Do-Over Vol. 1: Flying Lotus & House Shoes (Deluxe package 10” vinyl)
The renown party now comes to life in the form of a Limited 10-inch record series featuring exclusive tracks from guests of the party. Each volume is limited to 1,000 copies, featuring deluxe artwork/packaging by a different graphic designer.
La Kabala // El Caminante Solitario (1932)
La Kabala were a psychedelic funk/rock outfit from Mexico, who seemed to have only released one self-titled album. The LP is mega-rare and has gone for as high as $700 on Ebay.
Secondhand Sureshots (DVD, 12″, Slipmats, Hand-printed cover) // Stones Throw
Secondhand Sureshots is a filmed experiment in creative sound recycling. Dublab director Bryan “Morpho” Younce sent some of the World’s best Beatmakers (Daedalus, Nobody, J.Rocc and Ras G) on a safari into L.A. thrift stores with orders to make new music out of five finds while the cameras filmed the entire process.
D Bridge / Devonwho – Producer 2 (Part 4)
This is the third 7” in a series of 4 featuring tracks taken from the forthcoming Producer 2 album set for release in the Autumn. The compilation brings together all the most exciting elements around today from Hip Hop, electronica and beyond in the post - Dilla generation.
Mar
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Mar
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Mar
08
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ONE WEEK ONLY! Secondhand Sureshots Feature Film
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Mar
03
2010
03
2010
VIDEO // SAMIYAM + AFTA1 + ALTER @ BEAT CINEMA (Mar 2, 2010)
Big ups to DJ Erok for the footage!
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Feb
25
2010
25
2010
Madlib – Medicine Show No.2 – Flight To Brazil (2010)
Second of a one-a-month, twelve-CD series from Madlib on his own imprint, Madlib Invazion. Odd numbers in the series are original productions by Madlib, even numbers are mixtapes.
For Madlib Medicine Show No. 2: Flight to Brazil, Madlib sends us on an 80-minute guided tour through three of four decades of Brazilian funk, psychedelic, prog-rock and jazz
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Madlib – Medicine Show No.2 – Flight To Brazil
An 8-page booklet is included with the CD, containing anonymous liner notes that we have yet to make complete sense of. Cover by Jeff Jank, Currier and Ives. This will only be released on CD.
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Feb
25
2010
25
2010
SPEAK! + Afta1 “Simma Down Chill”
Afta1 & SPEAK! have recorded a handful of songsthat will be appearing on an album called “No Distance Just Grace.” The songs will be limited to a 500 copy tape cassette run.
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MP3:Afta-1 – Simma Down ft. SPEAK!
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Feb
25
2010
25
2010
Gonjasufi Interview, by Pitchfork
Gonjasufi is the latest musical incarnation of Sumach Ecks, a rapper-singer-yoga teacher currently living in Las Vegas. Though he’s been making hip-hop records since the early 90s and has released music with the San Diego-based Masters of the Universe crew, it’s his recent singles as Gonjasufi– from his forthcoming Warp debut LP A Sufi and a Killer (out March 9)– that are gaining him more notice than ever before. The album features worn-in, Dilla-descended production from L.A.’s the Gaslamp Killer, Mainframe, and Flying Lotus (Gonjasufi was featured on “Testament” off FlyLo’s Los Angeles), but the unequivocal star is Ecks’s voice– a scraggly, scary, smoked-out croak that creeps like the spiritual offspring of George Clinton and Leadbelly. In a recent interview, we spoke with Ecks about his unforgettable pipes, racism, and throwing rocks at cars:
Pitchfork: When did you start singing?
Gonjasufi: I got a VHS of me doing some Greek opera shit in second grade. I played the god of the sun, Helios. I had to come out on stage with my little staff and robe and I had this sun on top of my head that my mom made– that was the first time I was ever on stage singing in front of anybody. I realized that I was one of the best acts of the night but I didn’t give singing much thought after that. I was really into playing baseball.
I didn’t get into music again until the early 90s when I heard rap music for the first time. The first actual rap tape I bought was N.W.A.’s Straight Outta Compton– I had to get my mom to buy it because it had that “explicit lyrics” sticker. But what really changed my life was watching the movie Juice and the opening scene– just hearing that record rotate. When I heard that I started getting serious about DJing and making beats and recording myself on the four-track.
Pitchfork: When did you realize you had the disorienting singing voice that you use throughout A Sufi and a Killer?
G: That voice came out of me around 2006 and I’ve been trying to channel it ever since. I found it through teaching yoga, straight up. I don’t like to use a microphone around my head while I’m teaching so I had to learn how to project from my stomach more. I would come back from teaching three classes in a row and my voice would be all fucked up– most of the vocals on the album were recorded right after I taught yoga.
Pitchfork: What do you get out of yoga?
G: I found the ability to become still. The hardest thing for people to do is just be still. And in that stillness you create motion. It’s really a form of worship that the West turned it into this McDonald’s shit. It’s the realest shit I’ve learned in this life and it helped me to deal with the outside world by mastering my inside world.
Pitchfork: Was it always easy for you to achieve this stillness or was your life more hectic before?
G: It’s challenging, man; I still need yoga every single day. For instance, I was just driving here in Las Vegas and some dude threw a fucking rock at my car window. I guess I cut him off. He’s lucky I didn’t have a rocket launcher because I would have blew his ass to smithereens. Everybody that knows me knows I have a temper. If you look in the middle of my eye you’ll see this line from just screw-facing people for most of my life. Yoga helped me let go of a lot of that anger and to love myself more. I’m far from a fucking saint but I won’t snap as quick. Five years ago I would have yanked the dude out of his car and pounded him but now I’m like, “Ah, OK.”
Pitchfork: Who just has a rock in their car like that?
G: Well, back in the day I used to drive with a rock just in case, so I know where he’s at.
Pitchfork: Was there a moment in your life where you had to take stock and try to change?
G: When I had my daughter eight years ago and then my son five years ago. When my son showed up I had to chill out because I didn’t want him to see me at my worst. I have more to live for. I’ve dealt with a lot of bullshit because of the way I look and a lot of misconceptions about what people should be afraid of.
For example, I used to walk down in San Diego’s gaslamp district, it’s like a conservative, military town. One time, right after 9/11, there were a bunch of marines outside this club, and one said, “We found him– Bin Laden!” and they all started laughing. If anyone had wanted to catch the motherfucker, it was me, because I was tired of dealing with this shit. So I stopped and manned 50 of these marines up and was like, “Who called me Bin Laden?” Nobody said shit. If you can say some shit behind my back then you should be man enough to say it to my face. I said, “When I leave I don’t want to hear any fucking whispers or I’m going to turn into Bin Laden.”
I used to fuel gasoline at an airport during this time. Imagine someone like me at the wing pumping up gas. I had the whole fucking right side of the plane watching me thinking I was pumping water into the plane. Security would be called and they’d be like, “Oh, it’s just you.” American bullshit.
Pitchfork: This album has a unique, mystical quality reminiscent of stuff like Sun Ra or late John Coltrane. How did you arrive at that sound?
G: I think a lot of it happened during the mixdown. I spent more hours mixing the record than I did recording it. I mixed with this guy out of Silver Lake, AGDM, who was mixing with J Dilla right before he passed. It meant a lot to me to be mixing through the same board Dilla was using in his last days.
I had other cats that wanted to mix this record but they were like, “Your files are distorted.” But I don’t care what the file looks like, it’s about what they sound like. I wanted someone to mix the record down like they were blind and not just to rely on what the computer is telling them. With AGDM, we spent a lot of time going to the bar and getting to know each other. Then we’d come in at three o’clock in the morning and stay up till the sun came up, shroomed out.
During recording I was into yoga hard and I was very sober and clear minded. But when I went to mix I took a break from that. Right now I’m back into the yoga hard and I’m sober again and I’m not smoking anymore and I’m recording and cutting new shit.
Pitchfork: What did the record sound like before you mixed it?
G: It was less abrasive on the ear. But I didn’t want it to be too easy for the listener. I wanted it to hurt a little bit. I wanted it to get into a spot in the head that hasn’t been hit. When I first heard [the Digable Planets album] Blowout Comb, I was like, “They recorded these vocals too low.” But then I took a minute to adjust and now I understand what they were doing. So, with this album, I had to spend more time in the mix to make it an instrument.
Pitchfork: How did you hook up with Warp?
G: Through Flying Lotus. But I wasn’t recording to get signed to Warp, I was just doing it ’cause this is what I love to do. When people say, “Yeah, [signing with a label] can change you,” that shit’s true. I signed with Warp in late 2008 and it’s been the hardest thing on me creatively. After I got signed, I didn’t record shit for a year. I was like, “OK, fuck it, I made it! Now let me smoke a bunch of weed and chill the fuck out.” It took me eight months to mix the record. [Warp co-founder] Steve Beckett was like, “What the fuck’s taking you so long? This shit should’ve been out a year ago.” But now I’m about at a spot where I’m comfortable with the place I’m in.
Video: Gonjasufi: “DedNd”
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Feb
25
2010
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2010
J Dilla documentary, by Stussy
Stussy has produced a 3-part documentary on J Dilla’s life during his later years in Los Angeles, interviewing a few of the people he worked with in Los Angeles. Part 1 – Introductions – is here today. Part 2 (Detroit to Los Angeles) will be shown 2/17, and Part 3 (Donuts) on 2/24.
The limited edition J Dilla t-shirt created by Stussy in conjunction with the Dilla Estate and Stones Throw will be released this Saturday, Feb 13, and celebrated with in-store release parties in L.A., Vegas, D.C., Toronto and Vancouver. Check here for dates
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www.j-dilla.com | www.stussy.com
via http://www.stonesthrow.com/
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Feb
25
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Feb
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2010
Mr. Dibiase – Cakeology EP
Greater Manchester County’s Fat City is back with a brand new record for yo ass!
Produced by MR. DIBIASE it’s a five track E.P called ‘CAKEOLOGY’ and follows on from the massive ‘May the Force’ which we released in 2009, receiving huge support from John Williams (who actually sampled it for his 1977 pop hit ‘Star Wars Tune’… damn!) The E.P is a proper good piece of kit and if you are into hip-hop that kicks down the door you will love this shit! Woop!
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Mr. Dibiase – Be Fly
Tracklist
01) Atomic Slop
02) Keep On Runnin
03) Brazilian Lady
04) Be Fly
05) Cosmo Boppin
