Laid Back @ Musique Non Stop

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1. Strand & Oli-B present DUB!
2. Audiocentric Deluxe edition
3. The Head Hunters
4. The story of Hein Huysmans
5. Audiocentric Unplugged
6. Wallifornia Soul documentary
7. Louie Gee Ensemble – Scrabble
8. The radio manifesto
9. Ensadinado – R.I.P. Sadi (1927-2009)
10. A new player for LDBK radio

Strand & Oli-B present DUB! Posted: 29 Jun 2010 01:54 AM PDT Yes! I do love this project! Mixing music and art is always the magic recipe for a great collaboration. A couple of months ago after his visit in the FM Brussel studio, Spanish producer Strand told me that he would like to release a 7inch. The kind of project wI love to be involved with especially with a musician as versatile and open minded as Strand. When looking for a designer to team up with, I immediately thought about Oli-B… who immediately accepted. The only constraint I gave them? Keepng the production costs as low as possible… Thank you Miguel and Oli for offering us at Laid Back another chance to demonstrate our mission: support artists and connect like minded creative profiles. It was a pleasure to collaborate with you guys. `

Audiocentric Deluxe edition Posted: 14 Jun 2010 11:04 PM PDT Honestly, It started as an accident… Back in 2008 I was frustrated with the prospects of producing for other artists. At the same time Seon was about a year and a half into learning the guitar. Seon and I both work together, so we constantly talked music. There was always a back and forth between us when it came to our musical tastes. Seon preferred rock, folk, and mid 90′s hip hop.  I was more into soul, afrobeat, southern hip hop and classical music. Looking back it was a pretty eclectic mix of influences from the start. One day I invited Seon over to my apartment to chill before going out drinking. He just so happened to have his guitar with him. After a couple of pre-party drinks I suggested that we go into my home studio and try to record something. 30 minutes in, we came up with the skeleton of a track that would eventually become “Legacy”. After that, I knew that we had something. The birth of Audiocentric… The recording process stuck to that same initial formula. Seon would come to my home studio twice week for recording sessions. During these sessions we would brainstorm ideas on the piano and guitar an record them into Pro-Tools. Afterwords I would take the ideas and produce them into semi flushed out songs. This would involve me sequencing drums and percussion, adding other instruments (bass, piano, synths) and developing the overall song arrangement. Then Seon would come back and record the finishing touches on the guitar and percussion. I would also arrange for other musicians to play on the tracks when needed. I would compare the recording process to piecing together a massive jigsaw puzzle. It was a labor of love. After awhile our varied influences began to show up in the album.  We began to hear all the music that we grew up listening to in the project.  So after 8 months of hard work, various recording sessions, additional musicians, mixing and mastering we finally had… Audiocentric. Enter Laid Back… At the time we didn’t realize that finishing an album is only half the battle.  Getting our music heard turned out to be the real challenge. I came across Laid Back Radio’s website in October of 2009 while I was emailing various blogs for press. I really liked the overall vibe of what they were doing, so I sent Laid Back an email. Within a couple of days Julius responded and suggested that we get in contact with Brooklyn based Photographer Carlito Brigante for his Streets of Philadelphia project. One thing lead to another and eventually the idea for the Audiocentric [Unplugged] Project was born. As we continued to promote the album we knew we wanted to get physical cd’s made. We wanted the physical cd’s to become collectors items that would supplement the digital release. This is why we chose to go with a complete artwork redesign and add a bonus track to Audiocentric[Deluxe Edition]. It just so happened that Carlito knew a very talented graphic designer named Felipe Villarreal who was up to the task. From that point on ,we all worked together tirelessly to make the Audiocentric[Deluxe Edition] cd’s come to life. The end… So here we are, 9 months after the the digital release of the Audiocentric and a year and a half after we first started recording.  Its a very bitter sweet moment. Audiocentric has been a child to both of us. The project has been the source of many highs and lows. Audiocentric has also allowed us to meet, connect  and collaborate with new friends from all around the world. But at the end of the day in order to move on you have to let go. So this is it, the final chapter of our project. We proudly present to you Audiocentric[Deluxe Edition] and we hope you enjoy it! -Jason “Classicbeatz” Minnis Purchase Info: Bandcamp – CD Baby – iTunes Article Photo’s Photographer: Sonya Freeman Model: Bilen Gaga Audiocentric[Deluxe Edition] Photographer : Carlito Brigante Graphic Design: Felipe Villarreal

The Head Hunters Posted: 28 Apr 2010 01:47 PM PDT Head Hunter is an institution here in Brooklyn. It is one of the oldest and most respected barbershop in Bed-Stuy. I heard about it because it is a well known fact in the neighborhood that Notorious B.I.G. used to hang out there. Few weeks ago, Jason "Classic Beatz" Minnis mentionned to me that the shop was one block away from his house and that he goes there two or three times a week. I immediately asked him to hook me up with those guys. One week later, Jason calls me back and says "Mark, the owner of the place, is expecting us this Saturday. That we should go at around 2.30 PM when the place is packed so you have a feel of the place". Bingo. "More than anyplace, the barbershop is the black man’s way station, point of contact and universal home." William H. Grier and Price M. Cobbs Jason told me that whether in Bed-Stuy, North Florida or Brixton U.K, the ambiance in a barbershop is indistinguishable. A barbershop holds a key role in African-American culture. It is a community gathering place, a discursive space where you receive words on local doings and the latest rumors of the neighborhood. The barbershop is also a neutral place where men interact regardless of class, education, or occupation. Kids, adults, cops, hustlers, nearly everyone takes part in the casual conversations where the barber plays the very active role of moderator. During the hour I spent there, the discussion touched upon an eclectic range of topics, switching from mentoring and education to culture, food habits in the North vs. the South to politics and of course girls. He also told me to be prepared, because the three barbers (Mark, L and Boo) are very quick and have a sharp sense of humor. He told me that being an outsider, the barbers and the clients would scrutinize me at first. That is the rule in a barbershop, it is all about how one's carries himself, and attitude and behavior dictate how one is being treated. After introducing myself to each an every one in the shop, I asked permission to unfold my gear. Mark took over the business 18 years ago and plays the role of the patriarch. Boo has been working for 14 years with Mark. He's a charismatic and well respected figure in the community. "L" is the last one of the three mousquetaires. "L" is still relatively young at 24 years old, but his 6 years working as a barber at head hunter was the perfect vehicle for developing his razor sharp wit. Head Hunter: 1092 Bedford Avenue, Stuyvesant, NY More about Carlito Brigante: flickr – blog

The story of Hein Huysmans Posted: 23 Mar 2010 07:19 AM PDT One of the Belgian jazz records I cherish the most is the self-titled album by long forgotten vibraphone player Hein Huysmans. Recorded in the middle of the seventies with a quintet and a septet, this jazz funk album is definitely one of the more adventurous Belgian records. That's why I found it weird that hardly any information on the record or the artist is available. Curious as I am, one beautiful day in fall I jumped in my car for a long ride to meet mister Huysmans and to have him tell me his story. As we sit in the cozy rehearsal room of his home in one of the more rural areas of Belgium, close to the Dutch border, Hein Huysmans narrates about how he started playing the harmonica with his uncles at the age of three, about how he started studying the accordion four years later and how he started playing in commercial orchestras really quickly. "I played accordion in an orchestra, and one day they needed a vibraphone player. I liked the instrument, so I bought one and started playing. After a few weeks, I already took it to concerts." Huysmans learned to play his instrument the hard way. "I never took any lessons. I just played and listened a lot. Milt Jackson, Gary Burton… Lionel Hampton too, but that was old. I saw him once, in Antwerp. It was great, but when I saw him on television later on, I noticed that he had studied parts of the solos, groups of notes. I never really liked that." The story of Hein Huysmans is that of a musician who had to choose between the struggles of playing his own, commercially less successful, music, or making a living out of playing music he liked less. "I was semi-professional back then, I played eight, maybe ten, concerts a month. One day, the manager of Marc Dex (One of the most popular singers in the Dutch speaking part of Belgium, those days, ed.) asked me to join his orchestra. They had at least 25 shows every month; I could have made a living out of that. But I refused, I didn't want to play that crap." Instead, Huysmans opened his own music instruments store and continued to play in less known groups, focusing more and more on the jazz music he loved so much. A Dutch bass player By 1973, he had succeeded in forming his own jazz quintet. "It was difficult finding good jazz musicians over here," Huysmans recalls. And indeed, if you'd make a map of the history of Belgian jazz, none of the big names are located anywhere near Huysmans's hometown. Although Belgium gave birth to European jazz greats such as Bobby Jaspar, René Thomas, Jacques Pelzer, Francy Boland and Sadi, most of the jazz scene was located in Liège or Brussels. The country's northern part, Flanders, is mostly known for its traditional New Orleans-style groups or big bands. It was in one of those bands, the Yellow City Big Band from the city of Geel, that Huysmans met Jan Van Giel, who was the leader and piano player from said big band, and who'd join him in his quintet, together with drummer Frans Pelgrims (who was actually a classical percussion player) and saxophone player Gust Geenen (a friend from the same village). The most difficult though, was to find a likeminded bass player. Huysmans had to go to The Netherlands to find Toon Segers, a professional musician who'd play electric bass on his album a few years later. Searching for new rhythms How come they ended up playing a really modern jazz record with Latin and funk influences with a bunch of big band guys? Hein Huysmans answers: "We wanted to add something new to it, other rhythms than the standard ones. It was pretty modern for the time, I really wanted it to be like that." On stage, the group played their own compositions, such as 'Night People' and 'Marakesh', both of which are featured on the only album the group ever recorded, standards and own arrangements of other songs. Hein Huysmans shows me an album by Hadley Caliman. "We used to play 'Kicking On The Inside' a lot. I really like that theme." "The quintet actually stayed together for pretty long," says Huysmans, "we had a lot of concerts in the Antwerp area, but also in Brussels." He shows me an old poster of Pol's Jazz Club, a notorious jazz club in Brussels. It dates from December 1973 and announces 'Placebo featuring Marc Moulin' one week and the Hein Huysmans Kwintet the next. Although his album is often described as a Placebo featuring Dave Pike jam, Hein knows Marc Moulin by name, but has never heard of his mythical band Placebo. Since Hein Huysmans had a good feeling about his quintet, somewhere in '75 or '76 – He doesn't remember precisely and the sleeve doesn't mention any date – he decided to take a shot at recording an album. The recording of the album almost came in danger when Huysmans and his buddy and saxophone player Gust Geenen had a biking accident, two days before the recording. "You see those red spots on my face?", Huysmans asks while pointing to his picture on the cover. "Me and Gust were cycling and I rode into his rear wheel. They took me to the hospital and I staid in bed the entire weekend. And on Monday we recorded the album. I had a light concussion." Huysmans asked two saxophone players, Eddy House and Eddy De Vos, regulars in the big band circuit, to join in on three of the tracks. They recorded what, in my opinion, is one of the more adventurous Belgian jazz albums. Whether it are the pulsating funky break beats of 'Night People', 'Marakesh' and 'Thinking Of', the bossa nova tinted theme of 'The New Time' or the cool jazz influences in 'Blues For Paul', the album has something for everyone. Local label A. Decap Sound, a label that put out tons of commercial accordion and organ records, agreed to release it. "I had recorded an album for them with accordion songs (as Heintje Huismans, ed.) and I had a good relationship with the people at the company, so they didn't mind releasing it." Hein Huysmans doesn't have a clue about how many copies were ever sold, but he estimates that one thousand were pressed. "After a while, the fun got out of it. That's when I said: 'I quit.' The group wasn't really motivated anymore, and we lived far away from each other, so after a while we only rehearsed when we had a concert, and that took the fun out of it," Huysmans tells when asked about how and why his group quit. Although he doesn't have his own group anymore and also quit playing with the Yellow City Big Band, Hein Huysmans continues to play the vibraphone and accordion every day.

Audiocentric Unplugged Posted: 16 Jan 2010 12:57 PM PST “I believe that some people were born to create music and others to savor it.” Jason and Seon were born to create music. Producer/Pianist/Songwriter Jason “Classic Beatz” Minnis and Guitarist/Songwriter Seon Gomez form an instrumental duo called Nicholas Kopernicus. Their first opus, “Audiocentric“, is a homegrown blend of Afrobeat, Funk, Soul, Blues, Folk, Reggae and Hip Hop. The album’s name comes from Nicholas Kopernicus’ quest for sound perfection. The result is an album that transports you back to the 70′s, a time where most albums had that characteristic warmth absent in a lot of today’s music. The entire album was created in Jason’s home studio. A 6x10ft room in his Brooklyn’s apartment where Nicholas Kopernicus crafted the album note by note – chord by chord – instrument by instrument – overlapping layers of live instrumentation, leveraging everything in their environment from pots and pans to Jimbe drum recording in the bathroom. Methods and tricks that would be considered unorthodox by many recording engineers but techniques that gives Audiocentric a genuine soul and personality. I am the kind that was born to savor music. I love to transmit my passion through images and try to capture music via my photographs. Most of my music stills are centered on and around live concert photography and I have never had the chance to work directly with a band.  When my friend Julius from Laid Back radio asked if I'd be interested in doing a photo-essay on Nicholas Kopernicus, I jumped at the opportunity. It started with a trip to Philly. I was working on an audiovisual project of Philadelphia’s murals and I needed a wicked soundtrack to set the mood. Julius suggested Nicholas Kopernicus. He sent me the track called “Legacy” and I was blown away. I immediately picked up the phone and called them. Fortunately, they were happy to allow their music be a part of the project. I first met the guys at Jason’s in Bedford-Stuyvesant. We discussed music for a couple of hours over some sweet Jamaican rum cream and decided to go forward with the portrayal. Nicholas Kopernicus was working on an exclusive acoustic version of some tracks of their album and  Jason and Seon were looking for coverage of the project. This video features Nicholas Kopernicus performing an acoustic version of the track Commentariolus. This live session was filmed and taped at Rachel's Studio in Brooklyn, New York City. The three songs audio-taped during this unplugged session (I'll will never forget, Commentariolus and Brisa) are now available as free download. Pianist/Producer Jason "Classic Beatz" Minnis and guitarist Seon Gomez talk about their music, their creative process and the unplugged project. Jason "Classic Beatz" Minnis takes us to his home studio in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. A personal and intimate dive into Nicholas Kopernicus' natural element. DOWNLOAD: Nicholas Kopernicus – Audiocentric [unplugged] (zip) Project by Charles le Brigand & Laid Back Radio Filmed by Juan Dominguez & Charles le Brigand Edited by Juan Dominguez Photography by Carlito Brigante Audiocentric [unplugged] cover art by Felipe Villarreal Special Thanks: Julius at Laid Back Radio & Rachel Jimenez

Wallifornia Soul documentary Posted: 10 Nov 2009 03:14 AM PST After meeting record collector Jean Roger aka JR on a flea market, Eric invited him in the FM Brussel studio for a Laid Back session (October 2008) … Blown away by his stories and musical knowledge, we decided to meet him again to discuss about music, records, travels and life in general. More than a crate digger, JR is a man who follows his heart in order to achieve his dreams. Working on our first 15 minutes documentary was a hell of a DIY learning experience but we made it. Thank you to Jérôme ‘Djé” Escobar for the introduction animation, Matthieu “Maty” Cadet for the colour grading, Louis “LuiGi” Van De Leest for filming and Eric Paquet for not only editing it but for taking care of this project from day one. A special big up to Noah Greenwood for hooking us up with Aki from Cosmos Records in Toronto. Let’s hope this is only the first in a long series. Making of Pictures by Eric Paquet on the 6th of December 2008 somewhere in the suburbs of Charleroi (Belgium).

Louie Gee Ensemble – Scrabble Posted: 30 Aug 2009 05:07 AM PDT The Scrabble 7inch is now officially available. Thanks to Taro, Mitsu, Nao and everybody at Jazzy Sport for making this possible and congratulation to the Louie Gee Ensemble for their first release. “Scrabble” originally released by Rene Costy, has been sampled by Jay Dee for “Fuck the Police” and covered in a bossa version by the Louie Gee Ensemble. Soon after Louis presented this track on this blog, we got contacted by Japanese label Jazzy Sport who offered us to release it on vinyl with a DJ Mitsu the Beats remix on the B-side. Credits A Side: “Scrabble” by The Louie Gee Ensemble Re-arranged by Pierre Anckaert & Louis Van de Leest Jr. Recorded and mixed by Louis Van de Leest Jr. Louis Van de Leest Sr. – violin Hendrik Vanattenhoven – double bass Pierre Anckaert – fender rhodes Louis Van de Leest Jr. aka LuiGi from Infinitskills – drums B Side: “Scrabble (remix)” by DJ Mitsu the Beats (Gagle/Jazzy Sport) Mixed by Okuda Supa (Physical Sound Sport) at Studio MSR Takumi Kaneko (Cro-Magnon) – additional keyboard Cover layout by Koji Umade (Jazzride) 7inch released by Jazzy Sport in collaboration with Laid Back. Available through Rush Hour - Groove Attack - Juno

The radio manifesto Posted: 11 Jun 2009 11:30 PM PDT What started in 2002 as a weekly radio show on a local radio station kept on evolving throughout the years. If I am still proud to produce shows for FM radio stations (thanks to FM Brussel and 057 radio for giving us this opportunity), I also decided in March 2008 to create an online radio station on the Radionomy platform as a way to expand the Laid Back project. So far more than 20 deejays and numerous guests collaborate on LDBK and help us broadcast 24/7 the best in urban music from the last 40 years. But our goal with LDBK is more ambitious than being a jukebox. We want to make the best use of the new technologies in order to shape the future of radio. In December 08, willing to balance my DIY experience with some “corporate” views, I collaborated with Cleverwood to organize a conference about the future of radio. Many meetings, brainstorming sessions and prototypes later, we released – together with Central and Datasmart – the first public version of the LDBK desktop player. Next to the desktop player and it’s upcoming iPhone version, I also wanted to explain the theory behind our experiments. Hence this manifesto listing 11 recommendations on what could be done to offer a new radio experience to listeners. Download the Radio Manifesto (pdf version) Slideshow FR – Slideshow NL Each point of this manifesto corresponds to a group of functionalities we might consider adding to our players. Let’s take #10 for instance: “Listening to the radio doesn't require 100% of the listener's attention. But once you catch their attention you'd better give them something nice.” This pop up – implemented in th latest version of our player – appears when we have something more to offer to our listeners be it an exclusive article, a free track on download or an invitation to participate to a contest/game. Manifesto: Layout – Diane d’Andrimont French translation – Olivier Beaujean Dutch transaltion – Jurgen Noel Text – Julien Mourlon in collaboration with Fabian Tilmant Players: Programming – Anthony Janssens User Interface Design – Ali Nassiri & Geoffroy Delobel (Central Design) Concept – Julien Mourlon Top picture: “Retro Radio” by Francis Bourguoin

Ensadinado – R.I.P. Sadi (1927-2009) Posted: 22 Feb 2009 12:37 PM PST The mainstream audience may remember him from his work for Belgian national radio and television and his variety music, but 'Fats' Sadi Lallemand was one of the most important jazzmen in Belgium and a well known musician in the European modern jazz scene. Born in Andenne, Belgium, in 1927, Sadi already played xylophone at the age of nine. He fell in love with the swing music of Louis Armstrong in his early teens and, after hearing Lionel Hampton, switched to the vibraphone at the age of fourteen. He was the first European jazz artist to play the vibes as his main instrument. Although he is known to be a multi-instrumentalist (piano, clarinet, marimba and percussion), composer, arranger and singer, the vibraphone, together with the bongos, would stay his main instrument for the rest of his professional life. His career started with Sadi's Hot Five, a combo playing mainly for the American troops during the occupation. After the Second World War, he moved to Liège, the heart of jazz in Belgium where he became part of  Bobby Jaspar's legendary outfit the Bob-Shots. Known to be (one of) the very first be-bop outfit(s) in Europe, the line-up of the Bob-Shots read as a who's who of the great generation of Belgian jazzmen: Jacques Pelzer (s), Bobby Jaspar (s), René Thomas (g) (although he wasn't really part of the Bob-Shots, he played with them very regularly), Francy Boland (p), Jean Warland (b) and John Ward (d) among others. The heydays of modern jazz In 1951, Sadi followed fellow Belgian jazzmen Bobby Jaspar and Benoît Quersin (b) to Paris. Although Paris was the epicenter of modern jazz in Europe at that time, Sadi faced a difficult economical environment. To say it with the words of Mike Butcher: "The Paris jazz scene (was) a hazardous affair. There (were) too many musicians chasing too few jobs". At first, Sadi had no other choice than playing in more commercial outfits, something he would have to do again and again, later on in his career. Two years later, Sadi is able to work his way up in the Paris jazz scene. He records a lot of sessions as a sideman and co-leader (with Henri Renaud and Martial Solal for example), mostly for Vogue and its legendary Swing subsidiary label. It's that same label that offers him to record a session under his own name – the 'Ridin' High With The Fats Sadi Combo' 10" Lp – that would appear on Vogue UK and on the legendary US jazz label Blue Note. It's one of the highlights of his career and at a given moment, when visiting Paris, Lionel Hampton was noted to say that he was amazed that "a vibes player like Sadi could possibly hail from anywhere but the States" (from Mike Butcher's liner notes for Vogue LDE 133). Jazz critics agree that Sadi is the best vibes player of Europe. A career of duality At the end of the fifties, when the heydays of jazz in Paris were over, Sadi moved back to Belgium. He joined the national radio and television orchestra (playing both jazz and variety music), formed his own jazz quartet and throughout the sixties played on and off with the Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band. It's with a stripped down version of the latter – a quartet session with Sadi, Francy Boland, Kenny Clarke and Jimmy Woode – that he recorded ‘Ensadinado’, a nowadays very sought-after album among jazz DJ's and lovers worldwide. The sixties and early seventies were a period of duality for Sadi. From touring the world with commercial artists such as Caterina Valente and having his own TV-shows on one hand, to writing European and Belgian jazz history by recording beautiful and timeless sessions under his own name or as a sideman with jazz legends like Sahib Shihab, on the other. It is this duality that makes him withdraw himself from music. In the book 'Dictionnaire du jazz à Bruxelles et en Wallonie', Jean-Pol Schroeder writes that Sadi's answer to the question 'what are your current activities', in a questionnaire preceding the book, was: "Sleeping. This era doesn't suit me." 'Fats' Sadi Lallemand passed away from the consequences of a virus in the night of Thursday the 19th to Friday the 20th of February 2009. He was 81 years old. A legend will be missed. The following tracks will be played as a tribute in “Pulsations” on LDBK Radio: The Fats Sadi Combo – Sadisme The Fats Sadi Combo – Thanks A Million The Fats Sadi Combo – Laguna Leap The Fats Sadi Combo – Ad Libitum The Fats Sadi Combo – Ridin' High Fats Sadi – Ensadinado The Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band – Peter’s Waltz The Flemish Radio and Television uploaded some footage from Sadi.

A new player for LDBK radio Posted: 06 Jan 2009 03:35 AM PST Launched in 2009, The LDBK desktop player added an extra dimension to audio streams by providing you with information related to the artist being played, the program grid, news from the Laid Back website and more… The full Laid Back experience gathered in one piece of software using the following services: - Radionomy (audio streaming) - Last.fm (artist biography and playlist scrobbling) - Flickr (pictures) - Twitter (messaging) How to install the LDBK player? End of 2011, we stopped maintaining this player. If you want to listen to LDBK radio, please visit this page. Credits Adobe Air Programming – Anthony Janssens (Datasmart) User Interface Design – Ali Nassiri (Digital Park) & Geoffroy Delobel (Central Design) Concept – Julien Mourlon (Laid Back)