We are currently converting the second bedroom in our place from a dual office into a baby’s room. The problem is, that office is where I’ve been keeping all my CDs. And as a former DJ, I have a large amount of them… in overflowing binders, shoved into individual plastic sleeves, stacked into and on top of a special CD shelf unit, and so on. And in this preparation, I’m doing something that would have been unthinkable ten years ago: packing up my CDs into boxes to go into the basement.

Now, I was a gigging DJ 10 years ago, but this still represents a giant change in priorities in my life. It’s also a reflection of how much the MP3 medium has taken over CDs for me. Thanks to a 500GB external hard drive, I still have access to the music. It’s just a hell of a lot easier to use, file, and listen to music via MP3.

I’m not quite at the point where I’m ready to drop off my CDs at the used music store for cash yet… give me five years maybe.

I did take a decent-sized LaLa dump last night though. Dropped off 4 Garmana CDs in the mail. It had been a while since I had spent some time on the LaLa site. Man, they do a crap job in updating their catalog. Not having the new Death In June in the catalog is understandable… Soleilmoon are small and independent. But what’s their excuse for not having the new Nick Cave in their catalog? That’s on a major fucking label! Unacceptable. Plus, I’ve been trying to get them to add a Cabaret Voltaire CD (that Reckless wouldn’t take) for more than a year now. Just don’t get why it’s so hard to update that site.

And, of course, the other reason I haven’t blogged much is I’m still gorging myself. w-ki.com hasn’t had much dupstep lately, and was offline for a very sad week, but I still find plenty of deep sounds on there worth adding to my iPod.

Have you seen the Soundhead blog? Great blog dedicated to minimal Euro synth sounds of the eighties. Right up my alley. They introduced me to the amazing minimal sounds of Monoton. Fucking amazing shit there, friends. No idea how I’ve missed them. To make things worse, Discogs revealed that they were on a compilation that’s been in my collection forever… whoops.

Even more interesting that one half of Monoton went on to become a successful Dutch gabber producer. In the days of gabber, I remember bitching about how no one in the industrial/experimental side of music was embracing hardcore techno. Guess there was at least one who made the jump.

Back to Soundhead, check out this recent post. Soundhead posted something they found on Soulseek… a practice I used for years in the infancy of MP3 blogging. The person who he copied the MP3s from on Soulseek GOT PISSED OFF that he posted the material.

The fuck? Talk about unclear on the concept. As if converting from vinyl to MP3 meant you had a copyright on the material. Even if that guy on Soulseek DID have a copyright to the material, that still shouldn’t stop him from posting. Unbelievable.

Even though I’m moving CDs into my basement, I can’t help myself apparently, and made an order at Tesco-US for Juche. It’s a fantastic CD of noise bands like the Grey Wolves and Genocide Organ making noise inspired by North Korea. I’ve got a soft spot for the world’s last remaining Stalinist regime, so I naturally ordered the fucker as soon as I saw the packaging.

I had originally planned on ordering the new Death In June through Tesco. However, Soleilmoon had other ideas. If you click on the Tesco site for the new DIJ, you’ll get an explanation. The long and short is that Tesco were told they could distribute the new DIJ CD, and were left holding the bag.

Financially, I can see why Soleilmoon would do this. If you’ve got an exclusive product, why sell it someone else so they can mark it up and sell it again? It is disappointing though. I met Jane from Tesco through going to Death In June shows in New York and Chicago. She’s a straight shooter who doesn’t deserve the shaft she’s getting from Douglas P. and Soleilmoon. Hell, Jane stood by Douglas P. when anti-fascist zealots were threatening violence at US shows. But, such is the indie music biz.

Still haven’t picked up the new CD yet though. I’d like to buy it locally here in Chicago, but I’ve got a nasty feeling that I won’t be able to since the Evil Clown died. Maybe Reckless. Maybe not.

Other stuff: New Ladytron. The missus loves it. I’m not 100% on board yet. I think “Runaway” severely annoys me. Love the Mira tracks though.

For some reason, I got about TEN e-mails telling me about an MP3 from the new Ladytron CD being available. Literally, ten e-mails. Guess, someone’s got a happy send button or something. I’ve talked about the cluelessness of Ladytron’s US press team before, so that’s hardly surprising.

It’s only 128kbps, but ”Black Cat” is a Mira track… and I’m a sucker for her songs. Give me lyrics in Bulgarian, and I’m a happy guy. There’s not much guitar on the track either… which makes my Kraftwerk-loving heart sing. Not that I thought the guitar ruined “The Witching Hour” or anything, but you know…

I found some rapidshit to the new Portishead from this blog. If the link is still good, grab it quick. I gotta say, I’m really digging it. Each track brings a surprise of one kind or another. There’s a track that if not for the vocals, could have been made by Klinik or Dive. Seriously. Industrial Portishead. And somehow they made it work.

About a month ago I added a few Portishead & Beth Gibbons’ solo CDs to my iPod. And I surprised myself at how quick I was to skip over them when they came up randomly. I think part of it is still not being 100% on board with Gibbons’ voice. Especially on Dummy, she has moments where she reminds me of Alanis Morrissette and her 800 sound-a-likes. Her solo stuff got erased real fast of my iPod. Her solo stuff just sounds like a second rate Jane Birkin imitation to me.

Gibbons sounds more dead on on “Third.” The Jane B routine is gone, and her voice sounds achingly vulnerable at times… particularly when she belts out lyrics like “I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve you. And I don’t know what I’ll do without you.” Plus, the mood of “Third” is amazing… dark, moody… blurred… with plenty of yummy ear candy.

And the DJ appears to be gone from the Portishead mix… which is not a bad thing, really. Scratching is fun and all, but it does kind of date those two Portishead albums. It was a little gimmicky, and it’s nice to see them moving beyond that.

But, nice to see they haven’t moved beyond flashy packaging for the new album! Jesus! Two records and a P-shaped flash drive? Nice! Almost worth the $80 plus shipping it’ll run you.

If you’ve spent some time on the Celebrity rumor blogs recently, you probably have heard of the French artist Yelle. One of those blogs that my wife reads featured a few some Yelle YouTube vids. The videos are certainly entertaining, but the music itself doesn’t suck either. It’s like 80’s-esque dance beats mixed with lyrics rapped/talked en francais.

Fun stuff. Great French girl-pop in the great tradition of French girlie-pop. You can find the rapidshit to the album here, or get some tastes of individual tracks here and here.

And if I were to point my fat, greasy, over-priveleged finger in an accusatory blog as the main source of my hoarding, it would have to be w-ki.com.

Holy shit, do these guys have me by the balls. Fucking amazing site. The whole site is almost exclusively links to vinyl rips of 12 inch dance records.

And that’s something very close to my heart. I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with white label dance records. I love the stripped down ethics of them. Fuck bands, fuck professional marketing, fuck putting pictures of the artist on the cover, fuck having a cover, fuck all that shit. Black sleeve, white label. Cheaply made to get the music out in the clubs as fast as possible. Before MP3s, white label records were the newest of the new music. Cranked out on home studios before they were cool and everyone had one on their laptop.

But having said that, I’ve long since stopped buying dance 12 inches because of hatred of the format (vinyl), hatred of the price per song ratio ($10-20 for 2 songs? you kidding?), and the high maintenance that listening to 12 inch records requires. If I’m buying music today, I want to be able to hear it on my iPod. I don’t have the fucking time or the inclination to convert vinyl to MP3s.

And that’s how w-ki.com has got me. All that bullshit I hate about white label records? Gone. Just easy drag and drop MP3s into my iPod. Brill.

W-ki.com will ask you to sign up, but it’s well worth it. The rips are almost all very well done, and the dubstep shit alone… well, my dubstep playslist on my iPod has swelled to about 250 tracks… and that’s being choosey with tracks.

They’ve also helped me out with “deep” or ”dub” techno records. You’ve got to me a little bit more selective, but if you click on the dub tag in w-ki, you’ll hit on dozens of tracks that would make Maurizio proud.

You like that new ”minimal” techno sound? I’m not crazy about it myself. I find a lot of it to be way too fucking happy for my tastes. Maybe 10% of what I’ve heard, I’ve liked. But, of course with w-ki, if you don’t like it, delete it.

And if you’re interested in all 3 genres, check out this guy’s folder on Rapidshare. Plenty of shit. All real new. Sure, there’s no description of what you’re downloading or anything like that. Guess that’s what Discogs.com is for, eh? Thank you “DiM”

In 2005, I posted an MP3 from La Sonorite Jaune that I found on Soulseek. At the time, I really didn’t know much about them. I picked up a very good cassette by them in like 92 or so. I was really geeked when I stumbled across the ”no longer forgotten music” blog that had links to two entire cassettes by LSJ converted to MP3: ”Breathing Soundtrack” and ”Ersatia.”

Some of it is pretty good, but honestly not as pure and awesome as the LSJ I remembered. Not bad, though. And if nothing else, jesus christ what a blog find! You got some time to kill? Go through this blogs archives for dozens of Dutch punk 7 inch records, and indescribably weird Dutch and European cassettes ripped to MP3s. A treasure trove of bizarre underground Euro 80s fun.

Lance got me interested in the ”Because God Told Me To Do It” blog. Snagged some nice ambient/neofolk/power electronics treats from this guy’s rapidshare links. Some out of print Nurse With Wound I had on vinyl once, some Psychic TV live shows I had on vinyl once, etc., etc. Thee Brad has got hit some good taste… even if he is obsessed with Sleep Chamber…

Jesus, Sleep Chamber. Lance insists that they had some moments of not sucking. I have a hard time believing that. I lived in Boston in the early 90s, and experienced some Sleep Chamber shows firsthand. Man, those shows were overrated suckpiles.

I understand Zewizz was in his “industrial disco” phase at that time. And I probably should download one of the three dozen of early dark ambient and/or noisier Sleaze Chamber cassettes that Brad links to on his site, but y’know, I just can’t be bothered. I just know that at some point in the middle of a dark ambient track that I’ll just be starting to enjoy, Zewizz will open his mouth. And I’ll immediately get a flashback to Zewizz singing “Catwoman” :

“She’s the only pussy for me.”

God. What a tardhole.

Nice use of the Ninja Tune logo. Lately I find myself skipping past the Amon Tobin/Ninja Tune stuff when my iPod is on shuffle, but I do give them props for an excellent logo.

Someone with decent taste was doing some uploading too. Some choice tracks from DJ Cam, Joy Division, James Brown, Tosca, Cut Chemist, etc., etc. A real creepy one from Ulrich Schnauss. Creepy in a bad way. To me, anyway. High-pitched male voice + techno = bad creepy.

Oh, and that’s a great Stereolab track. Just about the only good thing about that album “Cobra and Phases Group Play Voltage in the Milky Night” that it came from. I recently heard this song over the PA at Macy’s at Christmas time of all places.

Speaking of hearing stuff over the PA, is it me or is the Cure’s greatest hits turning into elevator music for American stores? It seems I hear “Close to Me” or “Lullaby” every time I go shopping. I knew kids who used to get beat up for listening to the Cure and looking like Robert Smith. Now I hear them when I’m buying groceries. Weird how the world works.

It’s curious because apart from the obligatory Philip Glass and Tangerine Dream, is also some sort of “classic” Hollywood action film soundtrack MP3s. The bitrate is abysmal, but the main theme to Rambo 2 is on here. And so is a godawful, obvious love scene MP3 called ”Skyline” from the soundtrack to Cobra.

Cobra. Jeez, that takes me back. Based on the amount of sequels Stallone has been shitting out these days, I’m surprised we haven’t seen a Cobra 2.

Anyway, back to the dex, one thing that does shout out at me on this dex is a track from Corvus Corax. My wife was obsessed with them for a year or so. Bought just about everything by them we could find for a while there.

The standard Corvus Corax hit was a heavy 4/4 medieval dance beat at about 130+ bpm, tons of bagpipes (or similar sounding instrument) for the melody, and male voices shouting and/or singing in German and/or Latin. That’s the basic pattern, anyway. It’s simple, you might eventually outgrow it, but it works.

My wife did eventually outgrow the Corvus Corax sound. Or at least got to a point where she didn’t NEED every single CD by them in existence. I think
she hit that point when we picked up some techno remix CD that gave no indication of it being a techno remix album when we bought it. Serves us right for buying before trying, I know. Still hammered home the point to us that the whole ren faire dance schtick was getting old.

Anyway, that track ”Gaudalier” is not their sort of typical goth dance floor hit. So, I’ve found another dex with a couple on it here. ”Baerentanz” and ”Ballade von Jean, Jacques und Nicolo.” The former being a more four on the floor kind of track with the latter being a ballad as you’d probably guess from the title.

Corvus Corax is pretty easily obtained in the US these days. Based on Google Shopping, even big box retailers like Circuit City are selling their CDs. I think we ordered ours through Middle Pillar. Looks like they aren’t selling anything by them these days though.

Those of you inclined to find them on Rapidshare are welcomed to poke your browser to here, here, or all your sharemniner results here. Just be careful because there’s a US metal band with the same name that are nowhere near as interesting as the German one.

But I did take the time today to peek through some dexes today though, and check this one out.

Yes. Most of it is crap. Pedestrian, dull, boring crap like Amy Winehouse and Fergie. The odd random MP3 gem by Barry White (who I’ve already written about several times) and Digital Underground. Mostly, a yawner though. But just as I was about to close the dex, look at what’s at the bottom: Two zipped full albums by Philip Glass: the Kundun soundtrack and Songs From Liquid Days.

Didn’t see that coming! And, holy shit, they’re not password-protected and don’t suck. The Kundun soundtrack is particularly good with some very nice use of Tibetan monk chanting. The Liquid Days appears to be a Philip Glass CD without a film… which I wasn’t aware that he made those kind of CDs. An early disc by Glass, apparently. Operatic, poppy, chamber music. Have to give that one a closer listen later…

PNF uses a rapidshare/megaupload system of sharing MP3s. Typically, PNF will share entire albums of long forgotten and out-of-print prog records along with a couple other things like world music that strike the bloggers’ fancy.

They’ve run into a problem recently with one person (or possibly persons) who have their own psuedo-blog at progagainstpirates.blogspot.com. Basically, any time Prog Not Frog posts some MP3s to Rapidshare, the progagainstpirates people complain to Rapidshare. Then, Rapidshare takes down the links.

What’s frustrating to PNF, is the Prog Against Pirates group is complaining not only about material they own the copyrights for, but also for material that they don’t own the copyrights for.

Truly, citizen activism at its worst. And there’s precious little that PNF can do about it.

This is why I’ve never been 100% on board with the Rapidshare MP3 model. Yeah, it’s great that Rapidshare, etc. will hold your MP3s for free. Sure, it’s fantastic that they’re taking the bandwidth hit for you. But, you’ve lost control of what you can and can’t post. Typically all it takes is one complaint- bam, Rapidshare stops hosting the MP3s complained about.

Companies like Rapidshare operate under the illusion that they exist for you to share your resume, digital camera photos and such. Not as an MP3/porn/movie depository. However, they do so with a wink to their uploaders, as Rapidshare isn’t checking or policing the material on its site. The reality is that Rapidshare makes a healthy profit off of sharing that violates copyright laws. They’re very happy to collect your subscription money (or money from advertisers to the freeloaders), and politely look the other way as you share MP3s and porn to your heart’s content.

Unless of course Rapidshare gets a complaint. Then, suddenly, Rapidshare is shocked, shocked! That something on their server is violating the copyright terms and conditions of the web site.

In many ways, PNF is a victim of its own success. As more people check out their blog, the greater the chance that someone is going to complain to get their MP3s yanked. If you will: mo’ readers, mo’ problems.

But with those readers comes potential power. It’s probably time for the PNF crew to put on their big boy pants and start paying for the bandwidth. Yes, it sucks and it’s expensive. However, the next time some antipiracy fucknut complains to you, you can ask them for proof that they own the copyrights. If they do, take the stuff down ASAP. If they don’t, tell them to go fuck themselves.

In a lot of ways, the Rapidshare blogs are some of the reason I haven’t been posting lately. Lance sprang for a one-month subscription to Rapidshare in November. And I’ve been hooked, re-buying each month since then. I’ve been much more into being a MP3-blog consumer than content provider.

Worse, I’ve felt that these rapidshare MP3 blogs have made my MP3 blog antiquated. I concentrate on open indexes with MP3s, and occasionally sharing one-off MP3s… these guys are sharing whole albums.

And while I love that as a MP3/music consumer, I’ve got a real problem with doing it myself as a provider. When I share an MP3, I do so because I want more people to enjoy that music. Ideally, I’d like you to buy said album, CD, whatever based on that MP3. With Rapidshare, I think I’d be harming more than helping.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but if I get a whole album on Rapidshare, I’m not buying the fucker. Unless it’s motherfucking spectacular. Now, I might buy some other CD by that artist. However, I don’t usually buy the stuff that I download on Rapidshare.

That’s the sad truth, right there. But, at least I’m not wrapping this blog in any kind of sanctimonious bullshit. You may have noticed that I added an extra slogan a few months back to the random ones in my header: “Disclaimers on MP3 blogs are for PUSSIES.” I can’t stand that dishonest horseshit like, “All MP3s on this site are for review purposes only, and you must delete them within 24 hours if you don’t buy the CD.” Who does that shit? What grown person gives that much of a shit to do that?

Possession is still 9/10ths of the law, bitches. I downloaded it. I own the fucker. Is it nice or fair? Debatable. But, I’m being honest with you. You download something from the internet, it’s yours. Your conscience bother you? That’s your own business.

The inherent dishonesty of Rapidshare bugs me. I hate that Victorian Compromise of giving lip service to copyright protection while profiting from wholesale MP3/movie sharing. It’s not that I dislike the MP3 sharing… it’s that Rapidshare are not honest about it. I’ve tried to be searingly honest in this blog, and something about using Rapidshare to provide content just doesn’t sit well with me.

Doesn’t seem to bother me as a consumer though. Man, have you seen idmtrade? Fucking great shit on there. Or how about Culture and Pleasure? Or the fantastic obscure new wave on the Mutant Sounds blog? Or Different Waters? Or Autres Grooves? Or the heart-breakingly fantastic taste of the late Dirk Friesland who wrote the Cities on Flame blog?

All fucking fantastic… and I find myself wanting to write about them… which leaves this blog in a weird place though. Having this rapidshare acct., I’m searching for dexes less. And what I’m finding is not very inspiring…

Thanks for reading this far. I’m trying to figure out what the next chapter of this blog is. While doing so, the spaces in-between posts may increase instead of decrease. If you’ve got some thoughts about this blog, I’d love to hear them.

To roughly translate, giant fucking Polish hip hop show in Chicago on January 26th!

While Molesta Ewenement is not on the bill, the show does have some large names in the Polish hip hop world: Pezet and Plomien 81 being the names I recognize.

Pezet you may recall from that video shown above. Plomien 81 have some albums that fucking rule. A bit more downtempo, but fantastic shit as far as I’m concerned. Click on the links at the bottom of plhh.com for some concert footage and/or music videos of the bands.

Plus, there’s like ELEVEN opening acts! 5 DJs and 6 Polish MCs! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

Now, the bad news. $25 cover. Yeah, that’s steep. But, goddamn, that’s a lot of entertainment for $25. Tell you what, if you join the emptyfree posse for the show, I’ll give you a free emptyfree.com t-shirt.

You in? Leave a comment below or drop me an e-mail at rkatemptyfreedotcom.

As far as I can tell, “Hip Hop Info” is a series of Russian hip hop compilations. And Stanislav here is giving you NINE volumes of it. From 1995 to 2001.

Wow, right? Pretty amazing… you can listen to the evolution of a genre over time… from the early days on 4-tracks in the 90s up to a more globalized, more professional and more polished sound by volume 8 in 2001.

If ya like the Poles, you’ll probably dig the Russians for the same reasons. There’s some excellent loops on here, and without understanding Russian, it’s clear that some of these guys have skills.

But, as much as I enjoy hip hop in other languages, I have to tell you… the most entertaining parts of this dex are the rougher, less polished stuff. Particularly when they try to rap in English…. and fail miserably.

”Hip Hop Info #0” appears to be a bunch of demo tapes and a glimpse into the very early beginnings of Russian rap. And on that dex is D.O.B.’s ”Flave of Big Profit,” which you need to download right now.

Why? Because it’s pants-wettingly funny. Quite possibly the most wonderfully awful thing I’ve ever heard.

“here’s my gun, I put gently to your ass and say ‘run, sucker, run.’”

Just hear that chorus once… and “here comes da flava” has a whole new meaning. It’s an instant in-joke.

And, before I get hate mail or hate comments, I fully acknowledge that 99% of Russian rap is a lot better than this one track. This is probably a big embarrassment to the D.O.B. these days. But, too bad because it’s funny as hell.

This MP3 is evidence of a hard hip hop law: if you don’t speak English as a first language, you really have no business rapping in English. Stick to your native tongue, and make the best fucking Russian/Polish/Thai/Tagalog rap that ever was.

No, you won’t be a millionaire MCing in your native language. But, the hard fact is your accent & lack of fluency in English will certainly keep you from being a millionaire in the US or UK.

Look at the grime/UK garage scene. Record companies spent thousands of dollars on trying to market Dizzee Rascal to the US market. Dizzee toured the US in 2005… and it was a flop. Why? Mainly because the US rap market wasn’t ready. And also because American hip hop kids couldn’t get past Dizzee’s accent. American kids want their rappers to sound like they came from the projects… not from some other country. And if Dizzee’s acent is a problem, how do you think rapping like Borat is going to go over in Detroit?

Fuck the US market. Fuck trying to get rich through rap music. Non-english speaking rappers just need to be themselves.

BTW, if you’re a fan of minimal music or trance, you owe it to yourself to check out Stanislav’s parent directory.

Actually, it’s a lot more than just covers of the Model. It’s covers of a ton of different Kraftwerk songs, Krafterk mash-ups, remixes, mega-mixes and ripoffs. Just about every Kraftwerk cover I know of *except* the Big Black one I mentioned in the previous post.

If you listen to ten different covers of “The Model” in a row, you’ll probably come to the same conclusion I did: fucking amazing songwriting by Kraftwerk there. The song was created for four keyboards, but goddamned if that song just doesn’t lend itself perfectly to classical music, nu-metal, britpop, and a dozen other genres frickin’ perfectly. Translated into Japanese, Portugese, English and German… pure brilliance in every language…

Even though some bands might attempt to turn The Model into suck, the brilliance of Kraftwerk still shines through. Even on that god-awful Brazilian cover. In spite of Nino’s doubling the length and adding tons of extra unnecessary new age instrumentation, you can just tell that this song is still the best song this band has ever done, and likely ever will do. They have Kraftwerk to thank for that… and whomever suggested covering Kraftwerk… even though I’d like to strangle that person.

This dex also has my favorite Kraftwerk cover ever. ”Tanzmusik” by Imminent Starvation. Fucking brilliant. “Tanzmusik” is from the under-rated and overlooked ”Ralf and Florian” album done just prior to Autobahn when Ralf & Flo were still half prog rock/half electronic. Imminent just take the piano line and just went fucking nuts with it. That’s my favorite kind of cover. The kind where the person covering does something new, different and unexpected with the original.

Although I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the amazing Señor Coconut in this discussion. While he didn’t cover “The Model,” he does amazing rhumba/cha-cha/merengue covers of just about every other Kraftwerk hit. No surprise that Kraftwerk’s keyboard melodies take to xylophones like ducks to water.

Oh, and the Balanescu Quartet’s violin/cello-drenched cover is equally brilliant. Very faithful to the original and brings the track to a new kind of beauty. Haven’t heard of those guys before… have to check them out…

Back to the dex at hand, former members Wolfgang Flur & Karl Bartos have their own subfolders on here.

To my shame, I had never heard of Flur’s solo project Yamo before this. The tracks on here don’t suck at all. Poppy, sure, and nothing here as brilliant as the Model. However, with Mouse on Mars backing him up, Wolfgang is at least trying new things, and exploring musically. I can’t say that for Ralf and Flo these days.

Which is more I can say for Karl Bartos. I’ve briefly talked about his side project Elektric Music before. It had been a while since I’d heard it… I sold ”Esperanto” to a used CD store ages ago. This dex let’s be get reacquainted… boy, it’s a pile of suck. It’s a horrible, horrible retread on the Kraftwerk idea. No new ideas… just a sad attempt to cash in on the Kraftwerk name and fame. God, did I really like that album? Ugh.

And, good lord… there’s an enormous amount of live material on here too. Dating back to the prog rock days of 1971.

Truly a Kraftwerk goldmine. Grab it while you can.