Of Cave Funk, Mysteries, and Ninjas

A few months back, I stumbled upon a contradictory, semi-coherent (and utterly fascinating) podcast from Aquarium Drunkard featuring "representatives" of one Clutchy Hopkins. Depending on whom you choose to believe, Clutchy is either turntablist/producer Cut Chemist's outlet for groove experimentation, a collaboration of beatmakers and musicians from SF-based Ubiquity Records, or a man who traveled the globe recording world funk musicians after training with ninjas and living in the deserts of the American southwest. (This last one, especially, is just too great of a theory for me not to want to believe in.)

It has certainly been a clever marketing ploy to keep the blogoshpere tossing around theories and obsessing over the identity of the artist. But buzz can only do so much and, thankfully, the music--whoever is responsible for creating it--is worth paying attention to. The three guesses above are only a sampling of the many floating about, but they do provide a clue about the kind of music that Clutchy puts out on his new release, "Walking Backwards". Think DJ Shadow performing in a cave with records replaced by live instruments or a late 70's groove session informed by hip-hop's willingness to borrow disparate sounds in the service of dopeness.

From Clutchy Hopkins' "Walking Backward"::

3rd Element

Alla Oscar

If you want to try to wrap your head around the podcast mentioned above go here.

For further nonsensical info and video go here.

Buy "Walking Backwards" at iTunes.

Physicalism (My Tongue is a Drum Mix)

I started this playlist with the intention of putting up songs from some newish indie-rock groups whose lyricism has impressed me recently. Somehow, through the twisted logic of playlisting where intent becomes severed from results, I have created something entirely different. Some people may call this a failure...but those people are jerks. I'll get back to that original post someday, but this is what moved me today as I began to write.

Move, as in, "move my ass". Yes, friends, only one rule for the songs here today--they absolutely require me to dance. The opposite of lyricism: physicalism. They might not say anything profound, but they sure as hell do something.

A quick word about the Spank Rock tracks: last years' YoYoYoYoYo was at the top of many year end lists and deservedly so. I practically put that album on repeat without break for a good two months. If you haven't listened yet, please do yourself a favor and check it out. The lyrics, a kind of absurd hyper-profanity, may take some getting used to (although they do have their own charms), but the beats are worth it. Anyway, these tracks are not off the album. These are remixes and, mea culpa, a mashup. Music bloggers may act all snooty toward the mashup and maybe for good reason. But Daft Punk and Spank Rock? Killer.

Songs can be downloaded individually or, if you really want to boogie, as a whole zipped file (39minutes).

The whole shebang:

My Tongue is a Drum Mix(39 min).zip

Individual shebangs:

Building Bloc::Jump On

DJ Kentaro featuring Spank Rock::Free

!!!::Heart of Hearts

Datarock::I Used To Dance With My Daddy

Ghislain Poirier::Spank Rock vs. Daft Punk

Incredible Bongo Band::Bongo Rock

Memphis Bleek::Alright (Ratatat Remix)

ThE BeATaRdS::DangDiggyDang

Bonde Do Role::Gasolina (Radioclit Remix)

Simian Mobile Disco::Hustler (Spank Rock Remix)

(Make it past the trance-y opening to the :57 mark of this last song and then proceed to freak out...)

We all have those songs whose rhythmic pull is irresistible. What is the song that never fails to get you on the dancefloor?

MIA: Andre 3000 (Or How Andre Benjamin Is Like Joe Dimaggio)

Man. I wish the title of this post referred to a newly leaked collaboration between MIA and Andre 3000. Because that would be amazing. But it doesn't. Sorry if I raised any false hopes.

No, I mean MIA very literally: Andre 3000 is missing in action. No one hates saying this more than I do. I am sure I am not the only (white) person out there who fell in love with hip hop because of Outkast. But doesn't anyone else miss the days when Andre 3000 was a dope MC? I am definitely not hating on the guy for being a trend-setting, genre-hopping experimentalist. He's a unique artist and I am glad there is someone like him out there. I just miss how good a
rapper he can be.

The good thing about being MIA, at least, is that you're not KIA. Missing implies that you are alive and, hopefully, can still be found. Have there been sightings of an MC named Andre 3000? Infrequent and all-too-brief sightings that give us hope that Andre Benjamin can still rhyme with the best of them?

A nation turns its lonely ears to you...

Lo!

UGK featuring Outkast::International Player's Anthem (Jive, 2007)
Quite possibly the jam of the summer. Andre starts things off impressively, composing a text message to his girl (don't worry, he "cc'd every girl/ that he's see-sees around town"). The style, slipping and stumbling over words unpredictably, doesn't overpower the disarming romanticism of the message. The rest of the song comes through with one of those beats that you've heard a thousand times and never fails to make you shake it. And it's also not as, um, chivalric as Andre's opener. Interested is that soulful sample or the video? Go here.

Devin the Dude featuring Snoop Dogg and Andre 3000::What A Job (Rap-A-Lot, 2007)
The song that reminds you how awesome it is to be a rapper. Just in case it you had forgotten or anything. These two songs have me convinced that Andre 3000 might be untouchable when it comes to writing mind-blowing opening lines, the kind that make me hope he returns to the rhyme game full-time.

Andre 3000::Banana Zoo (La Face, 2007)
One of the projects that has kept Andre from delivering the rhymes full-time is a cartoon for Cartoon Network, Class of 3000. If you check out the link, you'll see it's obviously for the youg'uns. And it's actually pretty good--certainly better than VeggieTales. All of this is to say that this song is goofy as all get out. Don't take it too seriously and you'll have a hard time resisting the urge to move like a monkey.


Help me in my search! What am I missing? And what's on the horizon? Can you remember the first time you heard Outkast?