Taylor Gang or Start Another Oil Spill

Wiz Khalifa: Damn It Feels Good to Be a Taylor [alt]

I'd go to the grave before I acted as a cowardly African American

Muzjiks Nation, I'm sorry to inform you that I will be taking a leave of absence... until Friday (see what I did there?). As much as enjoy doing this, it is secondary to school, so I must tend to that first. I hope that you will understand and survive the next few days without me. Until then, consider the following...

– Sugar Glyder Sugar Glyder Sugar Glyder Sugar Glyder Sugar Glyder
– Tiesto (ft. Jónsi): Kaleidoscope (ADD Edit) [alt] | Although the full song is superior, for my upcoming DJ gigs, I figure that I should cut the song down, extracting much of the atmospheric Jónsi falsetto, and get to the meat of it—that is, the absurd drop. After some quick Audacity tweaks, we have what I've called the (musical) ADD edit of the title track to Tiesto's 2009 LP.
– Follow me on the Twitters.
– Acquaint yourself with WALT.
– And take notes on this...

Influential Talk

Talk Talk's album Laughing Stock has been influential in the making of both the indie and post-rock genres we know today. The slippery, bending guitars envelop the mix and Mark Hollis' lyrics are what we call "universally cryptic." If you haven't gave Laughing Stock a chance, please do so. Begin your exposure to the album with its centerpiece, "New Grass." Enjoy.

Talk Talk: "New Grass" [alt]

MuzjiksRx (9.6 v2): Overdose

Coming down from this morning's prescription? Stay up with some more musical narcotics to cure that case of the Mondays...

Rick Ross (ft. Jay-Z and John Legend): Free Mason [alt]

+

Notorious BIG: Live Freestyle '95 (DJ Vlad RMX) [alt]

+

Wiz Khalifa: Boarding Pass [alt]

=

MuzjiksRx (9.6): Vegetable man, where are you?

King Crimson: Red [alt] (compare to this!)

+

Nektar: Astronaut's Nightmare [alt]

+

Pink Floyd: Embryo (BBC Peel Sessions) [alt]

=

Bring Us Together

Stardust - Music Sounds Better With You (Eat More Cake Remix) by MikeRog10

Big props to Why FuKK When You Can Dance. Great find.

dw|tb

How Strange It Is to Be Anything at All: A Discussion of Musical Morality and the Mashup Genre as a Societal Barometer

In general, I try my best to stay off my high horse when it comes to my musical opinions and tastes. Listeners have their own concepts of what music should be, and I respect that, despite any disagreements I may have in terms of subjective preference. However, there come instances in which the music lover in me cannot sleep soundly without expressing my qualms. This is one of those instances.

The mashup genre as we know it today can be traced back to Greg Gillis—or, as he's more popularly known, Girl Talk. Sure, there were records like Since I Left You and The Grey Album and Endtroducing... that are all several years Feed the Animals' senior. Hell, the genre is even indebted to musique concrete of the mid-twentieth century. But when somebody describes something as being a "mashup," the archetype that's been constructed in our heads is one of popular songs meshed together with a hip hop bass line and I-buy-my-shirts-at-Target ironic song titles. It's DJ Earworm's annual "United State of Pop." It's The White Panda's "Throw Some Tik on that Tok." It's Super Mash Bros' "Boom Boom Pau." It's any acne-faced computer geek with GarageBand, a YouTube account, and a dream. Now, this is not to say that just because the mashup genre happens to be DIY-friendly that it is inherently illegitimate. After all, never before has music technology and knowledge in general been as readily accessible as it is right now—what with Internet in our computers and phones, mp3s an informed Google search away, and tutorials on how to do everything from tying a tie to boiling an alligator head all at our fingertips. In a way, it's the modern-day equivalent of recreating a popular Tin Pan Alley song after dinner on the nineteenth century middle-class family's piano.

Allow me to reiterate: I have no beef with the mashup genre, nor do I have a problem with its gentle learning curve. Where my blood pressure starts getting raised, though, is when unwritten rules of popular music are broken. I'm not talking about music theory or the marriage of unlikely songs or even the aesthetics of the often-shoddy production jobs; I'm talking about the unacceptable pairings of bona fide masterpieces of pop with half-assed, got-drunk-in-the-studio-and-threw-on-AutoTune drivel. In other words, pairings that defy the will of the musical deities that be and disregard the spiritual capacity of music (and there is one, mind you)...

Torpeedoh has committed one of these mortal sins with "Get Loose," from his Girl Talk-aspiring Buckwild (that ultimately just lands him in the land of Gillis wannabes along with E-603 and Easter Egg). The track begins unassumingly and expectedly enough with an adrenaline-rousing Blur, Tag Team, and UNK musical stew, ebbing and flowing in intensity along with Albarn's 'woo hoo' and Coxon's massive guitar riff. At 1:28, however, the song falters and satisfies our society's perpetual musical ADD by leaving the trio of samples behind and instead opting for the duo of Drake's "Best I Ever Had" and... Neutral Milk Hotel's "In the Aeroplane over the Sea"?!?!

Some background: I first heard this track on Friday night at a college party. It was replete with the mainstays you might expect at such a gathering, including plenty of alcohol. The experience I'm about to describe to you I wouldn't wish on anyone. Hearing two dozen drunk girls chanting "you da fuckin' best" over Jeff Mangum's magnum opus of magnum opuses with their arms in the air in that way only drunk girls do was legitimately saddening. That enchantingly simple four-chord progression that serves as a backdrop to quite possibly the most perfect three minutes and twenty-two seconds of pop music in the past two decades. That musical canvas Mangum paints with his unrefined, yet heart-achingly beautiful voice. Those lyrics Mangum penned in a Romantic outpouring of emotion after the diary of Anne Frank haunted his dreams... All of it defiled by a corporate puppet who used to play this guy on Degrassi.

Perhaps worst of all is that less than a minute later (2:24), the agony is over, and Journey's ubiquitous "Don't Stop Believin'" keyboard riff exchanges duties for instrumental backup to Drake's annoying croon. Just like that. I'm not sure if you've ever listened to In the Aeroplane over the Sea, but it's fucking emotionally draining. I have to clear out time in my day if I want to listen to that record because every single song touches me at my core. Even listening to just one song requires at least five minutes of quiet reflection afterward. This shit is heavy. Torpeedoh blots out Neutral Milk Hotel's candid emotionalism and substitutes Drake's hedonism and self-indulgence in its place.

So what?

Call me a cynic. Call me a snob. Tell me I'm overreacting. Tell me that there are much more important things to worry about, that there are bigger fish to fry. You're more than welcome to do so. But when I hear music of this caliber—a form of art, I'd say—that has been treated in this manner, I can't help but feel a little upset, as it reflects not only a decline in general music appreciation, but more importantly and alarmingly, it is a sign of society's appraisal of sensation over substance, of "feelin' for a fix" rather than "lay[ing] in the sun and count[ing] every beautiful thing we can see."

Neutral Milk Hotel: In the Aeroplane over the Sea [alt]
Torpeedoh: Get Loose [alt]

Microcosmic Adventures in La-La Land

How big of a deal is Beyonce Knowles? A really fucking big deal. Sure, you could cite her success with Destiny's Child or her stellar solo debut in 2003 (remember 'Crazy in Love,' 'Me, Myself and I,' and even 'Daddy'?), but for the sake of this post, I'm going to stay fairly recent and focus exclusively on Sasha Fierce—namely, 'Sweet Dreams.'

Dedicated readers of Muzjiks know my stance on mashups. In general, I consider them the lowest form of music, except in cases where the artist takes two or more original pieces of pop music and fuses them to create an entirely new song that challenges our ear to decide whether the original is the predominant version in our mind any longer. Such is the case for The White Panda's 'Stuntin' Like My Energy' and the majority of Girl Talk's output (case in point: 'Here's the Thing'). However, 'Sweet Dreams' has gone above and beyond the mashup treatment, something that just about every top 40 hit of the past four decades has gotten at this point. That is, 'Sweet Dreams' has been sampled, covered, and altogether transformed several times over.

Allow me a brief digression: dubstep godfather Burial has taken such universally recognizable songs as Christina Aguilera's 'Beautiful,' Destiny's Child's 'Emotion,' and Massive Attack's (of House fame) 'Teardop' and completely reworked them into brooding, experiencing-the-inception-of-the-apocalypse-in-the-dark-alley-next-to-a-British-club soundscapes. It is this relative of the mashup culture which I'd argue is the primary progressive force in popular music today—not only is it cognizant and respectful of the past, but it simultaneously pushes pop forward.

Jigga's got the hottest chick in the game wearing his chain, and her 'Sweet Dreams' received the aforementioned Burial-esque treatment. From psych-rockers (and Jaguar promoters) The Big Pink to dubstep behemoth Kingdom to the Great Weezy F, 'Sweet Dreams' has transcended the scope and reach that one could ever imagine a single three-and-a-half-minute song achieving. The Big Pink covered it and made it an atmospheric, drugged-out, introspective anthem of angst and waking-up-the-next-morning-with-the-taste-of-vomit-in-your-mouth-and-a-wholly-unfulfilling-cluelessness-of-who's-asleep-next-to-you. Kingdom offers a glimpse of what happened the night before in the club when that sweet dream hadn't yet morphed into the beautiful nightmare it would become. And Weezy—well, he and heiress to the throne/rapper equivalent of Beyonce Nicki Minaj just command 'Sweet Dreams' and have their way with it on No Ceilings.

Beyonce Knowles' 'Sweet Dreams': a microcosm of where pop is and where it's headed...

The Big Pink: Sweet Dreams (cover) [alt]
Kingdom: Fogs [alt]
Lil Wayne (ft. Nicki Minaj): Sweet Dreams [alt]

EDIT 9/4: It's Beyonce's birthday today. She turns 29. Totally didn't plan that! Weird.

Kanye Does It Again

The man is a genius. A genius, I tell you.

Kanye West: Devil in a New Dress [alt]

MuzjiksRx (9.3)

Note to patient: Though MDMA is not required to listen to this music, it certainly helps.

Monster! Monster!: Died In Your Arms (Dubstep Remix) [alt]

+

Vitalic: Flashmob [alt]

+

Guido: Mad Sax [alt]

=

[Posh British accent] Extraordinary Record [/Posh British accent]

"Sometimes I feel like they [Radiohead] cleared a path with a machete, and we came afterward and put up a strip mall."
–Chris Martin

Air Traffic is your girlfriend's next favorite band. They're infectiously poppy and fall into the Radiohead-lite category along with Keane, Coldplay, Muse, and the like. Honestly, they're probably just one Twilight soundtrack or Stephenie Meyer cosign away from American teenybopper hysteria. And if you know anything about me, you know of my unabashed Radiohead elitism and general music snobbery. Hell, I own a shirt that reads "I listen to bands that don't even exist yet." So, why the hell am I posting this?

I'll admit it: Air Traffic is my guilty pleasure. I've been spinning their 2007 debut, Fractured Life, on the regular for the past three years now. In fact, the Bournemouth four-piece occupies two spots in my top 20 most played songs in iTunes. I guess you could say that Air Traffic fills that soft spot I have for Brits who sing with their native accent and proudly wear their indebtedness to The Great Thom Yorke on their sleeves.

Don't expect anything terribly groundbreaking or progressive here, but do prepare yourself from some catchy britpop, memorable melodies, and a band whose material you'll probably find yourself coming back to for the foreseeable future...

No More Running Away [alt]
Shooting Star [alt]
Charlotte [alt]

Derp

Sure, the Princeton Review might've awarded the University of Georgia top honors when it came to party schools, but Davidson College students know that those rankings are all politics anyway. Apparently, this is the DC fight song, but with Tom Ross leaving and rumors abound of the campus going dry under the new police regime, I propose the following as the new fight song of Davidson College... [/tongue-in-cheek]

Tim Berg: Alcoholic (Dada Life Remix) [alt]

Can you dig it?

You've heard of the Budos Band. You just don't know it. Perhaps you're familiar with Black Eyed Peas' "Imma Be," which sampled the band's "Ride or Ride." Or maybe you've heard Wale's Mixtape About Nothing, which lifted the beat for "The Chicago Falcon (Remix)" from the opening track of The Budos Band II. Blending jazz, funk, afrobeat, and the sound of the 1970s blaxploitation film into a nostalgic retro style, the Staten Island-based collective evokes Super Fly and Shaft so authentically that I thought I was listening to an obscure '70s band, rather than an alive-and-well group that's only been together since 2005.

Now, don't misconstrue my words. Just because the Budos Band is making music characteristic of four decades ago doesn't mean that they're retracing steps on well-trod ground; rather, these musicians are fusing the aforementioned genres into something new, something fresh. And as you can see in the picture above, there's a lot of people in Budos. They combine their efforts to yield groovy syncopation, subtle melodies, sultry horn lines, and countless other musical ingredients that ultimately create a dense sound that rewards repeat listens, as there's simply too many elements demanding interest for the ear to process it all at once.

Golden Dunes [alt]
Chicago Falcon [alt]
Ride or Die [alt]

Oh Yea!!

These are way better.

Beyonce and Andy Griffith: "Single Ladies" (Mashup)

The White Panda: "Signs to Blow" (Drake v Bloc Party)

dw|tb

Wake up, bake up!

Wiz Khalifa reps his hometown in this brand new track, entitled "Black and Yellow." Taylor Gang or start another oil spill, motherfuckers. Enjoy.

Black and Yellow [alt]