The Juan MacLean

Still riding the wave of his excellent The Future Will Come, The Juan MacLean was in town to grace the Heineken Expressions tour and show the masses at Tripod what disco sounded like before nu-disco. Having spent much of the year touring with his live show, and then took off across Europe on a two-week DJ tour. All of this travelling might get a little dull, but he has ways of keeping himself occupied. “That’s how I spend most of my time, reading. My favourite thing of the year is probably The Road, the Cormac McCarthy book. Right now I’m reading a book by James Ellroy. His newest book just came out, called Clothes Like Blood or something [Blood's a Rover], it’s like 1000 pages or something. It’s part of a trilogy that started with American Tabloid, it’s in the late 60s.” For the uninitiated, have a look at this clip of Ellroy on Conan O’Brien a decade ago.

Juan had just come from playing Manchester’s Warehouse Project alongside Erol Alkan, Aeroplane and more, a popular fixture on the UK clubbing calendar. “It was good. I think there was like 1800 people. It was just rammed with people, big huge space packed with people. I asked to be in the small room actually. I hate those big main rooms. It’s not as fun.” I asked him how that show compared to April’s gig in The Deaf Institute. “I thought they were pretty similar. That show at The Deaf Institute was good. Just really packed with people who seemed really into it, having a good time. I like smaller places better, but it’s hard because they want you in a bigger room a lot of the time. I think it’s so much more fun playing in smaller, like 500 capacity is nice. When you get up to big huge empty room, well, not empty, spaces that are more wide open, sometimes it doesn’t sound very good.”

The Future Will Come, as is probably clear from my many posts on the subject, is my favourite album this year, but it works just as well on club speakers as it does on headphones. Making an album and directing it towards one particular experience is obviously something that requires very careful attention. “It’s a big issue that I think a lot about. It comes down to making in album, I don’t really about dancefloor atmosphere. I’d rather make something that you could listen to at home. So on my album there’s a lot of shorter, more pop structured songs, and then I think 12″s are the best to reserve for longer, loopier, more dancefloor-friendly things. That’s always been my philosophy.” The Future Will Come works best, in my opinion, because of the balance between short and snappy songs like One Day and dark, twisted, eight-miunute burners like The Simple Life - but not everyone can get that balance right. “I think it’s always the downfall of electronic musicians - some of my favourite 12″s of all time, like those artists will go on to make albums and they just don’t work very well at all. I think 12″s and albums are two entirely different things, albums that are just collections of instrumental tracks are really hard to do. Like the first Field album [From Here We Go Sublime] I love, I think it’s great. But a lot of the time it just doesn’t work.”

One aspect of the album that is most interesting is the lyrical interplay between Juan and DFA stalwart Nancy Whang. Happiness, heartbreak and every emotion in between feature in songs that seem to catalogue the peaks and troughs that affect every relationship. “That was pretty intentional. I think in dance music when people do have lyrics they tend to be throwaway, either party lyrics that are really meaningless, or really ironic things, or just really clever things, and Nancy and I sat down and just decided that we would try to write as personal, keep it very personal and honest as we could.” As far as Juan’s lyrics are concerned, they often seem to come from the point of view of a humanoid creature, devoid of emotion. “I think that’s kind of a stereotype that has a lot of truth to it in relationships in general. The guy is the one who more robotic and reserved and it’s always the girl who wants to be more emotional or something. So that’s why I’ve always used robots as a metaphor for that.” This robotic trope is turned on its head by Human Disaster, a bleak, desolate song that bares every hidden emotion, which precedes the epic Happy House. “Originally we had a sort of narrative arc to the album that we got away from for sequencing, but it was really a progression of two people coming together and growing apart, and coming back together again. I feel like it sort of getting bookended, in terms of vinyl, side one ends with the song Tonight, which is much more upbeat, happy, optimistic, and it was definitely ending with Happy House, to leave it on a positive, upbeat note.”

Getting back to the live show, Juan recently went into great detail about his setup for Resident Advisor’s Machine Love. I asked him to break that down for a layperson. “It’s hard, how much of a layperson? I think the best way to put it, now, most people in electronic music work entirely inside a computer, using software, synthesisers, all the sounds come from inside the computer, and everything I do is outside the computer, starting with live drums, and actually big collection of synths, and live playing of the instrument, I think that’s the most identifiable quality to it.” Bands like Holy Ghost! have talked about how difficult it’ll be for them to start touring, with the extensive setup they use, but they’re not the only ones. “It’s a big issue because it’s very expensive, especially when you start flying, it’s hard to get all the gear around. We’re in the same boat. Because we actually play all these synths and instruments, there’s a lot of stuff to carry around. Basically it’s a lot more engaging, a live show, than people getting up with a laptop and turning it on.” I recounted to him an experience last year when I saw Ulrich Schnauss start a show only for his laptop to crash within seconds of starting. “That’s embarrassing too. There was a Junior Boys show in New York, in Webster Hall, really big, like 1200 capacity place, and after the first song all their stuff crashed and they had to cancel the show. That terrifies me, I don’t ever want to have that happen. But everyone on DFA, LCD Soundsystem, you know, Hercules and Love Affair, we all carry around all this gear. I think it’s a standard at DFA that’s been established, you’re going to have a proper band.”

All of his recent singles have featured what can only be termed glorious remixes - Surkin, Matthew Dear and The Emperor Machine to name but three. “I usually try to go off the beaten path a little bit. I do so many remixes myself as well, I like the idea of having different things for DJs to play basically. Which is always what I think the point of any remix is, to have something for DJs to play.” And his favourite? “God, that’s a tough one. I think surprisingly it’s the One Day remix by Mark Romboy, which was really, people think of as a weird choice, but I thought it was amazing.”

A recent interview revealed a past spent teaching teenage delinquents in detention centres. Is this something that could follow a successful music career? “I don’t know, I think about it all the time. It’s so hard to say. Some days I think I’ll do it till I’m like 60. Then other days I think I can’t do it anymore, I don’t know. I played with Alexander Robotnick the other night, he’s like 68 or something. He’s 68 and he’s jumping around and going crazy! And I thought “Wow, that’s pretty amazing”. I don’t know. It’s one of the things with electronic music, like dance music, as opposed to rock music, like when I played in an indie rock band, I was like “I definitely don’t want to be anywhere the age of 30 and doing this”, like I found it kind of embarrassing. But with dance music I think there’s a tradition of people being revered as they go on.” Why not instruct kids on how to make a break into the music industry? “I could, I’d like to, when I was teaching I set up an electronic music programme, that was really fun. In the United States it’s looked at as a luxury kind of thing, there’s never money for it.”

I guess all that can be said to that is that, well, the future will come…

The Heineken Expression tour continues at The Classic in Cork on November 13, with Shit Robot, Dancepig and more. See here for more details.

The Subs

Analogue spoke to The Subs ahead of their Halloween performance at Transmission in Dublin next week.

Your sound has been described as “Boys Noize brutality and Wagnerian rave drama” - how appropriate do you think that description is?

Well, we can live with that. I guess the brutality and rave because we simply cannot leave a sound sweet and cosy, but it’s the contrast of emo-kitch with beats that are pounding like a motherfucker that does the trick for us. But we’ll take any influence and rape it. In fact, our sound is called Belga Trance.

Ghent is home to yourselves, Soulwax, The Glimmers, I Love Techno…. What is it in the water there that such a seemingly quiet place is home to such crazy parties and DJs?

Belgium has always been good at beats. Remember Telex, Front 242, Technotronic, the whole new beat period, cult labels like R&S… Why? Because we’re not the best songwriters, English not being a native language? Because we are good at stealing? Belgium, geographically at the heart, played an important role in bringing dance to Europe. And in Ghent The Glimmers started this eclectic way of DJing, followed by 2 many DJ’s…

The video of Fuck that Shit from Pukkelpop is pretty insane - how did you go about getting all the footage together?

On national radio we asked the audience to film us during the show with whatever cam they had, including cellulars, iphones etc… Then they sent the footage to us. It was a very bumpy road, getting all that different footage into one format. And also, I had a camera glued to my microphone, but during the show I got carried away (as usual) and I constantly blocked the view of the cam with my hand. You can catch a few shots of my mouth delivering the screams though…

Since Pukkelpop takes place so close to your home town, is that a special show to play?

It’s one of the best festivals in Belgium, so it’s special. Great line-up cause it’s a good balance between established and upcoming talent. We always try to come up with something special.

What’s been the craziest thing to happen at one of your shows? Apart from getting a few thousand people to scream “Fuck that shit!” of course…

Life is wonderful and magical, but at the same time it’s so dreadfully banal and full of boring patterns. Live we try to break the rules. This gives you momentarily the feeling of breaking free, which is delightful, but it is only a temporary illusion of course. But it can linger on for a while though… The craziest thing is when you realize thousands of people are feeling the same thing at the same time. A collective musical orgasm so to speak. But having literally more then 200 people from the audience on stage is quite crazy as well, with us in de middle of that turbulent frenzy trying to carry on playing…

I noticed some similarities between From Dusk Till Dawn and the music of Joe and Will Ask? - so it’s funny that they remixed the track. Apart from these guys, who do you see as your musical peers, on the same wavelength as yourselves?

That’s difficult to say, because everyone has his own sound. But Fake Blood, Simian Mobile Disco, Yuksek, Justice, Boy 8-Bit, Crookers… Too many to mention… They all have a few tracks we wouldn’t mind if they were made by us, hahaha!

Trance is a dirty word nowadays, yet you made a hit called Kiss My Trance - which found favour with Tiesto of all people. Do you think, with the right people, that style could be given any respectability? Surely it’s no more cheesy than the disco sound that’s rife at the moment…

Oh man, that whole thing about what’s hot and what’s not, I won’t say I couldn’t be bothered, but it’s a bit tiring if it’s about chewing on styles that have been. You know what I mean? The whole fidget thing was in a way interesting because there was something fresh about it, Africa trying to make club music, and at the same time artists like Santigold, MIA, Buraka Som Sistema in the picture. It was/is something that transcended the pure clubbing genre… So we liked what was happening but didn’t participated because it is simply not our thing. Disco on the other hand is the root of dance music, so for me, everything is disco… I mean, we absolutely adore the old Italo Disco, and Disco will always remain an influence, but we’re not intending to make some really disco sounding thing, unless we, there we are again, find a way to rape it with love.

The video for that track was pretty interesting - for example juxtaposing cooking and DJing was a nice touch. How involved are you guys in the videos for your songs?

We always work closely together with the guys from The MKR, who are really good friends (they also made some videos for Das Pop). But all of a sudden the Kiss My Trance video was just lying in our mailbox so to speak. Some young talent from the southern part of Belgium simply gave it to us. This was particularly pleasing since there’s a lot of political nonsense between the north and the south.

But our video for My Punk we practically made ourselves. We drove on three mopeds from Ghent to Paris with three cameras on our head. After like 10 hours or something, we got so bored we started to drive into shopping malls and stuff and eventually got busted… Well, it’s a long story to tell everything, but if you check out the video, you gotta know everything is 100% real. We even still got a lawsuit pending…

You’ve had a lot of releases on Lektroluv’s label - what’s it like working with such an elusive character?

He eats a lot of spinach.

What are you working on right now? Are you concentrating on shows, or is there new material in the background?

Doing a lot of shows (10 years of Fabric, I Love Techno) but spending a lot of time in the studio as well. We’re releasing a new clubber called Mitsubitchi, which will be available first on Fabric’s label.

The Subs play the Transmission Halloween Party at The Button Factory in Dublin on October 31. See here for tickets.

Joe And Will Ask?

Joe And Will Ask? have been making noise across clubland with their melodic yet heavy techno, while at the same time baffling bloggers and writers with their typographically nonsensical name. I recently spoke to them as they found themselves booked between a series of dubstep wizards at Beats of Rage in Preston’s Coda. “It was basically anthem bashing,” said Will. “It was kind of an introduction to techno to a dubstep night.” They were a little uneasy following a DJ playing 140bpm at midnight, so they played harder and faster than usual. “We played at 130bpm which is not normal for us,” said Joe, who dropped a stripped down version of Angello, Ingrosso, Axwell & Laidback Luke’s Leave The World Behind. “I love the Swedish House Mafia attitude to music, fuck it we’ll do what we want, if people think it’s cheesy they can piss off or whatever, but the vocal is too much, so I just scrapped it and made some kind of rearrangement of it. I’m kind of obsessed with that big piano chord thing.”

This euphoric big room house isn’t quite what they’re known for, but that’s not to say they won’t find themselves next to Angello and friends on the next Clubber’s Guide CD. Finding themselves hassled by Ministry of Sound to make something radio-friendly, Joe and Will hooked up with Becky Jones, also known as Saint Saviour of The RGBs. “She’s an awesome dance music writer, she does it in a kind of cool, edgy way, it’s not bland or boring, like let’s just stick a blonde babe singing something about the weekend.” That’s not to say the boys are stepping outside the deep and trippy techno that’s made their name. They’ve also been working on a track with Micachu, something Joe describes as the polar opposite of what they’ve done with Saint Saviour. “The instrumental I gave [Mica], it’s by a long way the most deep thing we’ve ever done, it’s like techno before techno became this kind of minimally, skippy, melodic thing, it’s techno techno. I can imagine someone like Adam Beyer playing it.”

Joe, who got his first set of decks at the age of 16, was already releasing electronica under his own name on the Sound Artillery label when he met Will, who grew up on a diet of Godskitchen and Sundissential. Out of boredom they started DJing together two years ago, and already they’re set to play Ibiza alongside 2manydjs, and Aeroplane. “Neither of us have ever been before,” says Joe. “When we were told we’re playing Ibiza we were like yeah! And when we were told it’s Ibiza Rocks we were like, oh. Cause we’re not really into the whole rock and dance mix.” Not that they are ungrateful by any means: Joe appreciates the stark contrast between the superstar resident DJs of the white island and the tireless blaggers who spend seasons just trying to get one gig. “For us it’s a real promising sign.” It all came about after a remix for Eskimo Twins, an act on the Wax:On label. The Leeds-based outfit were roped in to promote Reclaim The Dancefloor, a weekly night at Eden, and they were so impressed with what Joe and Will did for Eskimo Twins that they invited them along. Following a spate of unofficial remixes for the likes of Marc Houle and Ellen Allien & Apparat, as well as releases on Kitsuné and Gulp Communications, they’ve been approached by acts as diverse as The Subs and Kris Menace. “It’s quite nice to be asked to remix Kris Menace, he’s a fucking legend,” says Will.

Inspired by the current crop of forward thinking techno producers like Popof and Style of Eye, the Joe And Will Ask? signature is a characteristic cheekiness that shines through their melodies and sounds. “I’d like to think it nods to Orbital, people like that, you know the quirkiness, slightly kind of odd and funny,” says Joe, while Will tells of a tribute to their favourite person in the world: “We named one song after our friend Chris, who’s a bit weird, it’s kind of a weird glitchy song, and he kind of has a twitch, so we named it after him.”

They are excited about playing Dublin for the first time, as they headline Transmission at The Button Factory next week. Unlike Will, who spends time in Kilcock every year, Joe has never crossed the Irish Sea so is finally making up for lost time. “It’s actually really embarrassing, I’ve lived in England my whole life and I’ve never been to Ireland or Scotland.” Unlike their techno DJ set in Preston, they will be bringing their live show to The Button Factory, a venue which will no doubt suit their in your face live performance. “I think to do live it has to be amazing or not at all, to showcase your music, throw it everyone else’s face, whether they want it or not, you need an amazing sound system. We’ve got so many songs now we could probably play for two hours. But live we want to leave people wanting more, leave people wanting to see us again.”

And as for their name? “It was meant to be a joke,” says Will. “I think it’s cool cause it’s memorable, and nothing is similar to it. It’s not like a cool word.” Joe meanwhile accepts that there’s nothing they could pick that could top it. “We’re the most cynical, self-judging people in the world, so if we were to ever come up with a dramatic kind of name, we’d just say only a dickhead would have that.”

Joe And Will Ask? play Transmission at The Button Factory, Dublin, on June 13

The Young Lovers - The Young Lovers

I first came across The Young Lovers by accident, as I downloaded an album sampler from RCRD LBL – having completely forgotten about what it was or where it came from, I was shocked and amazed when I found that these jazzy, funky grooves had come from Joshua “Hervé” Harvey, famous for his squelchy basslines and cut-up hoover sounds.

You Make Me Dizzy, the album’s opener, lays a dancing piano line over shuffling jazzy beats, slightly reminiscent of MJ Cole’s Sincere. The next track takes down the tempo, and for some reason it calls to mind those ubiquitous chillout compilations from about 10 years ago, with its simple bassline, swooping strings and mournful oboe solo, as a crackle of vinyl lends a further air of nostalgia to the proceedings. This is no bad thing – just recently I dug out the first disc of Pete Gooding’s Cafe Mambo compilation, which soundtracked warm summer days and nights, school trips to Greece and wintry bus journeys during which I longed for nicer weather. Elsewhere, Harvey dabbles in salsa beats and melodies, slow, smokey sax grooves, and even a hint of funky beach house. As he says himself on his Myspace blog, “it’s more for headphones and holidays than banging clubs.” This is indeed an album that begs to be played in good weather.

The first hint of Hervé’s usual style of production comes with Love You Madly, which kicks off with a beat that would fit in perfectly on his Machines Don’t Care album – if it was sped up a bit. More screeching sax follows, before a cut up voice repeatedly utters the words “love you madly”. It’s probably the only track that would fit in a club set, at least in one played by the sort of DJs who favour Hervé’s signature wonky sound.

The album’s inlay card doesn’t say much, save for a border that repeats the words “let me tell ya’ what da’ blues is” – and this makes all the more sense when one reaches You Got The Down South, a sultry number over which is spluttered a monologue about “what da’ blues is.” The blues is, apparently, not having any money, not having anything. But then, when you haven’t got anything, you haven’t anything about which to be worried. It’s all a bit reminiscent of Gershwin’s I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’, and believe me, that is never a comparison I expected to make.

I can only reiterate that this is a lovely summer album, one which will make most sense on balmy, sunny days. It’s a joyous affair, which I would hardly have expected from someone whose previous output has been so resolutely focused on the dancefloor. Check it out.

The Juan MacLean at The Deaf Institute, Manchester

After the glowing review I gave their second album last month it goes without saying that I was excited about seeing DFA’s The Juan MacLean live. The band were performing at the weekly Now Wave night in Manchester’s The Deaf Institute, so I had the added anticipation of visiting an exciting venue for the first time.

Walking up a flight of stairs that wouldn’t be out of place in a boarding school, I didn’t quite know what to expect as I entered what is called the Music Hall. I was pleasantly surprised when I entered a small room that looks like a funky attic in a country house. The bar is lined with speakers, the stage is more or less the width of the room, and there’s even a lovely area of tiered seating if you can’t quite hack the whole standing and waiting lark.

The first band on stage was local band MAY68, whose energetic electro-pop was the perfect start to the evening. They were followed on stage by Everything Everything, whose ever-so-serious and disaffected songs was a bit deflating. I was also a little disappointed to learn that their name doesn’t have anything to do with Underworld. All that said, the band’s vocal harmonies were unexpected and impressive, meshing together chords that you don’t normally hear in this branch of indie-rock (apologies for the genre labels by the way).

By 11, when the gig was supposed to be over, The Juan MacLean had only started to set up on stage, and this was a lengthy process. What made this more enjoyable was seeing Nancy Whang sing along to the Chromatics’ cover of Running Up That Hill as it played over the house speakers. Eventually main man John said “I just want to play,” and things got underway.

Kicking off with album opener The Simple Life, it was clear from the band’s manner that they were there to do a job: play some kick-ass music. There was no crowd interaction, the band just got on with their business. After song number one Nancy Whang asked for an increase of volume, and John quickly asked “can you make everything louder? That was a joke.”

Their set was short but powerful. New single One Day was played, as was Give Me Every Little Thing, from 2003’s Less Than Human. The killer climax came with a 20 minute acid freakout gleaned from the bones of Happy House. On paper six tracks doesn’t seem like much of a performance, but their extended rendition of last year’s piano-led anthem was something to behold. A thousand stars washed over Nancy’s face as she sang “Launch me into space,” and the irresistible throb of the acid workout was just the icing on an excellent, if all too brief performance.

After the band finished an indie-disco kicked off with tracks from the likes of Animal Collective, Aeroplane and La Roux, so if you ever find yourself in Manchester on a Wednesday night and you’re not going to Old Trafford, definitely make a beeline for this excellent venue. With excellent new and established bands playing a lush and intimate setting, and even some great drinks specials to boot, it’s not a place to ignore.

The Juan MacLean - The Future Will Come

From the opening moments of The Simple Life, it is clear what kind of album The Future Will Come will be. The driving beats, the relentless hi-hats, even the ubiquitous cowbell mark this well and truly as a DFA album. That is not to say it is indistinguishable from any other album on the label, more that it fits into this mould while affirming its own identity.

Each track on The Juan MacLean’s new album is captivating in its own right, as well as adding up to form a coherent body of work that can be listened to in bits or in one go.

The album’s title is ironic, given the nods paid to older tracks. The Station and new single One Day call to mind The Human League, as male and female vocals argue over throbbing beats, while No Time even hints towards Mylo’s Drop The Pressure. Conversely, A New Bot is the most awkwardly futuristic track on the album.

Tonight, the album’s centrepiece, drifts through on a host of melancholic instrumentation, as acid basslines are topped off with mournful trumpets and out of tune pianos, while Nancy Whang sings of “all the love in this place.” The curious balance of such contented lyrics and more elegiac melodies is maintained until the album’s closer, last year’s epic Happy House. This choice of finale is fitting, as its warm piano riff and joyful lyrics are lent an air of darkness, undermined almost, by the preceding Human Disaster.

While such regretful undertones permeate the album it is definitely one which will get bodies moving. It’s only April, but if a funkier album comes along this year I will be very surprised.

What next?!

It’s Christmas Eve! So you really should have all of your Christmas shopping done. If not, what are you going to get for the clubber or clubbette in your life? Why not get them Ministry of Sound’s Annual 2009? It’s got some top tunes you know! Like Pjanoo, and Wearing My Rolex, and, eh, something by Basshunter… Or else, if you want to go all out, why not treat them to a super-fancy box set type thingy which features the marvelous compilation AND the Ministry of Sound Nightlife aftershave/perfume? It’s musky/clean/fresh (guys) or sensual/musky (again!)/fruity (gals), but either way, the bottle is sleek and stylish! Sold!

And it’s not just MoS who are venturing into the fruity world of perfume tie-ins - Hed Kandi, purveyors of funky sexy house and delicious downtempo grooves (I’m sorry) have released a perfume, appropriately called Eivissa. Quite. Apparently this scent will “evoke memories of those hazy summer days long throughout the winter months.” They’ve even outdone MoS on the description front - Eivissa is magical, sexy, seductive, uplifting and effervescent, it SPARKLES, it’s relaxed, easy to wear and “will take you from sunrise to sunset.”

I can only imagine how these things smell - if they really do smell like clubbing then they’ll hopefully contain enough sweat, dirt, alcohol, narcotics and nicotine to put off even the most hardened of partiers. Seriously though, if this is what it takes to sell CDs nowadays, I’m not suprised Zavvi has gone into administration. That said, queues in HMV are ridiculous this week, as is customary at this manic time of year. You never can tell? Enjoy the sales people! You might just get Nightlife or Eivissa for cheap!

Reasons to Smile

What a week! 808s and Heartbreak is finally out! Unfortunately, I can’t say that I’ve yet had a listen, as I’m being a good boy and I’m waiting for my copy to arrive in the post. I haven’t done that since Hell Hath No Fury!

It’s no secret that I’m a bit of a fan of Kanye’s one-time tour DJ, former DMC champion A-Trak. He’s a great DJ, producer, and he’s pretty funny when he gets to typing stuff up and putting it on the internet. So, after contributing at length to blogs on Myspace, The Fader and Colette, he’s only gone and established his very own sole-purpose blog. Go have a look for some hilarious reads.

As well as the afore-mentioned 808s, I think everyone should check out this Fear and Loathing in Hunts Vegas mixtape. Diplo and Benzi have thrown together a bunch of half-speed tracks from the Alabama-based Paper Route Recordz collective - some originals, some remixes, but all completely bonkers. I’m talking reworkings of Born Slippy, Careless Whisper and A Change Is Gonna Come, to name but three. Bizarre. Essential. You can grab it for free or for under $5 at 192kbps, and anything over $5 gets you 320kbps and a few bonus tracks. It’s all worth it.

And on the freebie side of things, check out Simian Mobile Disco’s twisted Re-Edit of Deerhunter’s Octet over on Pitchfork. It’s better than a kick in the face.

No donks allowed

I haven’t blogged over here in a while, mainly because I feel very removed from any musical scene in the cold climes of Preston. Even though I have the internet at my fingertips, it’s hard to be inspired by anything right now. But I’ve come across some interesting stories across the all too barren wasteland that is the internet.

First of all, I read of a “rave” promoter from Houston, Texas who allegedly faked his own death. This blog post reports the death of a “Dustin” in July of this year, as does this thread on the local Houston Beats forum. Halfway down the page however, someone announces the man is still alive! Apparently he was seen walking down a busy street on a Thursday night - I think he could have done a better job if he’d waited a few more months. Anyway, one board member, Leanna, suggests he faked his own death because some thugs are after him, while D_Struct ponders the lack of information at the supposed time of death. Users of the TexasDNB forum are sceptical, but, according to Houston Beats, he is like a returning Messiah to the Teknosounds forum, another Texas-based site. I tried to investigate that much, but the forum in question was notoriously difficult to read.

On the whole, all I can say is that this is a bizarre situation, and will probably do nothing to help the reputation of “EDM” in the States. Either that or it’ll generate a lot of publicity for the rave scene, and get more people interested by virtue of the sheer ridiculousness of this story. I mean, who is this guy anyway?!

Moving on. I first heard the now infamous phrase “Put a donk on it!” some time in early Autumn, without fully understanding its significance, if I’m being honest. Then I noticed an article entitled “What the donk!” about the phenomenon of bad club music in Mixmag’s November issue. You know, Scooter, Cascada (who plays Killarney’s INEC in December), the series of Clubland albums… I thought nothing of it from atop my lofty seat above planet clubland - pah, what of this sub-par tripe! All of a sudden, I see this video pop up on nearly every forum I read! All over the past week. Without fail. Although I doubt they’re laying down slamming donks over on Teknosounds… Anyway. While this tune is emblematic of everything that I think is wrong with “clubland,” the internet is loving it! Hooray for irony! The Mighty Alboy over on Dilated Choonz calls it “moreish.” A huge shout-out has to go to Shock, who puts forward several tracks which could do with the aforementioned “donk.” Indeed.

Finally, I must end on a sad note. Following Saturday’s I Love Techno in Belgium, three Dutch girls have died in a car accident. Two sisters (aged 17 and 21) and their friend (also 17) were travelling home from the event when they crashed on the motorway The only news story I can find on the matter is in Dutch, but a quick online translation suggests that both driver and passengers fell asleep in the car. All that can be taken from this tragic incident is that it really pays to have some sleep after a heavy night like this. RIP etc.

So until next time, make mine Marvel and all that…

Not another biopic!

Honestly, I’m not quite sure how this slipped under my radar. They’ve only gone and made a film about the life of Christopher Wallace, or The Notorious B.I.G. I won’t lie - this prospect fills me with dread. 11 years might be a sufficient gap before they make a film about the man, but that doesn’t mean it has to be done.

The trailer plays out with some snippets of Biggie songs, like Juicy and Hypnotize, but the lead track is the posthumously released Notorious. Of course.

The dialogue is sickening, as characters utter clichéd movie lines as appalling as “you not goin’ back on the block - not if I take this bid fo’ yo ass” and “Can’t change the world unless we change ourselves.” Quite.

A quick glance at the casting shows that they’ve gone with unknowns, which is probably a good idea, although Anwan Glover (aka Slim from The Wire) should make for an excellent Snoop Dogg.

Who knows. It could be great. I’ll wager, however, that it won’t be.

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