Catch it if you can!

Previously unreleased tracks from the acclaimed best beats producer of all time, not only by hip-hop/house music lovers but as well by his peers. The EP/LP comes from a collab between J Dilla's  family and Mahogani Music owned by nonetheless than Kenny Dixon Jr. Very limited, vinyl only release at a special price is already selling out in many on-line record stores. Make a run for it because the discogs vinyl mafia is already smelling blood. Snippets follow: DILLATROIT EP - snippets

True School

Ben Simpson a.k.a. A Guy Called Gerald. He said it, he meant it and we're here to represent it!

''A Manifesto For The True School.
A Manifesto For The Original Art Form Of Electronic Dance Music Production.
My Art is the production of music, predominantly music for dancing, using technology.
One of my goals is to encourage inventiveness in a medium that has no boundaries.


What is the “True School”?


True School is respecting the old and embracing the NEW – new melodies, new beats, new sounds, new rhythms, new harmonies, new textures.
True School is Deep Attention.
True School is pushing your Art forward.
True School is being true to yourself which encourages others to be true to themselves.
True School is dancing only when you feel it.
True School is knowing louder is not necessarily better.
True School is knowing bigger is not necessarily better.
True School is respecting your audience.
True School is knowing the roots of the music you’re producing.
True School is knowing that the music and the dance floor is more important than the DJ. This is not a spectator sport.
True School is demanding good sound.
True School is not ripping off the Old School.
True School is not remixing without permission and putting it out into public domain.
True School is not faking it but making it.
True School is not fetishizing the machines or the format. This just distracts from the content.
True School is taking yourself seriously and having fun. If you really feel the music, you feel serious about it and what you feel is pure, unadulterated fun.
True School is not going through the motions with hands-in-the-air fake fuckery.
True School is not being afraid to play original tracks.
True School is not trying to make fast cash out of old hit records or borrowing other people’s names to make yourself known.


I openly discourage throwaway DJ-based music production as it stands today i.e. taking large chunks of other people’s music, illegally or not, looping it, and adding a few beats / percussion / vocals over the top and calling it your own track without crediting the original artist and THEN swearing vinyl is the saviour of music meanwhile they starve the original artist.
e.g. Searchin’ – 33 1/3 Queen vs Blow Your House Down – A Guy Called Gerald


It seems to me that the dance music industry, when it comes to inventiveness, is stuck in it’s own loop and the groove is getting very tired.
This Art is being lost to money grabbers and fakers. I welcome comments and discussion.
I welcome you to the True School.
A Guy Called Gerald''

Hipsters

Nowaday’s hipsterism. It’s all about boredom and abundance, the arbitrariness of signs and meanings, everything getting ironic and interchangeable, an irony without aim and wisdom, smiling at itself as a complacent pose, the dead end of postmodernism, the absence of the liberating mephistotelic king, the regnancy of last men, as Nietzsche foresaw them, cuddling themselves in their little neuroses, narcisms and validity claims, precluding true schizic and transgressing forms of being.

It’s the age of Wes Anderson and Slavoj Žižek, mistaken for filmmaker and philosopher respectively, childish indie music, the arty-lascivious indulgence into supposedly smart consumerism and capitalism, semiconsciously justified by a misunderstood Warhol.

                      Hipster family: 2001 Wes Anderson's Royal Tenenbaums

Whilst the so called elites of politics and business have detached themselves from society and deformed into para-mafia structures, occupied by the self-assertion and broadening of their privileges, the remnants of society at some point got tired of resistance which didn’t seem to work no more, stopped caring and began loving the slowly ticking bomb of social disintegration, boosting themselves their slide down into cultural and financial precarity, shown with miserable pride by imitating the underclass’ insignia. And a strange feeling of apocalyptic festivity ran rampant. 

At this point, the rich kids, bored by their privileges, joined the carnevalesc precarity-camouflage. The whole hipster-community turned into a coolhunting fauxhemia of the too lazy or too wealthy to care. Whole meanings of resistance were stolen and neutralized into consumer goods, everything got ironic and interchangeable. It’s the age of boredom and repetition. It’s the dead end. The opening of Allen Ginsberg's Howl (1955), the first generation of hipsters' manifesto, then needs to be significantly rewritten:

                                           A young Allen Ginsberg

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

Angel-headed hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection

to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night [...].

I saw the mediocre minds of my generation destroyed by boredom, starving hysterically overdressed,

dragging themselves through the webblogs 24/7 looking for a lousy hype,

Empty-headed hipsters burning for the newest socialize-connection

to the starry dynamo in the machinery of fashion [...].

Is there still hope? Is there a world after the dead end? Every downfall is also a transit.  Let’s bury these cultural zombies.

                                           bury 'em

Copyright DIS

We are all aware with the implications of laws such as ACTA, PIPA, SOPA and with the FBI shutting down MegaUpload and for ''conspiracy'' and ''fraude''. I mean seriously, a culture sharing website, this would be laughable if there wasn't an incredible precedent set if the charges stick. This means every file-sharing company can be brought down and they will, like a house of cards.
But this isn't what scares me the most, corporate pricks, dicks will do what they have to get revenue. What scares me is the artists standing behind this, they are against the same medium that brought them fame and presented them the world at the fingertips and are now bitching about getting a few more bucks. It's confusing, everybody! Or I'm sorry, didn't you back in the day record your favorite music from the radio and shared it with your friends?

''A society free to borrow and build upon the past is culturally richer than a controlled one" Lawrence Lessig

Watch this video, it will put things in perspective.

''Overprotecting intelectual property is as harmfull as under-protecting it, culture is impossible without a rich public domain. Nothing today, like nothing since we tamed fire is genuinely new, culture like science and technology grows by accretion, each new creator building upon the works of those who came before them. Overprotection stifles the very same creative forces it is supposed to nurture'' Alex Kozinski

Stronger copyright control will only further suppress culture. We are living exciting times everyone is an artist, producer, dj, photographer because of free mediums and its great!

Tip Top

DJ Mag - Top 100 'Djs' 2011 ;)

Music 0.0

In a interview Jay Haze, a well know DJ/Producer, explained his views on the industry and how hes trying to detatch from it. The interview is a must read for all who simply love music, not only the electronic scene. We are all aware of the machine that is behind music these days, they exploit and brainwash everyone into tasteless consumerists of the now, the new now, the next now. Its all so fast and superficial that its impossible to keep up with it. Printed media, radio, television and internet constantly promote whatever they're bought out to promote and no one cares. ''It's just the way it works in a capitalist society'' people say. Well I haven't heard a more absurd excuse for the contribution for the death of culture. It's all monkey see, monkey do around here.

''I've realized that people have lost touch with being human, they're happy these days with being a product, literally, a walking and talking product.'' Jay Haze

Therefore he proposes a concept called Music 2.0 that recognizes real people, real work and real effort rather than the latest best-buy prophetic bastard that happened to release an album. Well, this is not something ground-breaking but these days you can't just hate the media, you have to be the media (as my friend Jello Biaffra once said). However in my contention we should all go back to just music instead of a improvement on it as 2.0 suggests. It should be 0.0, music as a artistic and cultural manifestation of our present times as it always was. Bring back the human and take the business out of it. That being said it doesn't mean there isn't good music out there, it's just not being recognized and noted as it should.

''My albums have been my greatest pieces of art ever, that I can make. Every single time I have made one, it has been the best that I can do. (...) People didn't want to put that together. The public, that the music profiteers have created, in the moment, tend to be a bit more dumb.'' Jay Haze

Though it is a shame about his labels disapearing, as they were aggregators of quality and vision, still much respect for Jay, he's a breath of fresh air in a otherwise fart-stream of false ideals.

His first single of the LOVE=EVOLUTION album. You can read the full interview HERE.

Drive

In recent times good movies are few and far between, however Drive is an exception to the rule. Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn Drive breathes 80's not just because of the soundtrack but rather the characters and visual environment somehow relating to other cinematography such as Miami Vice or Bullit. This film art-noir action piece technically executed to perfection, the lingering shots give the feel of a comic translated into film. It is, however, completely character focused and a slow burner strolling through scenes that keeps on building and building, Nicolas manages to slow our heart rate down at will with dwelling moments that build into jaw-dropping scenes of love and/or extreme violence. The score is one of the vital aspects of the movies ambience. Composed by Angelo Badalamenti acclaimed for his work with David Lynch, his melodic synths complements the movie perfectly. The soundtrack doesnt fall behind, hand picked 80's slow disco style burners. Make no mistake, this is a instant cult movie.

For those in the Vienna (Austria) area the movie will be screening in this years Viennale at Urania and Gartenbaukino at 21th of October 16:00h and 23rd of October 00:00h respectively. Dont miss it!