Ultimate procrastination

This site is the single greatest collection of stupid photos of cats ever. I have wasted SO MUCH TIME looking at them. Why are picutres of cats with poorly-spelt caps-locked captions so damn hilarious? You tell me, internet, you tell me.

Anyway, here are some of my faves, just from this latest round of browsing through them (I've been meaning to post this site for a while). Please feel free to waste a good portion of your life looking through them all. LOLZ

"laser hotness"

So I have criminally been missing out on 20 Jazz Funk Greats an excellent mp3 blog that I had seen mentioned in a few places but had never checked out because of the alignment of venus in the fourth quadrant or something. Their focus seems to be more on the beardo-disco (aka the kosmiche/space/italo/kraut/prog/disco/edits scene) which, despite me giving it a rather ridiculous name right there, I don't know a heck of a lot about, except that involves finding lots of old, pseudo-disco tracks and playing it alongside some new-school shit like quiet village project or prins thomas remixes. Y'know!

Okay, so ignore that crazy talk: download this. The mix at the bottom of the post is mostly italodisco and I've pumping it the last few days because it is catchyX1000+8!! Italodisco is just more euro and a bit odder (cuz of them italians) version of disco, with some of the best use of synthesizers ever (aka, the above mentioned "laser hotness"). Do you dislike laser hotness? What are you, some inert lump of ore deposits that needs LASERING?!!?!?

Tearjerker techno is not an oxymoron!!

Firstly let me say I'm thrilled janssen has decided to come out of the woodworks and pick a few fights in the comment sections. As you may or may not have figured out, I'm desperate for some intelligent conversation 'round here! Debate me! Or do you all just think I'm totally right about everything?

Second: nicole yesterday told me that the phrase "tearjerker techno" is an oxymoron, to which I point to this thread and even more importantly to this song, which I see has already been added to the list on above thread:

pantha du prince - saturn strobe

absolutely heartrending. I don't know why I still have to try and convince people that techno can be warm or emotional, but if this doesn't convince you, than I question whether you actually have any emotions at all, and aren't some sort of heartless robot killing machine sent here from the future to destroy the human race. No destroying the human race! Anyway, this track is just stunning. I'm absolutely obsessed with it right now.


Lastly: here's a reason why the "whishlist" feature on soulseek is excellent. In my first real post on this blog, way back in july of last year, i posted a youtube video of this weirdo italopop video from the late 70s, which I thought was damn catchy. Anyway, I entered the track into my wishlist on soulseek and promptly forgot about that for a good long while. But then the other day as I was downloading some tunes, the wishlist thing pops up with a returned search result for this very song, and I, not really even remembering what the hell it was, but trusting the judgement of my past self, downloaded it, and lo and behold, it is indeed a great track. So here it is for all y'alls enjoyment:

franco battiato - l'era del cinghiale bianco

68%

(click for full view)


I really should be working right now, but I just want to point this out real quick before I forget.

68%. That's the percentage of the total attacks in Iraq directed against coalition forces, according to the latest US Gov't report on Iraq, covering the last quarter of 2006 (see also lenin's commentary). Just remember that number the next time you hear about civil war in Iraq, and how they need MORE troops, else Iraq descend into chaos.

You remove the troops, you remove 68% of the attacks. Simple as that. The US occupying force is still, by far, the most damaging problem in Iraq right now. Plain and simple.

Post of Questionable Legality

...but undoubtable awesomeness.

I like to listen to music in my spare time. Here are some things I love



This post has the following sections, visit those you please:

great techno (yousendit only! get it while it's HOT)
albums (electronic version)
albums (folk rock version)
albums (krautrock version)

great techno

First off, we've got both sides of a release from what is apparently the new "it" label, Liebe Detail. Sherburne's been bigging it up in his techno column for pitchfork, and it's getting name dropped all over the place, and what do ya know? Turns out it kicks ass! The matthias meyer track is absolute gigantic techno monster, the ndru track slinky schaffel mood music. Keep tabs on this
matthias meyer - reichenbach
ndru - a pony named clipklop

Best track from that gustavo lamas 12" i blogged about below. Absolutely blissful techno, teeming with warmth. perfect first-thing-in the morning track
gustavo lamas - jovenes

I went on a bit of a binge downloading all sorts of remixes from Hot Chip's last album. Here are a few of my favorites.
hot chip - (just like we) breakdown (booka shade vocal mix)
hot chip - colours (jeff samuel rmx) [love the descending bassline on this one!]
hot chip - boy from school (cosmic sandwich remix) [deep. house.]

Lovely new one on Kompakt--pretty damn big-room and trancey, which is, what? TEH GREBT
Aril Brikha - Winter

This one's kinda old, but i realized i never posted it, and i LOVE it. Absolutely evil. Released on Richie Hawtin's M_nus imprint, and is very reminiscent of plastikman at his best.
heartthrob - baby kate

the following two from the excellent blog House is a Feeling
Faze Action - In the trees (carl craig mix)
H.O.S.H - suestoff

albums (electronic version)

Well, Sherburne listed this as his favorite album of '06, so I had to check it out. Turns out it's one of those back-and-forth, record then remix then record some more deals, going back and forth between burnt friedman and a jazz group called flanger. A nice change of pace for me this one, pretty mellow, but with a good beat to it--not crappy easy-listening jazz but nice jazz (me once again wishing I new more about jazz). I think it gets stronger as the album progresses. Moody, organic...but then you notice, wtf, every track is exactly 5:00 long??? Awesome
root 70 - heaps dub



Before Hot Chip's breakout '06 release, there was the '04 first album. A little more lo-fi, a bit more low-key, and a lot weirder lyrically (those "fey white-boy copping hardcore hip-hop lingo" lyrics are far more in effect), it's still just as charming and fun to listen to. I've decided I really rate Hot Chip highly right now, I think they're one of the best things going these days. (plus i threw in one bonus track, "ABC," that was on the US release, das is also gute)
hot chip - coming on strong

albums (folk rock version)

If you liked that track "Tam Lin" I posted a while back, you'll like this. 1969 combination of psychedelic rock, english folk and american blues produces solid, catchy, epic, beautiful LP. And Sandy Denny! Apparently Denny left fairport convention not too long after this album, and I don't seem myself investigating that period of the band any time soon. Sandy Denny is the bees knees.
fairport convention - unhalfbricking

albums (krautrock version)

I really like both Tago Mago and Ege Bayami, so I don't know what took me so long to get to Future Days, but it turns out I like it too. Mark me down as predictable I guess. Though I don't think it hits the highlights of say "Paperhouse" (which i just posted below), it may actually be the most consistently enjoyable Can album. Sometimes all the weirdo-acid-freakout stuff can get a bit tiring, and thankfully they seem to keep it on a tighter leash for this album, concentrating more on the groove. the groove!
can - future days




I like kraftwerk, but was curiously always a bit underwhelmed by them, considering all the praise heaped on them as "the godfathers of techno" and all that. Wasn't really all that caught up by their live double-cd they put out a while back, even though everyone else seem to love it. But this! This i like a whole lot. Lock in the motorik beat, cold teutonic vocals, occasional synthesized string, and I'm in! Connection to krautrock a lot clearer too, I would say. Seems the old Kraftwerk is where it's at, both of these albums are just great. [NOTE: my roommates (well, matt and russ) just told me to shut my door cuz they couldn't handle the kraftwerk I was pumping. philistines! go listen to some 10th generation watered-down mall-punk]
kraftwerk - trans europe express
kraftwerk - autobahn (yousendit link only!)



I actually downloaded this album by accident when i was trying to get the soundtrack to Aguirre, but it turned out to be a great find. I was kind of right anyway, given that half the album is comprised of tracks from the Aguirre soundtrack, but the other half has two other long moody tracks on it from somewhere else in the popol vuh back catalogue. Basically just 3 long (~20min) tracks plus the title track from Aguirre (only six minutes, psssh!), I think this is, again, the most consistently enjoyable Vuh album I've heard (lots of "consitently enjoyable" albums these days it seems. hence the full-album posting). The other track from the Aguirre soundtrack is a long, quiet piano piece, really quite beautiful, while the other two tracks are a bit more freeform, otherworldly ambience, but done with enough awareness of melody and rhythm to really create engrossing and hypnotic atmospheres. Quite varied, and highly enjoyable, this one.
popol vuh - gardens of the pharao / aguirre

Well, after a little poking around, looks like really, it's a combined release of these two albums (great covers!)






Lastly! Have you people heard avril lavigne's new single, "Girlfriend"? She's gone all girly dance-rock! Outstanding! Check it out, she's even doing choreographed dance moves...the video's kinda mean though isn't it? Oh well...

Paperhouse? Oh yeah!

Feeling the urge to post a whole bunch of music...i've been all over the place recently, lot's of good things. But for now here is the question: "paperhouse" or "oh yeah"? 1st and 3rd track's off of Can's classic Tago Mago. Similar length, somewhat similar structure, alternating between more melodic periods and more up-beat sections driven by that drum beat (oh god I love the drumming in Can. It is all about the drumming in Can. Same with Neu! actually, i really need to post tracks by them too, they're awesome), and all with damo suzuki madly singing god-knows-what over top.

So which is the winner? I think paperhouse is a little more melodic, oh yeah a bit more drum-driven. But I can't decide, they are both awesome. Really feeling the krautrock these days. Why is all the music I listen to so german?? (don't answer that)

Can - Paperhouse

Can - Oh Yeah


(ps. sorry the tracks are .ogg files, i just ripped them to my hardrive here at school and linux does that by defualt (stupid, worthless linux!), but winamp has no prob playing them. don't know about itunes/ipod though).