Tuesday 18 December 2007

Here´s the Record!











Got a bit of a turntablist/DJ thing going on this program, lashings of Rob Swift, DJ Disk, J-Zone. First came across Disk when Buckethead came to London for a promo trip to make heads aware of his latest album at the time. Disk was part of his band. With one deck, mixer and two guitar pedals he bedazzled the entire audience. The whole band rocked, a crazy ass in your face drummer, whose name i can´t remember unfortunately, and not like i need to say anything about Buckethead, playing intricate light-speed solos while doing maneouvres with nunchakas using his left hand.
Here´s Disk with Bill Laswell, Zakir Hussein and some other killer players doin´ it proper....

Javi dropped some of his extra Womex cd haul on me last week. Included was a collection of music from the Indian Ocean, courtesy of Takamba Records. The simplicity of a bell, and a voice set to an ear-invading rhythm on a tambour never fails.
Checked in with The Bug and he reports that his new album is one month away from completion, so should be dropping in next April. Artwork will be handled by Fefe....yep, wanna see it now don´t ya?! I hope he goes with the current choice for the title, it´s very apt. No, can´t say yet, however the singles, Jah War, Skeng, and now Poison Dart have been well received. Kode 9 played Poison Dart at the End earlier this year, and the crowd reaction was how you´d want it to be, over da top....caught us off-guard, glad for ya Kev´. Skream and Stereotyp are among the remixers for the Poison Dart effort. The Bug and Burial have also tackled Thom Yorke with respective remixes, which i believe came out yesterday.

Christmas time in the Canary Islands means truchas; sweet potato, flour, almonds, raisins, bit of liquor, and a lot of elbow grease mixing the ingredients, then fried. Another component is Lard.

Oh, the images....well a few years back Aki came back from a trip to Poland with a copy of Time magazine and it had the same photo in it. We immediately jacked it for theT-shirt, which when worn, and viewed by Farsi/Arabic-readers, they always ask if i know what the writing says.

Ear Conditioning Playlist / December 18 / Here´s The Record!

  • Here´s the record.....Intro
  • Mos Def · Tash · Q-Tip / Body Rock (Rawkus)
  • J-Zone / Catch 22
  • Stacey Pullen / Futuristicfreakqueen (Science)
  • Keith LeBlanc / You Drummers Listen Good (World)
  • DJ Disk / Holidisk Inn
  • Rob Swift / All that Scratchin is Making Me Rich (Asphodel)
  • Strata 3 / (It´s Not A) Man´s World (Bush)
  • Bomber Pilot speaks of dying with dignity, should his time come and being glad he´s not a ground soldier....(BBC Records)
  • SoftBalletForms · Jail of Freedom · Autechre remix (SSR)
  • ChainGang Song · WNEW´s Story of Selma (Folkways)
  • Lard / The Power of Lard (Alternative Tentacles)
  • Fun-da-mental / White Tongues (5 Uncivilized Tribes)
  • Ile Rodrigues / Mo mari ó (Takamba)
  • The Bug feat. FlowDan & Killa P / Skeng (Hyperdub)
  • Kode 9 and The Spaceape / Nine (Hyperdub)
  • Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson / Peace Go With You Brother · Wa-Alekum-Salaam (Strata East)
The Ear Conditioning program is dealt every Tuesday at 9pm on Radio Norte, 89.4FM Tenerife,
repeated at the same hour Saturday night.

I´ve thrown up a mix, Speaker Spazm, here if your interested or have the time. It´s got stuff like 2ndGen, FDM, Canarian comedy, Brazilian beats, Radiohead remixed by Fila Brazilia, Chávez on the mic, Grace Jones, Mutamassik, Blind Idiot God, Dr. Phibes and the House of Wax Equations, Massive Attack/Blur´d and so on. Clocks in at 42 mins, about 82mb.

Tuesday 11 December 2007

Ear Conditioning 11.12.2007 / No se calla porque es la voz del pueblo


In light of Chávez, The Bolivarian Revolution, the recent referendum, i started the program with Joe Strummer´s soundtrack to Walker, the Alex Cox film about Nicaragua. The amount of bullshit coming out of the US, Spain, the UK etc. against Chávez is overwhelming. When he first came to power, his opponents said he was a dictator. Since 1998, Venezuela has had at least 10 elections/referendums.....i thought dictators didn´t do that kinda thing. For the first time in the country´s history they have an indigenous leader, and the rich don´t like it at all. Toma! Bloggers are being asked to carry real news about Venezuela as the mainstream media are not doing the job they should be doing.

Over at the Guevara Convention, this month´s contribution is from Indigenous Resistance. Sacred Power (Embracing a Free Leonard Peltier) is the title. The original CD that features this track is dedicated to the memory of Galdino, a Pataxó Indian in Brazil, who in 1997 was murdered, when as a "joke" four rich kids poured gasoline on Galdino as he slept. He was then set on fire. The rich kids received minimal sentences and were soon back on the street.
Fuck Babylon indeed.

Shit, piss, bollocks....got word that Goya Music, the distributors of all dat Broken Beat an´ Future Jazz stuff, went out of business a couple weeks back. Goya was situated just around the corner from Virgin Records, and Nigel Wildman, a Virgin AnR man, signed IG Culture (NSM, People, Main Squeeze) to the label, and I was priviliged to work on the promotion of IG´s ´Download This´ album. Every couple of weeks, I would drop into Goya and Mike and Spence would drop some new joints in my eager palms, and send me on my merry way back to the Virgin office, where I would proceed to drop the needle on the latest releases in the office. One of my favourites was…..no, still is, Seiji´s Second Nature. Hopefully IG, 2000Black, Bugz in da Attic and crew will find a new viable outlet for their tuneage.

The ever-giving DJ/Rupture served up a remix of M.I.A.´s Paper Planes by Sonido Martines. Those familiar with this page or it´s mother, Ear Conditioning radio, will be familiar with Sonido….yes, he of the Cumbia Rebajadas mix that I jacked from Rupture a few months back…

Another group on the rebajadas tip are El Hijo de la Cumbia. They have also been kind enough to send some tracks and i´ll be dropping them next week, once this glich with my computadora is sorted.

Joe Strummer / Machete
Sussan Deyhim & Bill Laswell / The Candle and The Moth
Tunisian Folklore
Lucy Pearl /
Alabama A&M Marching Band
Taraf de Haidouks / A Stork Crosses the
Danube, in the company of a Raven
Inverse Cinematics / Seven by Seven

Seiji / Second Nature
Rubberoom / Space + Time
DJ Food / Nevermore
Burial / Untrue Album mix by Kode 9

M.I.A. / Paper Planes · Sonido Martines´ Paper Guacharaca Mix
Doug Wimbish / Just a Minute

Ear Conditioning...the radio program is transmitted Tuesday´s at 9pm, with the repeat going on on Saturday, same time, same station, Radio Norte 89.4FM. The engineer has been made aware that the online function isn´t happening, and since it´s being paid for, the problem is being investigated...or so i´ve been told. Will let you know when i know.



Thursday 6 December 2007

Islamic Terrorism in Europe


Going by reports in the mainstream media/press/tv, one would think Europe was a haven of Islamic terrorists. Figures from Europol, the European Police agency reveal that ´Islamic Terrorists´ have been responsible for 0.2% of Terrorist activity in Europe during last year.
In 2006 the National press in the UK carried 26, 577 reports which mentioned the word 'terrorist' or 'terrorism'. Of these 7,620 also referred to 'Islam', 'Islamist' or 'Muslim'. In other words the media reported Islamist violence out of all proportion to the number of attacks.

Click here for the juice, courtesy of spinwatch.

Do we expect corporate media to give us the truth about corporate and governmental matters when they feed off the same tit?

Tuesday 4 December 2007

Ear Conditioning 4.12.2007 / Shock Doctrine


Naomi Klein makes another appearance on the program, no, she wasn´t actually in the studio, i just jacked an interview she did with MSNBC´s Keith Olbermann, who seems to be one of the few journalists in the US mainstream that does not bow down like Faux News or CNN. Klein talks about the economic theory created by the No.1 Chicago Boy, Milton Friedman.
"Only a crisis, real or perceived, produces real change". His ideology was exported to Chile with the USA-assisted coup that brought Pinochet to power in ´73, and still continues to run to this day. At the most chaotic juncture in Iraq's civil war, a new law was unveiled that would allow Shell and BP to claim the country's vast oil reserves. Immediately following September 11, the Bush Administration quietly out-sources the running of the "War on Terror" to Halliburton and Blackwater. After a powerful tsunami devastates the coasts of Southeast Asia, the pristine beaches are auctioned off to tourist resorts. New Orleans's residents, still scattered from Hurricane Katrina, discover that their public housing, hospitals and schools will never be reopened. Interestingly enough this weekend i watched the John Pilger film on Venezuela ´War on Democracy´, as millions of Venezuelans went to vote on the constitutional changes the Chávez government has proposed. Despite the final outcome, which saw Chávez lose the vote, he and his government still have a good few years to make the best of their nation without selling out the Uncle Slam and discarding the hopes of the millions that were constantly forgotten and abused in the pre-Chávez years.

Late addition: Just saw this piece by John Pilger about the Venezuelan referendum in the Guardian of today, and this one from yesterday by Seamus Milne. The folks at Tenerife News should read this and learn something instead of spouting the line as if they were being paid by the Venezuelan opposition.

Now sports.....well, music actually.....the best DJ i´ve ever witnessed and had the pleasure of working with is called Rich McLean aka World Service aka Audio Shrapnel. Rich worked at Nation Records doing everything apart from writing the cheques. I found one of his mixtapes, and digitized a bit to play on today´s program. He mashed together Lata Mageshkar, Yabby U, A Tribe called Quest and an 7/8 opus from Nitin Sawney.

Last week FDM returned to Prague, and old friends Ivo, David Urban, James Scanlon were present. Pavel aka Mustakillah , Dj´d before and after the band set, wearing his Checkpoint 303 t-shirt....hence, i visited their site again, and downloaded Gaza Calling. A couple guys from the group Pop-Porn gave me a copy of their CD, while i was spinning with Mustakillah, so we got some fresh Czech joints lacing the Tenerifian radio-space as well Rachid again, gotta love him, despite his affliction for the whiskey.
The most diverse hour on Canarian radio is soon to strike....Radio Norte 89.4FM from 9pm.

  • World Service Mix– Best Dresssed Chicken Tikka in Town featuringYabby U/ Kishore Kumar / Baluji Shrivastav / Lata Mageshkar /A Tribe Called Quest / Nitin Sawney
  • Unknown artist / Ahl Al Aqil (Oh People of Reason) Folk and Pop Sounds from Iraq CD
  • Yumma, Al Hilou (Mother, Here´s my Beauty) Folk and Pop Sounds from Iraq CD
  • Naomi Klein / Shock Doctrine
  • Checkpoint 303 / Gaza Calling
  • Rachid Taha / Nokta
  • Sheik Usama Bin Laden / Message to the European Peoples
  • Moondog / Bumbo
  • Nick Cave & Warren Ellis / Cowgirl. From the Assassination of Jesse James by the
    Coward Robert Ford
  • Manu Chao / Politics · Prince Fatty Remix
  • Rusko / Cockney Thug
  • Unknown Dubstep t´ing
  • Pop-Porn / (R)evolution
  • Sonido Martines / Cumbia Rebejadas mix for DJ/ Rupture
  • Cymande / The Message

Sunday 2 December 2007

Rachid.....and not a bottle in sight!

Rachid Taha was in town last week, but to be completely honest, he was pissed as a newt. A friend did a pre-show interview with him and he was already on the scotch or whiskey. I hope this doesn´t become a fashionable thing among singers of his ilk. I mentioned it to Aki during our Prague visit on Thursday, and he replied that it had already set in among some of Rachid´s peers.
My best wishes go out to him. Here´s some footage with him in much better form, alongside Faudel and Khaled.



I have been trying to find the video that a stylish French director did for ´No, No, No´ from Rachid´s Olé Olé album. Rachid´s producer, Steve Hillage asked me to do some vocals for an ´international´ version of No, No, No....no, no, no joy so far. Here´s a little sample of the track itself....yes, it´s a house thing.

Saturday 1 December 2007

Rosa Parks 52 years on......

Today is the 52nd anniversary of the day Rosa Parks refused to move from the back of the bus. For the minority workers shipped into the richest enclave in the USA, the fight for basic human dignity continues.

On Friday, August 31st, 2007, security officer Wisly Jonatas clocked out of work at 11 p.m. after his evening shift on Fisher Island, an exclusive, private island off the coast of Miami. Like all Fisher Island service workers, Wisly took the ferry to and from the island for work every day. Tired from a long day at work, Wisly walked onto the ferry and sat down in the ferry’s segregated employee lounge…

Wisly had just taken his seat in the ferry’s segregated employee lounge when the ferry captain summoned and reprimanded him for not following a newly-instituted rule that prohibits workers from walking past island residents’ parked cars on the ferry to get to the employee lounge. For his insubordination, Wisly was forced to get off the ferry and wait for the next one. Five days later, he was fired from his job on the island…

It´s the 21st century dammit! Talk of being civilized is ridiculous. Let the so-called peasants revolt.

Click here to see video clip and read more on this, courtesy of alternet.org

Album of the Week

Just before i left for Thursday´s FDM gig in Prague at Lucerne Music Bar, i received the latest work of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, music for the film The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Violins, violas, tamborine, celestes....uh, what´s a celeste? Gotta check, back in a minute.

Ok, wiki cleared that up....."sound, akin to that of a glockenspiel".
So, the album is awash with violin, viola, celeste and cello. There´s one joint on the album, Cowgirl, that is a good one to grab your lady by her waist, and waltz around the kitchen table to. It´s been on repeat so much that i fear it´s hitting that point of annoyance to my ever-lovin´.

In today´s Independent newspaper, there is this feature about my former bosses at EMI, and their monied ways. I think it scrapes a bit of the iceberg....
I recall much noise being made over the 5million pound golden handshake that Ken Berry received when he was given the boot. To be honest, Ken was cool, and think he deserved it, he was at Virgin from early on, and held onto Virgin and it´s ways for many years even after we were swallowed up by the bigger EMI.

Do you really think he deserved five million pounds? Well, the second in command at EMI USA was given the boot after the company lost millions....his severance was fifty million dollars, and i didn´t hear any one say anything about that. It really pissed me off at the time....thinking here we are working to pay off this guy´s severance package. What are the artists gonna think about that, knowhatimean? And it´s not like he needed it....he, being Charles Koppleman, the K in SBK Publishing/Records already received roughly the same amount when EMI bought SBK. Can you spare a dime (10cents) brother?

I always thought Pop Will Eat Itself was one of the best band names ever, because it has.

Thanks to La Opinion/Radikal....for some reason they gave this blog a little big-up.
Do check the latest issue of Radikal/Rdk for the review of last week´s Womad Festival by the incomparable Javier Jiménez.