Wednesday, December 31, 2008

RIP Eartha Kitt, Freddie Hubbard
Farewell Eartha, Freddie.

"Always blunt about her beliefs, Kitt made her feelings about Vietnam known as she attended a White House lunch hosted by Lyndon Johnson's wife in 1968, when her fame was near its peak.

"You send the best of this country off to be shot and maimed," she told the group of about 50 women. "They rebel in the street. They don't want to go to school because they're going to be snatched off from their mothers to be shot in Vietnam." For the next four years, Kitt performed almost exclusively overseas." Link

Watch Eartha's finests moments on youtube. My fave tune of hers -"I want to be evil". Check the lyrics. "I wanna be evil, I wanna be mad, But more that that I wanna be bad... I wanna be nasty, I wanna be cruel, I wanna be daring, I wanna shoot pool..."

Monday, December 29, 2008

Ring The Alarm playlist, BaseFM, Dec 27
Continued from last week's show, today's show was a bunch of my favourite tunes and musical moments from the past year. Hope you liked em!

Dark angel -Free da mind
Rob Tex presents the Jimi mixes - Foxy dub
Gabriella Cilmi -Sweet about me (Ashley Beedle dub mix)
Jazmine Sullivan - Need u bad (Moody boyz remix)
James Brown - The bose (Geisha Boys remix - Gamm doin James vol 4)
UBB - I believe in miracles
Mr scruff - The clock
Beanfield feat Baijka - Tides (Carl Craig - C's movement #1 remix)
Overproof sound system - The model
Budamunky - Wednesday
Ray Barretto - O elephante (Shh remix)
Natural yoghurt band - Soft cheese
Car crash set - Dreams
Rodriquez - Sugar man (off the excellent album Cold Fact, reissued this year)
Kingites - Polynesian panthers
Unitone hifi - Up to eleven
Me and you - Last night (Bassnectar remix)
Nina Simone - Taking care of business (Pilooski remix)
Beat conductor - Caribbean path
V.V. Brown - Crying blood (Andrew Weatherall remix)
Mayer Hawthorne - Just aint gonna work out
Kova and Miles - Clap clap inst
Roberta Flack - Go down Moses (she's playing here in February 09)
MMW - Let's go everywhere
Dazz band vs Whitefield bros - Let it whip (B.cause half time remix)
Miles Davis - Freddie Boi (Applejuice kid remix)
Holiday reading
Try this for size...
"The James Brown Collection (Christie's). A 208-page book, gorgeously sorted by the color of the artifacts. Reproduced are handwritten letters ("Polydor is trying to kill me off"), break-up notes, hair supplies, living room sets, sunglasses, and a rainbow of S-E-X jumpsuits. Also online, but less elegant." Hat tip to WFMU.

And The Year In Music old and new from O-Dub.

Also, this watch... damn! Just, damn!

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Wu tang TV
Home video shot a week before Enter the Wu Tang dropped. Nice. Link
Just spotted this - P-Moneys fave shit of 2008. Go read it now!

Take it easy, have yourself a great christmas and a relaxing new years. And thanks for reading!

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Ring The Alarm playlist, BaseFM, Dec 20
Today's show was a bunch of my favourite tunes and musical moments from the past year, but I ran outta time so will have to jam some more in on next week's show. Thanks to all of those of you who txted in. Nice one.

Smoove's Funk Fantasy Bands - Smoove
Stevie Wonder -Master blaster (Radikal Roots edit)
Gabriella Cilmi -Sweet about me (Ashley Beedle remix) I spent a ridiculous amount of time and money chasing this tune down earlier this year. Found it online in a record shop in Scotland.
The Lions - Hot no ho
Steel n skin - Afro punk reggae dub
Mike Fabulous - Wang east
Ladi6 - Dark brown
Eru Dangerspiel - Sun again
Bo Diddley - Bo Diddley
Mighty Mo - The next message version
The Snugs - Trying
Rob Symeonn - The chosen one (Zeb steppers remix)
Barrington Levy and Beenieman - Murderation
Restless Soul - Turn me out
Johnny Hammond - Fantasy (Marc Mac presents the Visioneers beatdrop version)
Jimi Tenor and Kabu Kabu - Black January
Erykah Badu - Honey (Moody Boyz remix)
Lee Scratch Perry - God smiled (Moody Boyz remix)
Miles Davis - So what (Shoes edit)
Lightning head - Bookoor sound special
Menahan st band - Esma
Dub Colossus - Azmari dub
Quantic - Cuidad del swing version
Hot 8 brass band - Get up (Diesler remix)
James Brown - Santa claus goes straight to the ghetto
Kormac - Join together
Real Groovy relaunch hits bum note with creditors
As featured in the NZ Herald earlier this week, in case you missed it... link
"... The original owners, Chris Hart and Martin O'Donnell, regrouped with a new backer [Ralph Brayham, ex Ferrit, Telecom] under the company name Fonografo Ltd and announced this month that the Auckland store was fully operational again...
... However in the High Court at Auckland yesterday, the original company, Real Groovy Records, was put into liquidation by music distributor Southbound Distribution, which is owed more than $40,000.
Southbound director Jeffrey Stothers believed there were other creditors. He said he had been told that there were no surplus funds available from the sales of the stores to pay unsecured creditors.
Stothers was not against Hart and O'Donnell getting back into business, as the industry needed another record store closure "like a hole in the head", but he objected to it being done at distributors' expense.
Stothers said he outlined his position to Hart at an early stage, telling him Southbound could not keep supplying the store if it wasn't being paid.
"He was fairly indignant, saying he would have to look after the major record companies first and he would see what he could do."

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Versionaries live - check em!
Ex pat kiwi Christian Burns (Kakhand) and NYC/Jamaican Barrington Calia (Haile Suspicious) are the Sydney based dub/hiphop crew The Versionaries. I'm DJing before them tonight at Galatos Lounge, only $5 on the door.

"Based in Bondi Beach, Sydney The Versionaries have provided tour support for many NZ dub and hiphop acts crossing the ditch and are a firm fixture at many Sydney underground events from Earthdance in Sydney Park to D&BBQ at the Abercrombie Hotel. Their releases include collaborations with DJ Regal, The Nomad, Pitch Black, Solaa and a bevy of Aussie dubheadz and soul providers.

Thursday is a soundsystem show and features special guests Scratch22 and Peter Mac (Dub Asylum). As such its an early show kicking off around 8.30."

Listen: www.myspace.com/theversionaries



DECEMBER 18 GALATOS LOUNGE; AUCKLAND NEW ZEALAND (Soundsystem Show) with Scratch 22 & Peter Mac (Dub Asylum) 8pm $5

DECEMBER 19 FLOW BAR; HAMILTON NEW ZEALAND feat DJ Kina + Rayjah 45 and Hayden Weke with Knights of the Dub Table, B.Hopps (SYD) 9pm $10

DECEMBER 20 LEIGH SAWMILL CAFÉ NEW ZEALAND feat DJ Kina + Rayjah 45 and Hayden Weke with B.Hopps (Foreign Dub'/D&BBQ SYD) 9pm $10

DECEMBER 27 STAR AND GARTER COROMANDEL with CORNERSTONE ROOTS
DECEMBER 28 TBC WHITIANGA 9pm

DECEMBER 31 “ISLAND STYLES” WAIHEKE ISLAND AUCKLAND NEW ZEALAND with DJ R.I.A, The Nomad and more!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Seeline Woman
"In September, Legacy Recordings released To Be Free: The Nina Simone Story, a three-cd + dvd collection spanning the legendary singer's career, from her debut on Little Girl Blue to her final recordings on A Single Woman. The dvd makes available for the first time a 1970 documentary of Simone, which is excerpted in the video below..."

From The Fader. Go read a great interview with Nina's daughter there too.

"...I remember her and my dad leaving a lot. For the first six years of my life I remember her being the softer one. She didn’t give me a spanking or anything like that, so she was my refuge and I wanted to be around her all the time. One fond memory is of my mother and father doing the jitterbug in the living room. You know how kids just love to see their parents together? It was just a wonderful feeling to watch them in sync, laughing.

The people that I remember the most were Stokely Carmichael, Miriam Makeba, Betty Shabazz. Those are people I also had relationships with, those were my uncles and aunts. Times have changed a lot in terms of parent and child relationships. Children of divorced relationships weren’t really considered affected. It wasn’t talked about back then in the early ’70s, so I just remember one day my father was there and the next day he wasn’t..."

Friday, December 12, 2008

QTip live, some dude named Prince jumps on guitar.
Then QTip drops World Tour, stops and starts it again THREE times. Heard about this a wee while back, took ages for the vid to surface but DAMN!

Wandering eye
Fat Freddys Drop get covered at the Performing Arts Prizegiving, 2008, Whangaparaoa College. Nice one! link, or see below.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

"Cadillac Records Gets Nothing Right"
Ouch. Not so great review of movie based on Chess Records. Read it here.
"... in this version of the tale—told in flashback, with overwrought narration provided by Cedric the Entertainer as Chess producer, session musician and house songwriter Willie Dixon—there is no Phil Chess, only Leonard, played by an actor, Adrien Brody, who, with his anachronistically tousled hair and Forever Fonzie wardrobe, looks as much like Leonard Chess as he does, well, Howlin' Wolf. In fact, Phil ... is never mentioned at all..." Link.

Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Soul reviver
Gabe Roth (of Sharon Jones and the Dapkings) interview from NYT last weekend (hat tip to Jenfa), very cool read... also covers Roth's battle with Sharon Jones for songwriting credits....

"In the early 1990s, while the cool kids in the New York University dorms were listening to Nirvana and Pavement and P. J. Harvey, Gabriel Roth, a Jewish teenager from California, sat in his dorm room, night after night, listening to one obscure James Brown record after another.

He listened to “Dooley’s Junkyard Dogs,” a 45 that Brown cut in honor of a college-football team. He listened to Brown’s esoteric rock version of “Talkin’ Loud and Sayin’ Nothing.” He listened to “Gettin’ Down to It,” a collaboration between Brown and, as Roth puts it, “these white jazz guys — but it was really actually a cool record.”

Mostly he listened to “Hot Pants,” an album that largely consisted of just one chord. It was like “some kind of strange calculus,” Roth told me recently. “Everybody playing one little note or one little beat. But the whole thing worked together.” Roth and a friend would sit in his dorm room and listen to “Hot Pants” for hours on end.

They’d listen to one side of the album several times in a row, and then they’d turn it over and listen to the other side. “We would smoke weed and listen to the album,” he told me, “or not smoke weed and listen to the album.” Link

Friday, December 05, 2008

Miami's a hell of a good town to eat a banana!
Iggy Pop lives in Miami these days. He talks about why he likes it there.

Q: What made you move to Miami?
A: Iggy Pop: I was fed up after 25 years in huge, dark, media-centric cities. I decided to find a house and move here. I was looking for something in a kind of elegant coma with a lot of peace and convenience.

Link.

Thursday, December 04, 2008

Day by day
"Femi Kuti has had a remarkable career by any standard. He has also faced a bitter dose of reality. Shortly after [his father] Fela died in August 1997, Femi's younger sister, Sola, died of cancer. Five years later, on the heels of his two most successful records, Shoki Shoki and Fight to Win, Femi was sacked by his French record label, his band split up and his wife, Funke, a dancer and singer in his band and the mother of his 12-year-old son, Omrinmade ("Made"), left him.

To cap it all off, Femi's mother, Remi, with whom he was very close, died at the age of 60. As Femi spent time in France recording parts of Fight to Win, rumors swirled back home that he was in an asylum."

Bitter family rivalry developed between him and his half brother Seun, who started performing with some of their father's musicians as Egypt 80.

How did Femi get through the hard times? The saxophonist turned to the trumpet.

"The trumpet has really helped me become a calmer person and I really don't get that angry anymore," he says. “With the saxophone, you can leave it for a few weeks and come back, but you can't really do that with the trumpet. You must do it every day, and it has made me more disciplined in many ways. It has changed my life."

Link. There's a video there too about he making of Femi's latest album.
Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 are performing in NZ in March at Womad.
Bang. Crash. Boom
Started the day with news of Aussie music distie Creative Vibes shutting down, then Real Groovy AK survives, but now more gloom and doom... UK indie distie Pinnacle has gone under - they distribute almost 1,000 indie labels (story at Hypebot). Dubber also has news on the demise of Entertainment UK, and the announcement by Zavvi (formerly Virgin Megastore) that they will not be taking orders for any CDs, games or DVDs. Link.
ADDED The German vinyl distributor Neuton, which worked with labels like Bpitch Control and Playhouse, reportedly announced that it was insolvent earlier this week. [side-line via TDS]
Real Groovy AKL back in business!
Just got this email from Real Groovy... "We're excited to announce that as of Friday the 5th of December, Real Groovy Auckland is up and running again! We really want to thank all of our customers who have continued to support us through this difficult period, and are happy to advise that we will be restocking new titles, trading your unwanted discs, and redeeming all credit notes, vouchers and insurance credits.

And we really want to thank our fantastic staff members who have remained loyal, upbeat and positive despite the trying times.

But it's not over yet - we need your ongoing support, if we are to continue with our goal of offering the widest possible range of music and movies to New Zealanders. So please come in and visit your nearest Real Groovy store and buy lots of stuff!

WE NEED YOUR TRADES
While we have continued to process secondhand stock, we need a lot more good quality CDs, DVDS, Games and LPs to get our selection back up to the levels that we are renowned for. So please sort out all those unwanted discs and trade them towards new stuff. We will even take 45s, cassette tapes, Videos - any format, as long as they are saleable titles in good condition!

CREDIT NOTES AND VOUCHERS
If you hold a Real Groovy credit note, instore voucher, or online voucher, it is once again fully redeemable. We do apologise for the inconvenience but we are really pleased that we are able to honour these items. Remember, Real Groovy vouchers make great Christmas Gifts - both instore, and online. If you have family or friends overseas, online vouchers are the convenient gifts that give millions of choices!

WEBSITE
The Real Groovy website www.realgroovy.co.nz is offering a full range of CDs, LPs, Books and DVDs - over a million titles, couriered FREE to your door - and we are redeeming and issuing online vouchers again. As always, if you place an order on the website, your credit card IS NOT CHARGED until the goods are sent, so there has never been any risk to you.

INSURANCE CUSTOMERS
If you have an insurance claim to be fulfilled by Real Groovy, we apologise for any inconvenience you have been caused and advise that, if you have a current balance (within the last 12 months) you can once again use your credit in our stores.

SPECIAL ORDERS
We are again ordering daily from local suppliers and weekly from the USA and Europe. If you can't find what you want in our stores just ask and we will order items in for you.

VINYL
We will be expanding our vinyl selection due to the huge and renewed demand for High Fidelity recordings. We'll also continue to source large collections of records from overseas and will be offering a range of turntables in the future. Remember: Music Sounds Better on Vinyl!

YOUR SUPPORT
Once again, we have been overwhelmed by the support that we have received from our customers, and want to sincerely thank you for the patience, understanding and courtesy that has been shown to our staff over the last months.

FREE UNDERCOVER PARKING ON WEEKENDS
Now you can park for FREE while you shop at Real Groovy Auckland on weekends! The Tournament undercover car park on Waverley St - right next to Real Groovy - is available to customers WHILE YOU ARE SHOPPING AT REAL GROOVY during business hours, 9am-7pm, on Saturdays, Sundays and Public Holidays. Here's a map to help you find it.

Please note that costs or penalties may apply if you leave your vehicle in the car park after these hours. Real Groovy accepts NO RESPONSIBILITY for damage or inconvenience that may be caused by parking in the building.

CHRISTMAS HOURS
We'll be open some extra late nights during Christmas week:
AUCKLAND NORMAL HOURS:
9am - 7pm Saturday-Wednesday
9am - 9pm Thursday and Friday

CHRISTMAS HOURS
9am - 9pm Monday 22nd to Wednesday 24th
Closing at 7pm from Boxing Day through to Wednesday 7th January
We open at 11am New Year's Day
Normal hours from Thursday 8th January

WELLINGTON will be open 9am - 7pm from December 1st; 9am - 9pm Monday 22nd to Wednesday 24th December

CHRISTCHURCH will be open 9am - 9pm from Friday 19th - Wednesday 24th December

Thank you

The Real Groovy Team
Stephen Colbert roasts Kanye West
Link to video or watch it below. Kanye's response via Twitter - "Who the fuck is Stephen Colbert?"

So you may as well die, while you're having fun
Simon Grigg has been digging round the Film Archive's website and come up with some gems, like this - the music clip for Suburban Reps' Megaton, a classic look at Auckland central circa 1978. Love the scenes of the band running acros the road outside the Civic. Watch it here.
Aussie music distie Creative Vibes shutting down
"Australian label and distributor Creative Vibes is calling it a day after nearly 15 years in the business. In a statement, the founders blamed in part competition from vertically-integrated multinationals and the recent massive fall in the Australian dollar for their decision to wind-up.

"The majority of our business is in imported music which has always funded our investments in emerging, Australian artists," they write in a post on Creative Vibes' website. "Because of the recent, drastic drop in the value of the Australian dollar, combined with the spiralling demand for discounts and deals, we can't get the margin out of our imports to sustain the development of our local releases."

The executives add, "It will take us a couple of months to help our labels and artists find new homes, pack everything up, collect the money our customers owe to us and distribute it out to our artists and suppliers, but we'll conduct the wind up as quickly and as efficiently as possible."
Full story here. Hat tip to Spragga for the info.

Wednesday, December 03, 2008

Where did you get that voice, Ms Sharon Jones?
"I was somewhere between 5 and 8 years old when I played an angel at church, an itty-bitty angel with wings and a halo over my head," she recalls. "One time we did 'Silent Night,' and a lady at church said, 'Ooh-ooh, that little girl can sing.' That's where it all began." [The Isthmus Paper] Hat tip to BV.
Cadillac Records
The Playlist reviews the film based on Chess Records... "We didn't care much for "Cadillac Records," the Chess records biopic seemed to be the 101, greatest hits of the Chicago label's history and while that works in some cases, especially if you're not an expert in the story (which we're not), but it's like the script's beat points were lifted from Wikipedia.

It also doesn't help that the film is kind of cornball-ish (the voice over makes you want to strangle yourself), ham-fisted melodrama (the guy who plays Little Walter is just too over-the-top).

The performances are decent, Beyoncé does a startling good job and while she might not necessarily pull off the most convincing Etta James, she does pull off a credible and emotional believable performance. Jeffrey Wright (as Muddy Waters) is equally good, though somewhat muted. People who know nothing about music seemed to enjoy it, but those who are rather well versed in it were kind of appalled." More here.

Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Dazz Band vs Whitefield Bros
Digging this slowed down funky remix of Dazz Band - Let It Whip by B Cause, grab it over here. Check it.

Monday, December 01, 2008

Ring The Alarm playlist, BaseFM, Nov 29
Cornell Campbell - Rope in
Perfect - Handcart boy
Bob Marley - Mr Chatterbox
Stranger Cole - Rough and tough
Skatalites - Collie bud
Mr Vegas - Must come a road
Mr Vegas - Heads high
Lightning head - Abbasynian rising
Jimi Tenor and Kabu Kabu - Mystery spot
Menahan st band - Esma
Willie Colon - Che che cole
James Brown - Don't tell it
Love unlimited orchestra - Strange games and things
Mungos hifi - Mexican bean riddim
Dub Colossus - Asmari dub
Risco connection - Aint no stopping us now
Patrice Rushen - Forget me not
Hot 8 brass band - Get up (Diesler dremix)
Ernie K Doe - Here come the girls (Andy Smith re-edit)
Ernest Ranglin - King tubby meets rockers uptown
Barrington Levy - Dub murder
Tanya Stephens - Need you tonight
Me and you - Last night (Bassnectar mix)
Miles Davis - A different blues (Applejuice kid remix)
Archie Bell and the Drells - Tighten up (Bobby La Beat rework)
Femi Kuti - Tell me
Innerzone Orchestra - Bug in the bassbin