Kubo - another alias of the man behind the Siqnature project. Twenty minutes of barefoot-global-afro-latin-kuduro-baile-bass bizness (or somn like that). Some of the tracks are already available on 12 thanks to Daniel Haaksman and Mann Recordings.

click here for instant downloadable mayhem

First, here’s an all Steve Gurley mix I’ve been listening to quite a lot lately. I am flagrantly ripping this from the dubstepforum, where it was ripped from Uptown Music Forum, where it was posted about a year ago. The mix was done by someone named AverageJoe, an ordinary DJ with a funny Homer Simpson gif as his MySpace default.

Steve Gurley Mix

***

And now some pictures from last Friday.

The first is of Mr Eliel Lucero skankin’ (to some really good Roots music Matt was playing earlier in the night) in his brand new Dutty Artz tee! Get yours!

And here I am, standing around (yeah, i’m mad bcuz i’m only) in my plain old regular tee— waiting for that lite tropical pink.

And here’s Yellowman, AKA Geko Jones. This man spins and dances behind the decks like a mutha, (but then again, he falls into a state of deep concentration at times.) I’m not sure who’s the better dancer behind the decks, Matt or Gex? I don’t think Rupture dances behind his decks. Maga Bo doesn’t either. Well, I’ve never seen them dance behind their turntables anyway. Have you? If you have, I need photo-or videographic evidence of these two men getting down.

Maga Bo, author of Archipelagoes —a monster I can’t find the words to describe—, here manning the controls at the bottom of a bluest ocean with weird fishes and creatures swimming over his head and around him, while at the same time modeling tee shirts by designer Ghislain Poirier. Oh, Big Poppa Ghis (© Rupture), thanx 4 D Gros Beats. One beer wasn’t enough.

(I don’t have a single picture of Matthew Shadetek for some reason, and the man wasn’t scarce either. I apologize for that.)

And the people, the people, the party people…

Yes, lady on the left can shake it like a salt shaker.

My, my.. dazzling, beautiful brown eyes…

Go ladies.. all you stereotype ladies

Getting hazy and sweaty right about here.

Goodnight.

following on from matt’s todd edwards post. here’s a garage, bassline, 4×4 with cushioned airbags tune from last year. sleep tight.

scott tonic - hold on (bassline dub)

(dormant label myspace) (active artist myspace)

This has been floating around for a little while…

Courtesy of Versetti

I recently came across a slew of grime mixtapes/street albums, or should we call them road albums? In less than two weeks, I had about a dozen new mixtapes in my HD, not having enough time or attention to really listen to all the materials—ranging from artists such as Ghetto, Riko, Ears, Killa P, Jammer, Kano, Trim, and the not so grime, but definitely grimey garage crew Road Side Gees.

Jammer - Intro (to Are You Dumb, Vol. 3)

Produced by Rude Kid

Pre-album fire from a grime luminary. I feel funny about calling Jammer grime, now - especially after he states in that intro, “I make music, F grime / I make music, F crime / I’m not a lame, man, F a nine…”?

$$$

Ghetto - Mountain

Produced by Lewi White & Smasher

This one is off Ghetto’s new mixtape Freedom of Speech. Ghetto goes hard. Looking forward to his album.

I’m happy to say that it seems Grime fans are finally starting to dance again, and not just some random jumping around and gun-fingering but some real deal dancehall-style organized named dances with steps. They’ve still got a ways to go but I’m calling it a powerful positive step in the right direction. Unsurprisingly champion skanker Skepta is at the lead of the charge with his tune “Do The Rolex Sweep”. It seems this whole Grimey Electro thing is kinda popping off, I think it’s great. I’m glad the grime kids are not standing still and letting Funky eat their lunch after building up the thing for years now. The tune is clearly a response to Wiley’s “Wearing My Rolex” (featured below) so unsurprisingly Wiley is at the head of a major development in Grime, again. Big up the whole Boy Better Know camp for keeping the game flipping and coming through with another periodic fun injection to the scene. Check out more vids here.

Also, very unrelatedly Lamin sent me a wicked XLR8R interview with Bun B after I mentioned him earlier, thanks! There’s also these excerpts where he talks about some more general stuff, which are also great.

And the pendulum swings again. The kids are dancing to a new (old) beat. Since the police in London have decided to criminalise Grime and ban it’s fans and artists from holding any sort of public performances in their home city, the kids have started to fulfill their itch to drink, dance, bubble at clubs playing what is called “Funky”. Originally short for Funky House the rise in popularity in the scene has triggered a wave of new producers, many of them former grime heads to start making this new stuff. Some say that the rise in popularity of Funky is due to it’s explicit dancfloor focus and the fact that girls do not seem to want to go to grime raves at all any more. This leads to a mass movement of guys following the girls leaving (including most of the big grime artists) and ending up in “Funky Dances” wearing button down shirts, shoes and drinking champagne. While the scene is still in it’s early “what do you call it?” type phase and things are being hammered out, a few tunes have arisen that people are pointing to and saying, “that there, that’s it”. One of the guys making many of these tunes is the man with the most google-handicapped name ever: Apple. Not helping things by calling his tune Mr. Bean (who appeared in an ad for apple computers, search engine camouflage), he’s making these stripped, rugged, post-grime/sort of soca-ish house tunes, which I am digging.

Check out two tunes from Apple:

APPLE - MR BEAN

APPLE - DE SIEGALIZER

Also check out his myspace to hear more, last I checked I was digging “SAMPLE of wots to come”. Grimy, swinging and dark, I hope it is indeed a sign of what’s to come.

I love this tune. Wiley & Bless Beats doing electro-house. Not much to say, just listen, drink, dance, bubble.

I’ll definitely play this at the Dutty Artz Tropical Dance next Friday (3/21) in Williamsburg at Glasslands, so get ready. I’ve been pondering what I am gonna play and I think among a few select things like this made by other people I am gonna go hard on my own material, which I haven’t done in a while. Want to hear what’s coming out the lab this year? Come listen. We’re doing two sets each, warm up and prime time, so there’s room for a range of stuff to get played. I’m happy about this because really, who wants to listen to the promoters cousin and 900 opening djs you’ve never heard of? Definitely not me. I can play for two hours easy, why would I even want anyone else playing at my party? I’ll probably play reggae early and shadetek bangers, grime, dancehall, dutty beats late.  And yes, I know there are 10 million other parties that night in NYC, and good ones too, but ours is dirty and cheap so after you pay your 6 bucks you can actually afford to buy a few drinks and make some fun mistakes on a friday night, like you’re supposed to.