refreshing the links

Rocket to the moon (original post)

the Cave (original post)

NES greatest hits (original post)

DU instrumentals (original post)

more to come.

the groove is still in the heart

To this day Deee-lite's 1990 smash hit, "Groove is in the Heart" will always get the party started on the dance floor, yet most folks seem to think of the group that brought us this party classic as a one-hit wonder or a nostalgic "guilty pleasure." This couldn't be farther from the truth! World Clique, their debut LP, (an underrated masterpiece in my opinion) is an flawless blend of the late 80's/early 90's electronic dance music scene, DJing / samples, "real" instruments and unpretentiously fun & soulful vocals. Not a particularily innovative pop formula, you say? Perhaps, but it was a pretty new idea at the time and very few people have successfully pulled it off since then. Aside from say, Portishead and a few others, most attempts at this deceptively-simple hybrid-genre end up sounding like that horrible "smooth jazz" shit they play at the dentist with a generic breakbeat and some innocuous female vocals thrown on top of it. Meanwhile Deee-Lite's got Maceo Parker, Fred Wesley, Q-Tip and Bootsy Collins making sure everything's hella funky. Dig it, fool!

Unfortunately, their sound differed a bit too much from generic house music to be fully embraced by hardcore ravers (still an accepted term back then) but also was perhaps too "techno" for the ever fickle more-mainstream audience. I think they may have also got in some legal trouble over some of the samples they used. Perhaps as a result, the two albums that followed were a little half-assed in comparison (and isn't it all too often that way!) but still sport some fun tracks. I highly recommend World Clique as well as their remix album, Sampladelic Relics & Dancefloor Oddities. If those aren't too far out for you, pick up the other two as well. And you needn't feel one bit "guilty" enjoying 'em.


Now on to the music. From my (absurdly) extensive library of hella out-of-print Deee-Lite 12" singles I've put together this fairly assessable mix tape of alternate versions and b-sides for your enjoyment. And believe it or not, I'm a heterosexual man.

1. Frenchapella
2. What Is Love (Mr Aurel's Twisted Tribal Beats Dubapella)
3. Riding on through
4. Power Of Love (Sampla-Delic Remix)
5. How Do You Say...love (A Deee-Licious Pal Joey Dub)
6. Runaway (greyhound extended mix)
7. Power Of Love (Zanzibar Guitar Dub)
8. Pussycat Meow (The Meow Mix)
9. Groove Is In The Heart (jelly jam beats / meeting of the minds mix)
10. pal joey's shake your body to the beat mix
11. Build The Bridge (Jungle Groove Mix)
12. picnic in the summertime (guru mix)
13. elevator music / beatapella
14. Power Of Love (Pal Joey's Dub Mix)
15. rubber lover (stretched out extended mix)
16.Pussycat Meow (Murk Bonus Dub)

DJs: now is the time to dig through those old crates and pull out some of these near-forgotten gems! if you're too hip and/or embarrassed you could always "IDM" 'em up with some glitchy distortion or a buncha' envelope filters or whatever it is you kids do these days...

dance party!

The cave

Ok, here's a brand-new mix that I think you'll enjoy. It features two seven-inches I recently acquired that I'd been trying to find for years. Gary "Spider" Webb's "the Cave" is one of the most bizarre records ever made. Both sides consist of teens, Julie and Jimmy stumbling around in a cave calling each other's name over a reverb-drenched surf-jam. Pure genius. I don't really know anything about Gary Webb. I'm pretty sure he was a session musician and he's got another 45 out ("drum city"), though unfortunately, I've never heard it. "The Cave" was released by Bamboo Records (I'm guessing) in the early sixties.

Ray Cathode's "Time Beat" is a record put out by a pre-Beatles George Martin on the Parlophone Label in 1962. Credited to the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, "Time Beat" mixes experimental electronic effects with a minimalist George Martin arrangement, It vaguely reminds me Ferrante and Tiecher's prepared piano records. the Tornados' "Jungle Fever" is of course the b-side to the Joe Meek classic, "Telstar."

1. It Came From Outer Space!
2. Gary "Spider" Webb: the cave part 1
3. Paul Lowry: I got rhythm
4. Bill Watkins: Space Love
5. poinciana
6. Everlasting Gobstopper machine
7 Ray Cathode:Time beat
8. Transporter Energize
9. Batman
10. Swing a little Kim a little
11. Tom Glazer & Dottie Evans: What is the Milky Way? (space songs)
12. Pastor John Rydgren: Careful
13. Richard Nixon (song poem)
14. The Tornados: jungle fever
15. Raymond Scott: Ripples (Manhattan Research Inc)
16. Ford Motor Company: Standing On The Corner
17. les Baxter: Barbarian
18. Wonder woman excerpt
19. Sexy Girls
20. Raymond Scott: Twilight In Turkey (Manhattan Research Inc)
21 Out of This World
22 Hasil Adkins: cat walk
23. Paul Lowry: sabre dance
24. Leonard Nimoy: The Difference Between Us
25. Stella: beatnik's D'Occasion
26. Justice League of America theme
27. Ray cathode: waltz in orbit
28. The House Of Famous Name Brands
29 Ed Wood / Orgy Of The Dead soundtrack: She Lived As A zombie...
30. Theme
31. The Sho-Men: Slowly
32. Tom Glazer & Dottie Evans: electricity(singing science - energy & motion songs)
33. Pastor John Rydgren: a butterfly doing push ups
34. Gary "Spider" Webb: the cave part 2
35. Estelle: the Year 2000
36: Low Speed

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