Badly Scanned Jukebox

Blogariddims - Fin?

So that's your lot! Paul Autonomic wrapped things up in fine style last Monday with the 24th episode, a stupidly good Ableton creation blurring the boundaries between dub, techno and ***step, thus bringing us to the end of the first year of Blogariddims.

So this mix is about first steps into new territory and giving over to what may come. It pulls together a lot of the music and ideas that I䴜ve found most-exciting and least genre-bound in the last few months. Nine of the 22 tracks in this mix come from either Shackleton, kode9 or Mala, each of whom, I䴜ve often said, is more like a genre unto himself than a representative of any broader style or collectivity. The other major contingent here comes from Bristol in the form of tracks by Pinch, Peverelist and Rob Smith-related projects (Appleblim and Bass Clef were meant to be on here as well but didn䴜t fit in the end). There are also several remixes on here and a number of others would have made it into a longer mix.

Paul has already expressed his thanks to all the bloggers involved, and Id like to reiterate that here. None of this would have been possible without the selfless actions of a group of individuals who (I'm sure) had much better things to be doing with their time. All hail the Bloggamuffins!

To wrap up - here's a bit of blurb I wrote about the show for Greg's Harvard radio Blogariddims orgy:

Blogariddims came about last year mainly as a result of socialising and chatting online to the contributors. Jungle forum Subvert central had started a podcast at the start of 06, and it set me thinking as to what kind of podcast I'd like to be involved in. One of the major aims of weareie is to expose people to other types of music through DJng - to see the connections that we see, and I always hope that someone who comes to download a dancehall mix will grab a jungle or an ambient set at the same time. Id also been reading music blogs (mainly by UK 'Numm, reggae writers and US beatfreaks) for about 5 years, and I was always struck not only by the depth of knowledge these bloggers showed in their respective fields, but by the huge amount of effort they put into the audio side of things - particularly the mixes and MP3s from the likes of Bassnation, Gutterbreakz, John Eden and Paul Meme - effort that often seemed to go unrecognised. It wasnt much of a leap to put two and two together - here are all these brilliant individuals, all working in relative isolation, all excelling at what they do, most of whom produce mixes and write about music - why not try and do a podcast together?

All in all, its worked out pretty well. Theres a healthy sense of community, an edge of friendly competition,and most importantly, real diversity - in approaches, concept and results. Something that I think is evident when you listen to the series (especially when you do it all at once)! Id like to give a sincere thanks to everyone who has taken part so far and to Greg for bringing this to a new audience. I hope you enjoy(ed) the show.

And as for Blogariddims 2? You'll just have to wait and see...

FEARspace

So its finally happened. We've succumbed to the filthy realities of commerce and started a Myspace. Seeing as we have some releases coming up it's probably a good thing, but I cant help feeling - just a bit, well...

...dirty.

Creaky Doors

Things have been getting a bit unkempt around here of late - loads of short posts, and no new mixes for a while, and Im sorry to say you're going to have to wait a bit longer for something to get your teeth into... It's pretty frustrating for us as there's some really fantastic stuff in the bag that we haven't had time to get ready for publication, but on the bright side, there are a couple of major non-mixing related projects we've been involved which will soon see the light of day. If you've been following the rumours and joining the dots, you'll know what I'm talking about - but thats all Im going to say about it, apart from dropping these two big hints. The first year of Blogariddims (already!) also comes to end this coming Monday - so there'll be some more news on that front soon as well.

This is only the lull before the storm. Get your shutters up and wellies out - it's gonna be a wet summer!

Blogariddims 23 / La Ola De Calor

Last weeks episode featured the second appearance from the Heatwave crew, with a sparkling Reggaeton dominated session:

Like Ini Kamoze sings in the opening track, there's a world of (reggae) music on La Ola De Calor: sung, rapped and MC'd almost entirely in Spanish, from reggae to soca, dancehall to cumbia and reggaeton to hip hop. Artists featured hail from Panama, Cuba, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, Spain, England, Canada and the USA. Thanks to Rhythm & Flow (Barcelona), Kinky Music (Madrid), King-Der (Badalona) and Topa Top Productions (Costa Rica).

As someone still sitting on the fence somewhat when it comes to this vibrant sub-genre (or should that be genre?), this mix has gone a long way to pushing me off. Particularly impressed by some of the fast chat style vocal gymnastics and you've gotta love that version of 'night nurse'...

Grab it here, or direct from the source here. Only one more to go till the end of the first year of this cast!