Thursday, January 29, 2009

another late night.


image: sandra croft

okay we seriously need some happy news in here. a bit slow
on the uptake but here it is. owen meyers drops the 4am
installment in his late night series. more straight up electro
and a nice LED glow to fight the dark clouds and keep the line
between the the club and night tight and always ready to rock.
by the way, the other half of circuitflow & the bird, rajomo aka
mr. ray monner, makes his debut on 4am as well, courtesy of
the ace track hypa hypa hypa. keep your ears sharp coz there
is even more to love now.

you gotta listen: owen meyers - 4am mix

in all its stellar track-listed glory:

1. chromeo - bonafied lovin' (yuksek remix)
2. boys noize - oh! (a-trak remix)
3. midnight juggernauts - dystopia (turkish prison remix)
4. the teenagers - homecoming (guns'n'bombs remix)
5. the whitest boy alive - golden cage (fred falke remix)
6. photek - love & war (LA riots remix)
7. madonna - into the groove (sidechains remix)
8. justin timberlake - my love (diplo remix)
9. timbaland - miscommunication (the bloody beetroots remix)
10. beni - my love sees you
11. mstrkrft - bounce (feat. N.O.R.E.) [extended version]
12. daft punk - harder, better, faster, stronger (coin operated boy remix)
13. ghostface killah - charlie brown (yusek remix)
14. amon tobin - chicago jan 2008 mix (excerpt)
15. rajomo - hypa hypa hypa
16. snoop dogg - sexual eruption (boys noize remix)
17. lil' wayne - lollipop (chopped and screwed by dj young redd)
18. KiD CuDi - day 'N' nite (crookers remix)
19. deadmau5 feat. kaskade - move for me (santiago & bushid)
20. sébastien tellier - sexual sportswear (donovan remix)

and do we even need to mention that fred falke remix of
the whitest boy alive's golden cage. do we? i think not.

charlie cooper 1977-2009.



telefon tel aviv is now down to one. on tuesday, joshua
eustis announced the news via their myspace page that
charlie cooper, his other half, was discovered dead on
the 22nd of january at the age of 31 - just two days after
the long-awaited release of their third studio album on
ellen allien's bpitch control label. the already sad news
comes with the disturbing speculation that it could be
a suicide. if you've spent the last 6 days or so listening
to the album, the idea that it might be true becomes
profoundly devastating. instantly gorgeous, subtly
unsettled, embracingly moody even when upbeat,
uncharacteristically and generously expansive,
Immolate Yourself looks set to be 2009's Saturdays=
Youth: a work that is contemporary in its skilful
new-wave redux and timeless in its scope.

what is it that we always like to say...that there is no
going back? well, this time it's actually for real in an
uncomfortably literal way - you can never go back to
the bliss of a more innocent circumstance, of the
sadness of the album being an abstract thing. in those
6 days or so of ordinary time at the end of january,
against the usual background noise of winter isolation,
mundane early mornings, anticipation, the stress of
daily commutes, the humdrum of real life just getting
on with it - Immolate Yourself came to be an elixir of
distraction and the gift of expansive calm. really, that
it took only twenty days for the first great electronic
album of 2009 to come along should be the gift in itself.

those of us who spent formative years with telefon
tel aviv have our long history to fall back on and the
knowledge that life is all about taking things in and
putting things out. it is not to say at all that there
are clues to be read in Immolate Yourself - after all
the album was completed as early as april 2008 -
but it is conceivable that the shrouded vocals and
sonic fog could be the antidote to getting lost in all of
those questions that have no answers. even as the
title of the album becomes an unsettling irony, early
stages of listening have already revealed a work of
enduring beauty about the affirmation of being alive
and wide-eyed in one's own time.

for the rest of the world that knew charlie cooper only
through the music telefon tel aviv made, that's what we
have left of him. after a while, you'll realise that's how
most things go, so make sure you listen real hard to
someone you love today.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

endless summer january.



for when summer seems like a million miles away,
here's that long awaited knightlife edit of cut copy's
so haunted. maybe we should also be asking: what
is it that makes us still come back to this track after
almost a year (an eternity in blog time)? and yeah,
it's almost been a year. before there was in ghost
colours
, there was the so cosmic mixtape, cut copy's
preview of what was to be their annus mirabilis.
haunted with machines of the past and sounds of
the future, the so cosmic mixtape inhabits the
kind of space in time where trends are irrelevant,
music is about feeling rather than following and
1969 is just as relevant as 2020. somewhere in the
lovely looped piano riff of aphex twin's 'on' giving way
to the swirling sunburst dance rock of 'so haunted'
that started it all off
, the ice melted and prismatic
reality set in in 256-bit colour. the rock kids were on
the dancefloor, the mode was maxi, and new order
was transcendental. it was great.

and so with the knightlife end edit on so cosmic,
heartbeast/wolfgang came into existence to chase
endless summers of blue-sky gazing. this is the hand
we hold, kids. so here you go: back to the beginning
as a way of looking forward to another endless
summer. it may be 5 months away, but this might
help it get here a bit quicker.

cut copy - so haunted (knightlife's sun-soaked reprise)

Friday, January 9, 2009

all these crazy crazy ideas.



gotta keep on moving, gotta keep on going! it's almost
this month, day 10, and two-thousand-and-fine waits
for no one. everyone gets a new year, so what are you
gonna do with yours?

heartbeast/wolfgang starts the year by announcing
two upcoming mixes from owen meyers, 4am and 5am,
the fitting companions to even later nights that start at
3am. these ones point you straight to the dance floor,
you better get your move on. all that and more, coming
real soon. but first: here's a sweet taste, get dancing!

css - move (cut copy remix)


and so, it begins, all over again.