uncarved.org blog

Great to see some good discussion about Greensleeves’ court victory over Scientist blogged below…

wayne&wax is typically on point with some great hyperlinkage and thoughts on the nature of ownership, which is taken up by dj ripley over at her place.

I don’t have a great deal to add to this discussion, other than what I said on the thread on dissensus.

Wayne hints at Scientist perhaps getting mad AND getting EVEN with a future release and of course, there are precursors for this throughout reggae’s history, Lee Perry producing numerous “dis” records aimed at former record companies.

There’s even one example using the “vampire” schtick which Scientist could revamp for the 21st Century (how little has changed).

The cover shows Chris Blackwell of Island Records as a blood-drinking vampire – but this is apparently (allegedly!) something MORE than a metaphor for oppressive business practices…

In this interview Scratch states:

“You know, that Chris Blackwell disgusts me, makes me want to vomit. He invited me to the opening of the Compass Point studio in Nassau and there I saw him drink the blood of a freshly killed chicken. He thought I was into all that voodoo and obeah [...] stuff, and offered me some. It was disgusting. [...] I, Lee Perry, will swear that before any judge, solicitor or barrister he could employ.”

I sincerely hope Scientist is cooking up some lethal dubs in his laboratory which go straight to Greensleeves’ head – he and his fans can all benefit from that…

John Eden vs Paul Meme – Boom Boom Bashment Mix

63 minutes 9 seconds/87Mb/192K stereo zipped mp3 (right click and “save as”)

Quite clearly there is no way I’m going to out-do the sheer balls-out hyperbole of Paul’s sleevenotes, so I’ll keep it personal…

For me, this mix started before Shake The Foundations volume 1 was completed in the summer of 2002. I was much more immersed in the current goings on of ragga then – listening to Rodigan every Sunday night, tuning into pirates, devouring the monthly catalogues from Dub Vendor. It was a mania I have more under control at the moment (for now anyway).

Actually buying the tunes was something of a problem because I was pretty skint and the sevens had a habit of disappearing by the time I got the cash together to show my face in the shop…

But those Rodigan tapes went round and round in my head. The occasional one-riddim LP was snuck into the house, and Hackney Libraries came out on top with most of the Greensleeves one-riddim CDs in their racks at a very reasonable hire charge of 80p. Basically this mix would be impossible if I didn’t live in London.

I lived and breathed the CDs – on the way to work, at home in the evening on headphones (because only obsessives want to listen to 20 cuts of the same riddim in a row, yes?). Some of the riddims were rubbish, some of the great riddims had mainly rubbish performances on them or had great cuts which were spoilt half way through because of the obligatory bunning of the bogeyman, er, “battyman”. Slowly but surely the cuts were whittled down… ticks and crosses.

It’s safe to say that this mix falls short of what the usual audiences expect – trad reggae fans (cf trad jazz fans) won’t generally listen to anything after 1985, whilst the bashment massive won’t listen to anything that came out before last month.

The furious issuing of one-riddim albums, on an almost weekly basis by Greensleeves and VP has meant that a lot of tunes get completely overlooked in the stampede, and also that quality has been superseded by quantity. At one point it seemed all Sizzla had to do was to gargle over the latest riddim and it would be all over the pirate stations like a rash. With labels needing to provide the “big 2″ with 20 cuts of a riddim (or 40 in cases like Martial Arts and Sledge!) it seemed like nobody was listening to some cuts more than once – not even the people who produced them.

Which is why, in traditional white-boy crate-digging style, it’s not bad to spend a bit of time raking over the ashes. In 20 years there will be a new cohort of trad reggae fans paying big bucks for some of these tunes on ebay, whilst bemoaning the fact that ALL reggae made in 2045 sounds awful.

The mix was originally going to be entitled “Girls, Guns, Ganja”, those being the traditional preoccupations of most deejays. Of course many of the good cuts are actually from girls, and the lyrical preoccupations do move way beyond the basics. Half the fun is deciphering the vocal codes for yourself, though, so I won’t get into it line by line.

In terms of the actual music you have the subtle minimalism like Double Jeopardy, and the pounding Forensic. The Wu-tang and spaghetti western influences on Lightning and Mexican rub up against the more traditional African elements in Amharic and Nine Night.

As ever, I feel like a total blagger working with such excellent material. Most of what I do is re-presenting other people’s work in a new arena. If you like this mix the credit is due to the producers and artists and the best way to thank them is to stump up some cash for their work.

Tracklist

1. Double Jeopardy Riddim
Kings Of Kings (Ce’Cile Charlton & Cordel “Scatta” Burrell) 2001

Jah Mason & Chrisinti: Up Up Up
Madd Anju feat. Cecile: Feel So Good
Pinchers & Norris Man: Set Dem So

2. Bushy Bushy Riddim
Extra Extra (Debbie Harding & Harvel Hart) for 2001

Ce’cile: Spider
Danny English: Right Ya Now
Elephant Man: Sex
Sizzla: Bus Out A Dis
Alizade: Energy
Ce’cile: Spider

3. Mexican Riddim
Pot Of Gold (Richie Stephens) 2002

Bounty Killer: Dem Bawling
Mad Cobra: Fool
Ninja Man: Sharp Like A Knife

4. Rice & Peas Riddim
Natural Bridge (Rohan “Snow Cone” Fuller) 2002

Fat Bastard: Rice & Peas
Lady G: Girls Know What Guys Want
Spragga Benz & Elephant Man: Warrior Cause
Frankie Sly: Dem Nuh Know We
Shano: School

5. Lightning Riddim
2 Hard (Jeremy Harding) 2001

Ward 21: Don’t Push It / Pacemakers Bad Man
Gabriel: The Powers
Kurupp, Mr. Vegas, & Sean Paul: Eye For Eye
Buccaneer: Oh My God

6. Liquid Riddim
2 Hard (Jeremy Harding) 2001

Sean Paul & Cecile: Can You Do The Work
Devonte & Tanto Metro: Give It To He
Madd Anju: Someting For Dat
Lady Saw: Tell Me What You Like

7. Amharic Riddim
Jam II (Jammy “Jam 2″ James) 2003

Sizzla: Peace
Cecile: All Night
Lady Saw: Hot Gal Fi Life
Spragga Benz & TOK: We Waah
Spragga Benz: Dem A Chat

8. Tai Chi Riddim
B-Rich (Richard “Shams” Browne) 2002

T.O.K.: Cree
Sean Paul: Time After Time
Wayne Marshall: Need A Girl Tonight
Tanya Stephens: Please Me
Lady Saw: Yeh Yeh

9. Nine Night Riddim
Studio 2000 (Steelie and Clevie) 2001

Lexxus: Gwaan Trace
Red Rat: Fright Night
Mister G: Old Crook
Captain Barkey: Wine Baby Wine
Wicker Man: Girls Gungo Walk
Sasha: Poppy
Determine: Rappin’ Up Rhymes

10. Forensic Riddim
In The Streetz (Mr. Vegas & “Computer Paul” Henton) 2003

Kerry: I Got The Man
Determine: Round And Round
Cecile: Weh Yu Up To
Turbulence: Hype in Jah
Mr Vegas: Fuck Face

11. Big Up Riddim
Taxi (Sly and Robbie) 2004
Wayne Marshall: Big Up
Lady Saw: Messed Up
Bounty Killer: No More Suffering

“It was Xmas 1992 that I discovered the best music of all time, Jungle Tekno. A pirate radio station started up in Edinburgh called ‘Boomerang FM’. I was listening to Rave music, mostly being played by Tom Wilson on his Forth FM show ‘Steppin Out’ and at local raves like ‘Rezerection’. What I heard on Boomerang was a world away from the Italian Piano House and glorified Diva Disco of Scottish Rave music. It was jittery paranoia-inducing horror music. It was Rave’s evil twin that had kept locked in the basement and had now suddenly broken free and was looking for revenge.”

Bassnation and killyourtv.co.uk is proud to present a masterpiece of darkside hardcore from a Dj who knows the genre backwards and inside out, Dj Twist.

Well, that’s tonights’ listening well and truly sorted then!

Space Pig Vs Moon Cow

MANASSEH MEETS BLOOD AND FIRE (M Records 10 INCH)

An absolutely outstanding release from Holland’s Twilight Circus, ably helped by some big big names.

Manasseh are absolutely at the top of their game at the moment – check their remix of Emiliana Torrini’s “Rocky Roads” also.

Here TC’s recording of Michael Rose is given a breathtakingly simple treatment, just the right level of tweaky bleeps, skanking beats and live horns. Michael Rose floats above the music giving us a great reworking of Prince Alla’s “Funeral” and deejay Brother Culture even pops his head round the corner for a few bars. The dub coasts along gently with the bassline doing nice things on the nastiest of mornings. TUNE!!!

On the flipside the Blood & Fire soundsystem (i.e. B&F in its live/deejay incarnation) hooks up with Wai Wan (who I thought did House?!). A bizarre combination, to say the least. Of course, when the track kicked off, it all made sense. B&F’s keen feel for classic 70s reggae combined with a bit of dancefloor knowledge, leads neatly to… some funky breakbeat business with Ranking Joe (himself stranger to B&F live or on CD) brocking out in fine style above the occasional phrase from Mr Rose. And Ranking Joe rides a breakbeat waaaaaay better than most of the drum ‘n’ bass MCs I’ve had the misfortune to endure… (new broom sweep clean, but old broom know all the corners!)

I’m not easily blown away by contemporary roots and dub, but this is total quality from start to finish, me olde muckers…

Blog find of the week is Laputan Logic via Social Fiction (see sidebar).

It manages to combine good scientific rigour with a wry sense of humour, and some nice sideswipes at irrationalist new-agery (and more traditional irrationalism…)

See for example: Anti-Christ 616 on the alternate number of the beast; and

The Cult of the Golden Ratio on hermetic geometry and all that:

Honestly, people spout a lot of crap about the Golden Ratio .

I mean that, to paraphrase the Willard character out of Apocalypse Now, there’s just so much bullshit piling up on this subject that you practically need wings to stay above it.

The Golden Ratio, once a pristine jewel of geometrical truth and simplicity, has become a deity for a cult of hyperlinking headnodders whose chief devotional practice seems to be to handwave their way from one disconnected and unexamined falsehood to another.

REGGAE GIANTS Greensleeves Records recently won a copyright infringement case brought against them by one of Jamaica’s leading mixing engineers.

With everyone from DJ /Rupture to All Tomorrow’s Parties linking to my Mark Stewart & The Maffia piece, I thought I’d better remove some of the more serious errors from it.

See also tackhead.com for an overview of recent and forthcoming Maffia activity and K-Punk with details of a Resonance FM special on Monday.

Nice bit of jump up dancehall for your downloading pleasure over at Shards, Fragments and Totems.

Guaranteed to put a smile on your face and a spring in your step, this one…

When one of the best labels in the world has a sale, it’s worth commenting on. Blood & Fire have marked down a load of their titles to a paltry £4.25. Crucial cuts include Prince Alla, a Tubby/Jammy dub set, Cornell Campbell, and Sylford Walker… snap them up and put some money in these people’s pockets (they have enough love already, but maybe this will let them release some more stuff sooner rather than later)