basses for tame sweeping melodic basslines). Also you get badass remixes of big named producers by other big names, for instance this remix of a track off of rusko's upcoming LP on mad decent:

Rusko - Hold On (Sub Focus RMX)

Hey, genre pushing is great, but i think it gets ruined by jokers like bassnectar who cater to the drugged up, hippy, jamband scene. I don't like this american-version of the british raver. what the fuck america? does everything we do have to turn into some sort of mcdonaldized, mass-pleasing, money raking bastardization? ahh well, there's more to life than bitching about the mainstream. let's focus on the good shit, shall we?

First up is Freddy Todd. This dude churns out crazy, syruppy glitch-hop styled dubstep a la Rustie and some of the other lucky me crew. But he kinda trades the lofi nuances of lucky me for a fat, american hip-hop touch. Can you call it dubstep if it isn't 140bpm? Cuz a lot of his stuff isn't. (looks like he's even done stuff with my beloved Mochipet! yay!) But I fucking love it. oh yeah, he's from DETROIT, TOO!!!

Freddy Todd - Space 5 Penthouse

This next one is a real chopper upper. Seriously heavy, I'm going to get subby to throw it in a mix or something. I like how it feels as though this sort of ultra-heavy/grimey style of dubstep has evolved from simple wobbles to crazy shit like this (and it doesn't even feel that repetitive). You should check out Bar 9, his shit is heavy and he srsly knows how to keep it real fasho with the grime and all. However, I'm a little tired of the whole BLACK AND WHITE MYSPACE PAGE DUBSTEP ARTIST LOOK AT ME I'M A BADASS COMPUTER NERD WHO CAN DJ meme.

Sidney Samson - Shut Up & Let It Go feat. Lady Bee (Bar 9 Remix)

Lastly is a subvader release. A kind of otherworldly approach to dubstep, this Mr Hudson x Kanye x Gucci Remix is pretty nuts. Not many producers change up the feel in one song as much as Subvader, and nobody does it as well. His EP IS DUE MAY 1st!

Mr Hudson x Kanye West x Gucci Mane - I'm the Supernova (Subvader Remix)

Hopefully these tracks are enough for your grimey needs. And hopefully they're enough to help battle the upcoming epidemic of shitty popstep.

LOve,
pacman

Come On BLAZZZAAAA

16 y/o Dylan Khotin-Foote is quite a super rad dude, and makes some super rad music as well.  Hailing from Edmonton, Canada he goes by Kumon Plaza and crafts hypnotic tracks using mostly old analog gear, and occasional sounds from his gameboy via LSDJ (which we here @Tweaking love oh so dearly)

Be on the lookout for his Cliff EP due out sometime over the next few days on digital/cassette.

LISTENZ=>

Kumon Plaza - Hans Kruger

-djdrOUT

Utah and Back Again

Arches National Park; Canyonlands National Park; Zion National Park; Moab, UT; Vermillion Cliffs National Monument; St. Louis, MO; Denver, CO