Our Current State

So, it has been a hot minute since our last post. It is that time of year when school gets insane in the run up to finals and it is killing me yet again. For fun, the lab report that my lab partner and I had spent at least 15 hours on over the last week seems to have completely disappeared, which means a marathon lab session on Wednesday may be in the books so we can re-do the entire thing. Argh.

But on the brighter side of things, Jwan and I started our little bi-weekly joint “Night Moods” up again, which will hopefully be slightly more successful than it was over the summer. It’s nice having a regular gig where we can play all night long and play whatever the hell we feel like dropping, unlike so many other places who have guest deejays play for an hour and a half and adhere to whatever specific genres. Our first one since our boy Curt left to move to Atlanta happened on Friday, and it went about as well as it did over the summer, though our promotion for this one was not outstanding and we were competing with the Stevie Wonder concert that many people we know were attending.

There were still some good moments though, the main one for me being the last little bit of the night. Jwan had been bringing the mood of the music way down, leaving me to mix into Moodymann’s “Sweet Yesterdays”. Just as I was about to pick the next tune, the cat from the bar let us know that it was 1:45 so we had about 15 minutes left. Perfect! First, I dropped Omar-S’ classic “Just Ask the Lonely” and let it ride out for a while. Next up was Round Two’s “New Day”, which is just one of the most beautiful songs. After the chorus at the end finished up, I brought in Kevin Reynolds’ ridiculous “Anonymous Room At The Corridor Of Last Night”, and as soon as those chords hit, the few remaining dancing patrons all put their hands in the hair. And these are not techno fans by any means, they were just feeling the super-deep vibes, it captured the atmosphere perfectly. It is those moments, the ones where “regular” people (non-hardcore techno fans) can feel even the most serious music that keeps my confidence in the power of good music going. It was just a simple little moment in a nearly empty club on a random Friday night, but without those moments, there is no point to playing this kind of dance music!

Also on the good tip, I’m finally catching up on some of those recent releases. Malik Pittman’s “Midwest Advocates” EP is lovely, the B-side rolling out a Chicago influenced rhythm track while the A-side is a brilliant off-kilter acid joint. When the melody (which had been off beat previously) comes in on the rhythm in the second half of the track, it is pure dancefloor heaven. Recloose dropped his second set of re-edits on the Moxie label, and “Never Fade” delivers in a big way, a very Theo Parrish-esque soulful loopy builder. Lerosa’s “Much Later” EP is the debut release on Uzuri, and the tracks all sound even better cut into wax than they do on the mp3 samples online. Now I’m waiting on that Beatdown 12″ from earlier this year as well as the new Mike Huckaby on Synth entitled “My Life With The Wave”, both of which should arrive in the mail this week!

Last but most certainly not least, Burial’s ridiculously dope “Untrue” album finally came in today (on CD, we have to wait till next week to get the LPs in the US because of some screw up), as well as the “Ghost Hardware” 12″ that I had not picked up yet. It’s funny how many haters there are on the Burial album, for me it is the album of year with basically no competition. As much as I loved his first one, this one is really on a whole other level. The dude claimed in an interview that he listens to Goldie’s excellent 2001 track “Beachdrifta”, and it sure does sound like it on this album. Pure melancholic bliss, the twisted vocals are ripped from ’98 2-step but abstracted out with hypnotic repetition layered underneath a thick film of pops and crackles that recall the best moments of Rhythm and Sound, it is the perfect soundtrack to the long winter ahead. Any description of this album feels trite at this point, the hype for this album is so huge that Burial is no longer off peoples’ radars. The catch is that this one is worth ALL the hype behind it. I always love reading old record reviews of 12″s or albums that went on to become undisputed classics yet got terrible reviews when they came out. This won’t be one of those! I also love how perfectly the cover art matches the feeling of the record. This one will be going into the permanent night time listening rotation……