FACT Magazine This just might be Four Tet’s biggest fan @ Musique Non Stop |  |
- This just might be Four Tet’s biggest fan
- Stream last week’s FACT at BBOX radio show with special guest suicideyear
- Nicki Minaj remixes Rae Sremmurd’s song-of-the-summer contender, ‘No Flex Zone’
- DJ Dodger Stadium’s bizarro Lonely Planet guide to Los Angeles
- The title of the next Drake album is…
- Long-planned Arthur Russell tribute album due in October; features Robyn, Blood Orange, Hot Chip and more
- Jersey club producer R3LL remixes Lido’s synth-splattered ‘Money’
- London’s Illuminations festival announces Shabazz Palaces, James Chance and live horror scores from Fabio Frizzi
- Tupac musical Holler If Ya Hear Me to close after six weeks
- Watch the menacing video for Shapednoise’s crushing new single ‘Illumination’
- Hear Beam’s brooding remix of Gwilym Gold’s ‘Muscle’
- Gilles Peterson and Alex Stevenson talk acid house and Ibiza being the lowest common denominator
- Gui Boratto announces new album of “richly orchestrated club tracks” for Kompakt
- Stream the second of FACT’s Best of the 1970s list mixes
- Radiohead and Biz Markie given mariachi makeovers for Fox animation The Book of Life
- EX
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 02:41 PM PDT
 “I’m going to see Four Tet live ninety nine times” We know Four Tet elicits strong feelings in the FACT community (and for good reason), but this new Tumblr page making the rounds takes it to a new level. As its name suggests, NinetyNineTet documents one fan’s quest to see Kieran Hebden perform live 99 times. The Tumblr appears to belong to London graphic designer Marta Dos Santos. “People commenting on Four Tet’s FB saying I’m a creepy dude it’s the funniest thing,” she tweets. “‘That’s borderline obsessive’ is my best review yet.”         |
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Stream last week’s FACT at BBOX radio show with special guest suicideyear
Posted: 15 Jul 2014 11:15 AM PDT
 FACT’s US team descend on Brooklyn, and live to tell the tale. Last Friday at 3pm ET (that’s 8pm for everyone in the UK), FACT’s John Twells and Walker Chambliss made their way to the BBOX Radio studio in Brooklyn for the very first episode of FACT at BBOX. With a special appearance from Baton Rouge’s suicideyear (who just announced his record deal with the esteemed Software imprint) and Moneyworth, Celestial Trax, Geng Grizzly and Ad Hoc’s Brad Stabler poking their heads in the door to assist with the weekly Singles Club, it was a full house, and now you can hear the episode in full. Highlights include world exclusive premieres from Demdike Stare, Powell, Shit & Shine and Lee Gamble, and a brace of totally unheard material from suicideyear. Head here to stream the episode and take a peep at the extensive tracklist. This week Chris Kelly will be joining Walker Chambliss to host the show, and they’ll be bringing DJ/producer Brenmar into the fray. We’re sure he’ll be dropping some new, exclusive material and answering the usual flurry of questions. Make sure you head to the BBOX site on 3pm ET on Friday to tune in.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 11:09 AM PDT
 We told you to watch these guys. They may have an unpronounceable name, but duo Rae Sremmurd are ready for a breakout. When we dropped them in our list of artists to know in the second half of the year, we noted that their hit single ‘No Flex Zone’ was expected to feature heavyweights Nicki Minaj and Pusha T on the remix. Part of that is true: Nicki has continued her run of remixes, features and singles by sharing her take on the song, and while it’s not her strongest verse (time to retire all the “you bitches are my sons” metaphors), we’ll take it. Stream the song below. Nicki also featured on Future’s previously-unreleased ‘Rock Star’, a song built around an uncleared sample of George Michael.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 08:57 AM PDT
 Samo Sound Boy and Jerome LOL have reunited as DJ Dodger Stadium for their new LP, Friend of Mine. The pair launched their Body High imprint with an EP under that moniker back in 2011, but the ecstatic energy and ear-worming vocal loops of their debut album feel miles away from the body-jacking club material of Stadium Status. While the album is heavily steeped in Chicago house and Detroit techno traditions, Friend of Mine is fundamentally a Los Angeles album: a dance record built for downtown warehouses and drives down the 405 that is rooted in the space the city plays in our collective imagination. Cinematic opener ‘The Bottom Is As Low As You Can Go’ reworks an iconic line from The Naked City — “There are five million stories in the big city… this is one of them." — before launching into a love letter to the city they call home, and with that in mind, we asked Sam and Jerome to break down the Los Angeles icons that inspired the album. They describe the locale-heavy results as their "kinda depressing, potentially fun guide to Los Angeles."
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 07:48 AM PDT
 … Views From The 6. Even as they report that Drake “hasn't even begun recording his fourth album in earnest,” Billboard is proud to announce that it will be titled Views From The 6. The title is assumed to be a reference to Toronto’s 416 area code. On recent cut ’0 to 100′, Drake teased a release of the album in Spring 2015: “We already got spring 2015 poppin' / PND droppin' / Reps-Up P droppin' / Majid Jordin droppin', OB droppin' not to mention me droppin'.” To hold you over until then, LuckyMe’s DJ Paypal shared 30 free Drake edits.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 07:47 AM PDT
 Red Hot’s long-gestating tribute album finally sees the light of day. Back in 2012, Red Hot and Pitchfork announced plans to Kickstart a tribute album to Arthur Russell, featuring an impressive slate of acts from across the indie, electronic and experimental worlds. While the participants have changed a bit since then (no Laurel Halo, unfortunately), Master Mix: Red Hot + Arthur Russell is out October 21 via Yep Roc. The 26-track collection includes covers by Robyn, Blood Orange, Hot Chip, Sufjan Stevens, Devendra Banhart, Scissor Sisters and many more. The full tracklist is below, along with Hot Chip’s take on Russell project Dinosaur L’s ‘Go Bang’. Russell’s Loose Joints classics were recently reissued, and — as we count down the best albums of the 1970s — check out why his World of Echo topped our list of the best albums from the 1980s. 02 Lonnie Holley – ‘Soon-To-Be Innocent Fun (Interlude)’ 03 Robyn – ‘Tell You’ 04 Hot Chip – ‘Go Bang’ 05 Sufjan Stevens – ‘A Little Lost’ 06 Lonnie Holley – ‘In The Light Of The Miracle (Interlude)’ 07 Richard Reed Parry, Little Scream, Sam Amidon, Colin Stetson & Sarah Neufeld – ‘Keeping Up’ 08 Liam Finn, Ernie Brooks & Peter Zummo – ‘This Love Is Crying’ 09 Rubblebucket & Nitemoves – ‘Eli’ 10 The Revival Hour – ‘Hiding Your Present from You’ 11 Sam Amidon – ‘Lucky Cloud’ 12 Devendra Banhart – ‘Losing My Taste For The Night Life’ 13 Phosphorescent – ‘You Can Make Me Feel Bad’ 14 Blood Orange – ‘Is It All Over My Face & Tower Of Meaning’ 15 Scissor Sisters – ‘That's Us/Wild Combination’ 16 VEGA INTL. – ‘Arm Around You’ 17 Oh Mercy – ‘Planted A Thought’ 18 Lonnie Holley – ‘Hop On Down (Interlude)’ 19 Cults – ‘Being It’ 20 Richard Reed Parry – ‘Just A Blip’ 21 Glen Hansard – ‘I Couldn't Say It To Your Face’ 22 Thao & The Get Down Stay Down – ‘Nobody Wants A Lonely Heart’ 23 The Autumn Defense – ‘Oh Fernanda Why’ 24 Alexis Taylor – ‘Our Last Night Together’ 25 Lonnie Holley – ‘The Deer In The Forest (Interlude)’ 26 Redding Hunter – ‘Close My Eyes’         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 07:46 AM PDT
 Taking Jersey Club back to Jersey. In June, Norwegian artist Lido released his synth-splatted, R&B-laced I Love You EP via Pelican Fly. Among the scintillating tracks is ‘Money’, a cinematic groove perfect for fans of Cashmere Cat and Ryan Hemsworth. On his remix, Brick Bandits / Thread crewmember R3LL (formerly DJ Rell) keys in on the track’s Jersey club influence and turns it into a bed-squeaking monster that would kill in Newark. Stream the remix below; the full EP follows. The forthcoming I Love You remix EP is set to feature the likes of Crookers, Hoodboi, Obey City and others.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 07:42 AM PDT
 Multi-venue music and arts bonanza returns for the third year. Rockfeedback have unveiled an excellent programme of shows, events and films for this year’s Illuminations, which takes place in various venues across London from October 27 to November 7. As well as performances from Parisian songwriter Sebastien Teller and Sub Pop hip hop rebels Shabazz Palaces, the more unusual events on the bill include a night of Lucio Fulci horror films at the Barbican accompanied by a live orchestral score from legendary Italian composer Fabio Frizzi – read FACT’s Beginner’s Guide to the godfather of gore for a hint of what to expect. No wave icon James Chance will also be performing alongside frantic fusion band Melt Yourself Down in a one-off collaborative show at Village Underground, and on the cinema side, this year the festival will also feature a music film series in partnership with Hackney Picturehouse. On the schedule are Wild Imagination, a portrait of Arthur Russell, and the acclaimed Fugazi documentary Instrument, plus a night dedicated to the music-themed Random Acts strand of programming on Channel 4 and an event dedicated to MTV's 120 Minutes, focusing on the 'most-shocking, sensational and banned videos' from that time, timed aptly on the day before Halloween. More events and films will be announced in the coming weeks – take a look at the programme below and grab tickets from Rockfeedback.          |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 07:12 AM PDT
 The Broadway show is reported to be one of the worst-selling musicals of recent years. Holler If Ya Hear Me, the stage musical based on Tupac’s songs, is set to close this Sunday after just six weeks at the Palace Theatre in New York. One of the show’s producers, Eric L. Gold, blamed the closure on "the financial burdens of Broadway" and added, "I was unable to sustain this production longer in order to give it time to bloom on Broadway." He had previously admitted making a "rookie mistake" by underestimating the money needed to keep the $8 million show running. The New York Times reports that Holler If Ya Hear Me has become one of the worst-selling musicals of recent years, never bringing in more than $175,000 a week in gross revenues. Last week only 45% of the theatre’s seats were occupied. "My hope is that a production of this calibre, powerful in its story-telling, filled with great performances and exciting contemporary dance and music will eventually receive the recognition it deserves," said Gold in a statement, adding: "Tupac's urgent socially important insights and the audiences' nightly rousing standing ovations deserve to be experienced by the world." Watch a clip of the musical below and check out three tracks from the show, including the weirdest version of ‘California Love’ you’ll ever hear. Meanwhile, the long-awaited Tupac biopic is also expected in the next year or so, helmed by Boyz In The Hood director John Singleton and featuring music by Ashanti. [via Pitchfork]         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 06:59 AM PDT
 Italian producer and Opal Tapes alum Shapednoise returns with a stunning new visual display. Put together by LA-based visual artist Amanda Siegel, the video, which is set to Shapednoise’s brand new track ‘Illumination, is described as “an overblown construct of analog and digital distortion” and it’s hard to disagree. It’s the perfect accompaniment to Shapednoise’s blackened production, and its nightmarish forms are at times absolutely chilling. Interestingly enough, Shapednoise is pushing the visual element at the moment, and has a brand new audio-visual show prepared, along with visual artist sYn. Called Metaphysical, the show will be building on the textural complexities of the physical world, and you can see an example above. ‘Illumination’ is snipped from Shapednoise’s forthcoming EP on the Russian Torrent Versions imprint.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 06:46 AM PDT
 Forward-thinking solo act remixed by newcomer. Set to release his first new material since 2012, UK musician Gwilym Gold has invited Beam to remix his tender ballad 'Muscle' to inaugurate artist Eddie Peake's HYMN imprint. Something of an unknown quantity, Beam has reworked the original into a brooding, soft-footed version of itself, where the organic finger clicks and soaring chords of Gold's piano are replaced by eerie synth strokes and a restless shuffling beat. Having premiered the lead track last week, you can hear Beam's remix below. 'Muscle' is out this week and available to order on 12″ vinyl from The Vinyl Factory’s online shop.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 05:02 AM PDT
“Where were you in 1988?!”
“I was probably playing football in the garden”. “Oh. You look older”. Gilles Peterson may be one of British radio’s elder statesmen, but he still needs someone to keep him on his toes – and that person, in recent years, has been Alex Stevenson, Peterson’s former radio producer and collaborator with him on Brownswood, the record label that has housed projects by Mala, Jose James and Gang Colours, as well as the Brownswood Electric series of compilations. With Brownswood Electric 4 out this year, Joe Muggs spoke to Gilles and Alex about their introductions to dance music (Gilles – acid house, Alex – a dance remix of the Rainbow theme), the development of the UK party scene, and, why modern-day Ibiza is the lowest common denominator and more. Also check: Gilles Peterson on FACT TV’s My Favourite Record.         |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 05:00 AM PDT
 Brazilian techno mainstay Gui Boratto outlines his fourth. Back in 2007, Boratto produced that rarest of beasts – a (gasp) crossover techno LP. Chromophobia's crisp, airy textures found some cache with the indie crowd, and his two subsequent albums (2009's Take My Breath Away and 2011's III) minded a similar seam, albeit to a more muted critical and commercial response. In September, Kompakt will put out Boratto's fourth studio LP, Abaporu. The album promises to be something of a cross-cultural fusion, offering pieces where "European and indigenous influences[...]collide in the most exciting manner." The cover at, which reimagines Tarsilo Do Amaral's painting of the same name, is below, as is strobing new single ‘Joker’. Abaporu will drop on September 29 through Kompakt, and will be available on 2xLP, CD and digital.  01. Antropofagia 02. Joker 03. Please Don’t Take Me Home 04. Get The Party Started 05. Abaporu 06. 22 07. Take Control 08. Indigo 09. Manifesto 10. Wait For Me 11. Where I Belong 12. Too Late 13. Palin Dromo    |
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Posted: 15 Jul 2014 04:41 AM PDT
 Following on from yesterday’s #100-81 session, here’s the second of our 100 Best Albums of the 1970s mixes. We’re counting down the finest albums of the 1970s over the course of this week, with the full list being revealed on Friday. In addition, we’re also uploading a daily mix to accompany each clutch of records, each curated by a different member of the FACT team. If some of the albums on the list are new to you, this is as good a place as any to get to know them. Our second mix, which covers the albums in the #80-61 bracket, comes from Joe Muggs; experimental soul, heayweight reggae, globetrotting free jazz and some good old fashioned V-flicking punk all feature. And where else are you going to find Bernard Parmegiani blended with Gil Scott Heron, eh? You can click on the track names below to read more information on the release it came from. |
01 Basil Kirchin – Emergence (extract)
02 Annette Peacock – Gesture Without Plot
03 The Residents – Hitler was a Vegetarian (extract)
04 Bernard Parmegiani – Ondes Croisées
05 Gil Scott Heron – Sex Education Ghetto Style
06 James Chance & The Contortions – Dish it Out
07 Richard Hell & The Voidoids – Love Comes in Spurts
08 Prince Far I – Shine Eye Girl
09 Shuggie Otis – Aht Mi Hed
10 Judee Sill – Lopin’ Around Through The Cosmos
11 Don Cherry – Siddartha
12 Art Ensemble of Chicago – Theme de Yoyo
13 Conrad Schnitzler – Krautrock (extract)
14 Gil Scott Heron – Whitey on the Moon
15 Lou Reed – I Wanna be Black
16 Guru Guru – Next Time See You at the Dalai Lhama
17 Sex Pistols – Submission
18 Sun Ra – Rocket Number Nine
19 Caetano Veloso – London London
20 David Bowie – Rock’n'roll Suicide
21 Fleetwood Mac – Never Going Back Again
Posted: 15 Jul 2014 03:57 AM PDT
‘Creep’ and ‘Just A Friend’ appear on soundtrack to movie inspired by Mexican folklore.
Songs by Radiohead, Biz Markie, Elvis Presley, Mumford & Sons and more will get mariachi and norteño makeovers in Fox’s animated movie The Book Of Life, produced by Pan’s Labyrinth director Guillermo del Toro.
The covers are based on “the playlist of my life”, according to first-time director Jorge Gutierrez, who also included Elvis Presley’s ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’, Rod Stewart’s ‘Do Ya Think I’m Sexy’ and Mumford & Sons’ ‘I Will Wait’, plus songs by Café Tacuba, Kinky and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes.
Based on Mexican folk art, Day of Dead folklore, the Greek myth of Orpheus and Mayan culture, The Book of Life will also see Ice Cube making his animated voiceover debut.
“Using norteño and mariachi music communicates to the audience Mexican culture is international,” reckons producer del Toro, adding: “Mexico is more than folklore – it’s the way we filter the influence of the world.”
The movie arrives in cinemas in October – watch the trailer below, which looks pretty damn trippy. Sadly the music in it is just some “rousing” pop-rock nonsense, so you’ll have to wait to hear Mariachi El Radiohead. [via Billboard]
Posted: 15 Jul 2014 03:51 AM PDT
Available on: Mute
"Bringing electronic music into the faculty of education – into universities and colleges – changes things. It helps legitimise and open it up to a wider… market, a wider audience. [It] sets the stage, I think, for new developments in electronic music, and openness."
There is a point in this statement, taken from a promotional video released by Richie Hawtin, at which he departs from sincerity. Somewhere between sentence two and sentence three the man's eyes glaze over a touch and he slips into salesman's patter – slick, impressive-sounding, meaningless. It's an instant that will be familiar to anyone with the gift of the gab; that moment when, in order to navigate out of the rhetorical cul-de-sac in which you find yourself, you are forced to resort to just a little bit of bullshit.
In this case Hawtin is talking about his 2012 CNTRL tour, a string of performances and panel discussions across North America which bore the subtitle "beyond EDM". As a mega-DJ on the other side of the perceived taste divide, Hawtin has had plenty to say about the US's EDM explosion. He worries that it has pushed electronic music to the "precipice of being homogenised too much". He exhorts EDM figurehead Deadmau5 to act as a "gatekeeper", introducing his fans to the other delights that dance music has to offer.
Hawtin's motivations in all this might seem altruistic – if a little condescending – but there are other forces at play. As per the common argument, a proportion of those teen EDM fans will, indeed, soon grow out of Electric Daisy Carnival and begin to seek more esoteric thrills. By positioning his brand of techno as the mature, historicised yin to EDM's juvenile yang, an entire emergent market is laid at Hawtin's feet. Hence that bit of promotional patter. Wider market and audience? Straight from the heart. "New developments" and "openness"? Well, you have to give people something to believe in, don't you?
Of course, it has always been thus. From the unmistakable Plastikman logo onwards, the charismatic Hawtin has displayed a knack for marketing that evaded most of his second wave Detroit peers. And while business acumen and creative vitality are by no means mutually exclusive, at some point one overtook the other. The artist and his M-nus empire operate on the understanding that techno is now an industry before it is a music. Corporate partnerships – with Sennheiser, Native Instruments and so on – are to be cultivated. Label signings, meanwhile, must serve Hawtin's mixing style: a tech-savvy approach in which tracks are broken down into homogenous units and reconstructed as the chugging, monochrome soundtrack to global haute hedonism. Like any industry, techno, as M-nus sees it, will live and die by its ability to follow predictable, measurable contours. Stability is paramount, and Hawtin's DJ sets certainly provide that.
Still, when faced with the absurd plenitude of highly paid festival gigs available to a DJ of his stature, Hawtin is quick to point out that he doesn't always take the easy route. He's known for bringing a conceptual slant to his performances (each one tends to have a snazzy name like "Close" or, in the case of his Sake-peddling Ibiza residency, "ENTER."). He has also, in the interest of broadening his horizons, undertaken a number of collaborations with the art world. In 2011 he performed in front of Anish Kapoor's Leviathan sculpture in Paris' Grand Palais, in what was presented as a kind of duet between two auteurs of their respective fields. Late last year, meanwhile, he performed a special Plastikman show – the first since 2010 – at the Guggenheim's annual International Gala.
Speaking about this latter show, Hawtin enthused about the possibility of "touching people who’ve never heard of you," as well as the more broadly evangelical goal of "bringing them closer in to electronic music in general." It's worth asking exactly who he is reaching here. Techno was invented by the aspirant black middle classes of Midwest suburbia, bastardised by working class kids across the pond and subsequently entrenched as middle class European lifestyle music. Perhaps this crowd of New York socialites and art bods sipping free Moët at a Dior-sponsored gala event, minimum admission $125, is the logical next step in this process of gentrification. But they're certainly not lacking in means of access to the music on offer.
Beneath this, there is of course another motive. What does it mean for your art to be accepted by the cultural establishment? It means money, perhaps – new kinds of sponsorship and funding – but in the booming '10s, dance music has plenty of that. More importantly, it means credibility. The value of an establishment artform goes largely unquestioned, even by those who don't care for it (few people, for example, complain with any seriousness about government funding to modern art museums, even if Duchamp's Fountain leaves them cold). Just as with the ill-advised classical-techno crossovers that crop up every few years, it seems Hawtin would love for a bit of that absolute, unassailable legitimacy to be conferred on his music. This in spite of the fact that his vision for modern-day techno – as essentially just one more functional component in an enormous industrial mechanism – horribly misrepresents the genre and many of those who operate within it.
In any case, now us proles have been given a chance to hear what such "establishment techno" might sound like. EX is the recorded result of the Guggenheim performance, and the first Plastikman album in over a decade. As ever, we're told, Hawtin went the extra mile in pursuit of something new: after being asked for a re-run of 2010's Plastikman 1.5, he instead came up with 2.0, centred around an enormous obelisk that pulses with digitised colour. One imagines most of the effort went into this visual aspect; musically EX is very obviously a live performance, and not in a good way. Heavy-handed delay and reverb busses, the odd kneejerk tug on the hipass filter: for all the cutting-edge technology Hawtin supposedly deploys, he doesn't seem to be doing anything beyond the reach of a cracked copy of Ableton.
EX is not awful, but it's certainly not good either. Perhaps closest in tone to the gloomy 'verbscapes of 1998's Consumed, the album draws on familiar Plastikman tools – crisp 909-style percussion, the sleek rubberised coils of the 303 – to make brooding, spartan techno. There is the occasional pleasing moment – the kosmische-like opening half of 'EXpire', for example – balanced with the odd cheesy one (closer 'EXhale'). But for the most part the album commits the softer (or harder, depending on your standpoint) crime of being utterly ignorable.
It's not like the present day Hawtin is completely inimical to the Plastikman of old. 1993's foundational Sheet One, a rebuttal to the harder-faster mania that was gripping techno at the time, was slow, slick, and clinical in execution; qualities in line with Hawtin's more recent tastes. 2003's Closer, meanwhile, expertly turned the Plastikman formula to ket-addled mnml ends. But EX is, as Hawtin put it in a recent Reddit AMA, an “EXploration [sic] into what Plastikman should/could/might sound like in 2014″. And just as Hawtin has resorted to ever flashier gadgetry, bolder performance gimmicks and savvier branding to conceal the stagnant pool at the centre of his aesthetic, so too must this album have absolutely nothing new to say, even if it says it with style. But of course, it hardly matters. Richie Hawtin's music is no longer about the music; it is about "concept" and "curation", "new experiences", "openness". How crass of us to suggest otherwise.
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