Here in the plague, I’m bored enough to write about music again, for my beloved audience of about a hundred. How are you all?
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Category: R’n’B
Aretha Franklin can make any old rubbish sound good, and I think she just has.
Links: The Shakin’ Stevens game, Quincy Jones, death of the CD, Spotify songwriter credits, Snub TV.
Now I’m trying to imagine an ’80s Quincy Jones game.
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Links: Rasa Didzpetris Davies genius of The Kinks, Milli Vanilli, Arthur Baker, Children of Satoshi.
Planet Rock. Nicht halt. Raza DIdzpetris is why the Kinks were that good.
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Links: Rap as poetry; labels as services; where are all the pirates?
And Dave Graney on video, just because.
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Links: Piracy doesn’t affect sales, DC hardcore, Bowie and Cale, early proto-blues.
Und Sisters gegen Nazis.
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Reviews: Gaddafi Gals, It’s The Lipstick On Your Teeth, Ankathie Koi (2017).
In which I trip over Seayou from Vienna, a good label I hadn’t heard of before.
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Reviews: Gnu Reunion, Treasureseason, Shijo X (2017).
A cheering selection, from old and new bands.
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Links: Stoner metal, Stevie Wonder, Bill Drummond on punk.
Essays on aesthetics.
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Links: Spotify without SoundCloud, 808 classics, the Legendary Pink Dots, millennials.
Spotify rejects SoundCloud again, ten 808 greats, the Legendary Pink Dots and you awful millennials.
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Gary Clail’s Tackhead Sound System: Tackhead Tape Time (1987).
“Hard Left” remains chilling and apposite. The fascists and quasi-fascists haven’t changed in thirty years.
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Hip-hop and post-punk synthpop: Ich habe der fahr’n fahr’n fahr’n auf der Autobahn blues.
I don’t often see it noted just what was happening with early hip-hop and English and European synthpop in and from the post-punk era. Hip-hop histories gloss over it, and the reconstructed histories of techno somehow jump straight from about 1988 back to Kraftwerk, as if all that stuff from 1978 to 1984 never happened.
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Lost post-punk classics: That time A Certain Ratio were hanging out with Grace Jones.
Back in the day, A Certain Ratio were regarded by the outside world as post-punk no-hopers. So it was a surprise when Grace Jones, fresh off a hit with Warm Leatherette, took an interest in them …
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Links: September, Ziggy Stardust, Alan Turing, rap as social news system, even cheaper streaming.
Today at work I’ve been busy discussing the horror of Blockchain. So have some interesting webpages that are completely not about that in any manner.
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Reviews: French Concession, Novie, Golden Graves, The Decliner (2016).
Dreampop, shoegaze, synth landscapes … and in-your-face rap.
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Witch house is the new coldwave: totally not goth video links.
The nicest Nivek Ogre interview ever, 1984 goth clubbing and Joy Division’s influence on rap.
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Reviews: Desert Dollhouse, Chuck, Soft Touch (2016).
Atmospheric dream-pop, indie pop and soulful R&B.
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Links: Dr Dre and Apple, Alan Vega, Dangerous Minds.
Dr Dre and Apple’s new headphone jack, reminiscences on Alan Vega (and Bruce Springsteen) and clickbait for aging record nerds.
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Why De La Soul’s ridiculously important albums are unavailable on the face of the earth.
Why you can’t buy De La Soul’s albums: the sample rights are so complicated, Warner refuse to sell them to anyone.
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More eyegouging eastern European rap video for your delectation.
After yesterday’s wonder of the pop video maker’s art, we have a couple more. Here’s Russian rap act Little Big, whose dick is very very big.
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The worst video you will see today: “Winaloto” by Tommy Cash.
Estonian rap. The genre is “trap-pop”, apparently. The video itself is probably not worksafe, though technically within YouTube rules.
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Yes, but which day was that good day?
Donovan Strain went to great effort a couple of years ago to find out precisely what day was Ice Cube’s good day. Two years
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Today’s unbelievably terrible sounds for your delight: neo-Nazi rap.
Hey, it worked for Christians,[citation needed] perhaps co-opting rap music will work for neo-Nazis! Multiculturalist site Imagine 2050 writes of White Power rap used
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Rappers, sorted by size of vocabulary.
Matt Daniels answers the question you hadn’t thought to ask: who has the largest vocabulary in hip-hop? Counts done from first 35,000 released words.
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New Wu-Tang Clan album available only as no copies at all.
JOHN CAGE MATCH, Praxis, Wednesday (NTN) — The Wu-Tang Clan has announced the nonrelease of their new album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin,
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How a major record deal works in the 2010s.
From Cracked, one-hit wonder rapper Spose describes his major label career trajectory. Thankfully his story had a happy ending and he’s now making a
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A Good Friday tale of crucifixion and resurrection. Yes, it’s Tupac Shakur.
Over on the RationalWiki blog, I’ve got a rundown of Tupac Shakur conspiracy theories. Ironic-as-Alanis given that Shakur hated stupid conspiracy bullshit, and thought
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ARC and KSW with Arp Cola at the Melbourne Day Org.
Official Church of Scientology Australian rap music. That is all. (This is what I get for declaring something the possible worst.)
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If I did not like big butts, could I lie?
The twentieth anniversary of the release of “Baby Got Back” was February 5th. To commemorate this occasion, we present a logical puzzle. “You are
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Don’t make me wait.
Remember Street Sounds? Brilliant R’n’B compilations, unavailable on the face of the Earth for the past thirty years? Here you go. The label is
Read MoreQuis indagator Æthiopicus qui sicut mechana futuit?
Obituary of the year.
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