remixes
coldplay - talk - 12" remixes
Madonna's new mate, stuart price, aka jacques le cont a la 'thin white duke', takes this modern enormo-dome classic and straps on a monstrous electro disco groove for eight and a half minutes of dance pop perfection. junkie xl comes out of hiding to drop a more minimal techno version on the flip, but i can guarantee that its the a-side that will get you digging out the record deck for regular spins.
limited vinyl only - and totally worth the hassle.
the fallout trust - before the light goes out - simian mobile disco version
of course this is to be expected. a new indie band gets a complete overhaul by the ubiquitous simian mobile disco. surely this stuff is overdone now and unnecessary ? well not when the results are as mad as this ! while the normal version is as straightforward as you'd expect with its laid back take on radiohead vs david bowie's berlin period, the simian mobile crew strip the track way back to just a few stuttering clicks and staccato noises. very uneasy listening and if this track is ever played at a student disco could easily kill any atmosphere. excellent stuff.
cut copy : going nowhere
one of the best tracks off the recent album by cut copy gets the full on remix treatment with digitalism, whitey and sebastian giving the new order styled track a makeover. of the three versions on offer, i prefer the acid heavy, spiky electro, dirty dancefloor monster that digitalism has crafted. 6 minutes of 'very now, and very good' dance music, and rather addictive. especially when the distorted bass starts to mutate into an acid house squiggle, giving the listener the same aural rush as when you first heard tribulations by dfa, a band that i suspect has been listened to a lot by digitalism, as there is a very similar feel and sound to the noise manipulation and extended groove workout. whitey however, has been a lot more restrained with his 5 minutes. while maintaining the melody of the original, he provides a more laid back approach to the proceedings, and being honest the cutup freakiness by sebastian doesn't really go anywhere, but does make the digitalism track stand out even more.
death from above - remixes
for such a minimal operation of 2, dfa1979 love to fuck up their dark-n-nasty bass terror noise with all manner of beats and grooves. word has reached me that there is to be a full remix album proper a la recent bloc party release, but in the meantime there are to be several interesting tracks pushed out for all to enjoy. firstly there is 'romantic rights' which has been given the dancefloor treatment by jesper dahlback and the trash-y man, erol alkan, as well as josh hommes take on 'black history month' which will be available as a download. firstly, jesper leaves the distorted bass in place and wraps a pumped up 4/4 beat to the roots of the track and then adds all manner of synths/handclaps to the sonics. one for the dirty-electro fans. massive, in so many ways. erol then takes the isolated vocal lines, adds some uptempo adam and the ant congo freakiness, lots of mark king styled slap bass funk and generally ramps up the tension factor all the way to 11 before letting rip with the oh so important bass noise, not one for the end of a night, that's for sure. luckily, things are levelled out by the unusually ambient calmer revisit by queens of the stoneage's josh homme, proving that he has a soft caring side. he has taken the lyrically disturbing 'black history month' and encased the track in all manner of beautiful harmony rich electronic noises, before bringing in an excellent glam funk marriage of drums/handclaps and bass, totally perfect.
four tet - a joy (the remixes)
four tet release the most dance propelled groove monster off their recent 'everythings ecstatic' album and slice some hardcore hip hop action over the top in the hope that this will bring in the head nodders from afar. several versions are available with 'the legendary Percee p' spitting it out fast and proud while the twisted bass noise, that dominates the track, does its mutated noise thing, and the jazz drummers from hell let rip, a massive track that will destroy soundsystems all over the country, and now with the added focus from percee p just adds another level of excellence. as well as the normal album version, with the words added, there is a stripped down old school electro version (listed as the 'part 2' version), which would have sat on one of those classic 80's electro/streetsounds compilations (if only i ha kept those tapes!) with total ease. but, hang on there's more, a strange distorted white noise and bleeps version ('remix'), that will thrill the warp massive, the ultra short visit 'koushiks quick remix' where the drums come on strong with their smoky late night jazz session grooves, very smooth for its whole 1.5 minutes, and then finally, there is the 'battles remix', where the melody is off the scale, to be replaced with an excess of fractured noises and laptop glitches. don't think you'll hear this when out on the dancefloor that's for sure.
you takes your pick people.
diefenbach - glorious - the remixes
as so many others are prone to in 2005, indie bands are rediscovering the joys of dance action, obviously as some of these bands are signed up by record labels previously only known for their big beat releases this new era of fun makes for some excellent final results. in this case denmarks finest emotional guitars pop pickers have sorted out some versions of their recent single 'glorious', by such people as minotaur shock, silent running, and the ubiquitous simian mobile disco. my fave is of course is friend of ireallylovemusic minotaur shock who goes against his usual laid back styles and ramps up the tempo with some lovely 80's electro styled synths that make you wonder if dave edwards has been listening to erasure recently. yet for all the sonic playfulness, he has brilliantly kept the melody and structure of the song.
oh and a warning - there are a chunk of broken cd effects - yes yes i did run to the player to make sure all was still working!
silent running (??) take the track and form a well defined uptempo dance track, which admittedly doesn't really do much that i haven't heard before, but it will slide in well with any decent electro-house dj set, especially with the lovely deep sci-fi bass noise that anchors the track down to the floor. simian gets his hands on album track 'favourite friend' where he strips away the pop and restructures the song into something else entirely, a little talking heads bass funk, cut up vocals, electronic ambience make the track something that would never work on the bands album, but works brilliantly as part of this set of remixes.
annie/mystery jets - the remixes
you may or may not have noticed that 2005 saw the rearrival of guitar pop bands dragging in the holier than thou for cool remixer and getting said button tweaker to spruce up the originals for the dancefloor. there have even been a couple of compilations just for this type of freakiness. anyways, some of the results are great.
so in a couple of weeks we get to hear new hotly tipped band 'mystery jets' dirty electro'd versions of the hardassed libertines single 'you cant fool me dennis' that is out now (remixes in a couple of weeks - vinyl only). first there is the justice remix that actually doesn't really strap a disco beat on at all. in fact the track is just a stripped down, rhythmically tighter affair with the song left intact and lashings of piano chord domination. then we get the weirdly named 'straight bat version' (simian's james ford has been involved apparently), whereby a pills and thrills beat kicks in and will make people of the night wiggle about while gurning in pleasure, but the track that will get most attention is the ubiquitous erol alkan reworked version of 'zoo time' where the drawn out rhythm and isolated bass line, guitar parts are seperated out and left to their own fragile vices, until a few minutes in when all manner of ramshackle extras are thrown into the equation. and, just in case you dont know, erol runs the trash club, and is a scenemaker of repute, to the degree that even Annie asked him to come up with a few 12" reworked versions of several album tracks. so erol enrolled various noisemakers to f*ck around with annies pop perfection. part one of the series of 3 was released a few weeks ago, and now part 2 is imminent.
again 12" vinyl only, for those that require details :
always too late - joakim dub mix
helpless fool for love - patrick wolf mix
always too late - joakim vocal mix
without wanting to upset joakim at all, i have to admit that it's the patrick wolf track amongst these that makes my nerves go all gooey. patrick has stripped away the basics and added layers of analogue gorgeousness (with cupid choir of course!), which counteracts the glitchy broken acid techno-fied tracks that joakim has provided.