My girl Juliana Huxtable LaDosha was one of the first people to hold it down for me when I started DJing on the east coast. Pure Genius. Check the rest of her Bcalla looks cover shoot.

COP THAT SHIT

(h/t @LanaLana)

Since you all loved up that last footwork / juke post I made I figured I’d share a video piece that Wills Glasspiegel who did the audio I posted did, I assume on the same trip to Chicago.  Some of the material is the same but since it’s about dancing the visual is pretty key: watch those feet work!

Also Wills was nice enough to make the audio in the original post (below) downloadable for those of you who requested it for your filez.

Also Traxman who’s in the piece will be playing in NYC this Friday at an underground party at an undisclosed location in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  Also Total Freedom from LA!  Looks like there will be some footwork dancers there too.  Shout to Azizaman for putting it together, looks dope.  FB event here w/ info.

I am not involved with this but am showing it a bit of promo love because I remember what it was like trying to bring Grime artists to NYC when no one knew what it was but I just loved this new crazy music and wanted to share.  It ain’t easy! If you like this kind of stuff vote with your dancing feet.

Katey Red‘s very FIRST music video “Where Da Melph At”

In the spirit of pride week and Gay Bajo?!

Shout to Diego for the heads up & all the visuals!

New Orleans thank you!

Next Friday (the 13th! hope you’re not a superstitious partier!) at Sweat Lodge we’ll be celebrating the release of new DuttyArtizt Atropolis debut self-titled album.  Atropolis will be joined live by Uruguayan singer Noelia Fernandez (who appears on the album) and her comparsa and Nabin Shanti will MC for his set.  On hand will be myself Matt Shadetek, Geko Jones, Chief Boima and DJ /Rupture.  So far these parties have been nothing short of amazing and we aim to continue the trend.  This time we’ll also have some exclusive Dutty Artz stuff for sale including CDs of the Atropolis album, new Dutty Artz hats and hopefully t-shirts too if the boxes arrive in time.  This will be the first time any of this stuff is available for sale anywhere. The party itself is FREE cuz we’re nice like that.

DUTTY ARTZ SWEAT LODGE

Atropolis Album Release feat. Atropolis w/ special guests Noelia Fernandez & her comparsa and Nabin Shanti

DJs:

DJ /Rupture

Matt Shadetek

Chief Boima

Geko Jones

The Cove 108 N. 6th St. Brooklyn, NY.  L train to Bedford Ave.

Friday May 13th, FREE PARTY 10-4AM

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DJ Quik – “Fire And Brimstone” from The Book of David (2010 Mad Science)

Here’s what I was listening to, as I read Tally post about fresh and exciting new Dutty Artz gear; the opening track from that other legendary producer/rapper from Compton, California DJ Quik. Undoubtedly, one of the most underrated rappers/producers, Quik is without question one of the greatest producers. Super talented, adventurous, and unafraid to experiment with with bugged-out rhythms and structures. If you dig “Fire And Brimstone,” definitely don’t sleep on his new album The Book of David, or his last collaboration with Kurupt BlaQKout or Trauma or any of his early album. Get it how you live!

Maga Bo – “Gondar feat. Eritbu ‘Solomon’ Agegnehu and Entenesh Wassié”

Here’s a video from Dutty Artz family and habitual transnational/borderless bass collaborationist Maga Bo. Filmed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the beautifully shot video for the track “Gondar” which from Maga Bo’s most recent release Ransom EP out now on Senseless Records. Not only providing a glimpse into Bo’s recording process and collaboration with the two Ethiopian musicians – masinqo player Eritbu “Solomon” Agegnehu and singer Entenesh Wassié, we are treated with some wonderful Addis ambiance, plus some beautiful girls dancing to the traditional Azmari song, which Bo laced up/reinforced with some dancehall-like riddim! Stream to the entire Ransom EP on Bandcamp – with remixes from Filastine, Timeblind, Teleseen, Pacheko, and Fletcher.

It also goes without saying that Bo is repping Dutty Artz extra hard in this one! We’ve some some incredible gear coming your way soon too.

We’ve moved location and day

Now Made in Africa is every 1st Friday of the month at Bazaar Bistro North African Restaurant in the Union Square area.

And we’re every first FRIDAY Night of the month! So if you couldn’t make it before because it was on a weekday, now’s your chance.

$5 Well Drinks until midnight

Again Birthday Celebrations, contact us for special deals details!…

$10 Cover

And Hookah/Sheesha available

Facebook event page here.

& here’s a video for all the gyals + man dem who like to see man wine! dance competition in cote d’ivoire -

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FACT mix 222: Urban Tribe

While Carl Craig and Derrick May were preparing to headline the show at Manhattan’s very fancy District 36 night club last month – to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Planet E label, their fellow #313 legend/producer Stingray (real name Sherard Ingram) unleashed this monstrosity in the form of a new Urban Tribe mix on Fact Mag! We have been jamming to this for weeks, and  it’s only getting fresher with each listen. Indeed this is one of the best in the long-running series (the King Midas Sound was my favorite last year.) In their words: this is serious, serious shit, and we recommend that you listen to it LOUD, ideally while driving round your city at night. Don’t have a car? Get one. Nuff said!

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Here is a mono radio rip from a live DJ mix on WFMU a couple of weeks back. It’s jam packed with unreleased, exclusive killer Shadetek tracks! The tracklist is a little rough, but the unreleased joints – opening track “NIC U” and “Pterodactyl” are gleaming freshness not to be slept on!  Look out for his Dutty House EP coming out Tuesday!

TRACKLIST

Matt Shadetek – NIC U
Matt Shadetek – This Is Love
Matt Shadetek – Pterodactyl
Contakt – Not Forgotten
??? Dubbel Dutch Remix
Matt Shadetek & Lamin Fofana – Sunshine City
Black Ryno – Nuh Take Talk (Matt Shadetek Remix)
Matt Shadetek – Delta
Kingdom – Bust Broke
Mayster & Contakt – Korak
??? Secret Agent Gel Rimix
Maxwell D – Going Away
SBTRKT & Sampha – Evening Glow
Matt Shadetek & DJ /rupture – Sunset B35
Chief Boima – Techno Rumba (DJ /rupture & Matt Shadetek Remix)

I’m in the near south with family and friends observing yet another fucked up and annoying holiday – this one associated with the genocide of indigenous Americans. While unpacking my bags after the journey, and thinking about stuffing and delicious chocolate and pecan pies, I turned on a new mix from a trio of young, Afrocentric DJs – Crowdkrushers, from the south of Germany – a town called Tübingen. The mix was commissioned by Akwaaba Music to celebrate the netlabel’s second anniversary. It’s been two years already! Although I have lost count of the releases, Akwaaba remains consistent and continues to exposed us to some amazing music. So enjoy this mix, containing a healthy dose of fine Akwaaba Music.

A word from Crowdcrushers – “So this is our exclusive mix for Akwaaba Music. It‘s not so much all new and exclusive bangers but rather our impression of African music and its big influences on other musical territories (with one or two stylistic exceptions in the mix). We also kinda tried to give an idea of what we do in our club sets, not paying too much attention to tempo or style while keeping it funky and a wee bit humorous… Featuring Akwaaba artists Appietus, Ruff‘n‘Smooth, Kedjevara, Onyenze, Killamu, Dred Man-Gi and Arc Djebe. Hope you enjoy!”

Krush on Akwaaba by Akwaaba Music

Whenever I land in a new city, I go into town with three intentions.

*Find out if there is a really old and amazing music from the region.

*Find out what the locals are listening to at the pubs and clubs so I have an idea what my set should be like.

*Find something really new listen to.

Language barriers usually don’t usually impede this. You might go in with an idea of what you’re looking for but the skilled know not to expect anything. Just find something amazing.

Walk the streets with eyes and ears peeled. Somewhere some 14 year old kid that cut class today, came home early and is blasting a local mixtape so loud the whole neighborhood can hear it. On the metro, someone is rockin out their mp3 player so loud you can hear their headphones above the racket of the moving train. A restaurant owner from a foreign country is simultaneously playing the most amazing CD of music from his country to make his establishment feel like home. Music is everywhere and when its good, its usually loud.

I was walking around Oberkampf in Paris with Marie Maurin from Jacasseries Radio an area where a lot of the college kids go to get wasted for cheap and we ended up checking out a bar called International. We were just walking over to see what was playing because there’s always some live act going on in there but what we found heard from outside was amazing.  I’m talkin Konono no. 1 on acid.

The street outside was mobbed with with smokers. Gotta love that you can walk out the bar with your beer there. We pushed through the crowd to get closer to the music. I spent the next couple minutes trying to figure out if what was on the projection screen of the crowd downstairs was really happening or if it was a tape. There was a bearded man in a faded santa suit throwing popcorn at the crowd dancing downstairs. When I realized it was real time I told my friend I needed to push through and check out the basement.

Congopunq as a duo are a fairly odd pair of dudes to behold. Dr Kong is a towering 6’2 dude jumping up and down and pulling all manor of tricks out his suitcase. He is happy to make you crepes on stage or bang a kettle with a broomstick or stare at one person menacingly for the duration of a song. His performance interacts with the crowd and makes the show more participatory something I’ve been looking for in new acts to book.

Percussionist Cyril Atef performs in a custom made jock strap and sits behind the oddest drum kit I’ve ever seen assembled. A djimbe for a kick drum, a random collection of random shakers and percussive instruments gathered from around the globe all microphoned through a sample station to loop and stack beats. There is a roland or korg synth which also ran through the loop station and probably a couple pots and pans. He’ll stack a few loops to the beat add a synth line then proceed to rock out the amplified thumb piano for 15 minute jam sessions of improvised dancefloor mayhem.

This is them performing live in Haiti. Watch how the crowd goes from chanting for the local dancer Chi Chi Man to going totally mental for Congopunq’s jump up carnival vibes.

Cyril, is the long-time percussionist for Mathieu Chedid (french megastar with the oddest haircut in the biz) and he’s also founded another project called Bumcello. He has been living in France for some 20 years now. I  sat down with him to talk about the new project at his apartment and from what I can tell he’s completely insane in the healthiest sense of the word.  Here’s the video for their single from the Candy Goodness album released on Crammed Discs. This guy should be rocking at tropical parties around the globe right now and no one seems to know about him. Promoters and Booking Agents… get on your P’s and Qs and BBM’s and twitter… I’ll be playing with him tonight at the same bar I met him at International 5/7 Rue Moret. Planning on bringing him to NYC soon so please hit me up if you wanna host them at your parties.

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I’m on a bus right now heading to Boston! Monday night Beat Research party with residents/kind hosts wayne&wax and DJ Flack, guests John Barera and me! Yep, this is my Boston debut! Do come out and say hi!

Enormous Room
567 Mass Ave
Central Square
Cambridge
9pm-1am
FREE!

In some DUTTY BIZNESS, XLR8R unleashed a track by Matthew Shadetek + Lamina Fofana. Matt works fast! He has three tracks on our recently released New York Tropical compilation. The man is a production wizard.

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Dutty Artz will release Lamin Fofana‘s debut EP What Elijah Said on September 21. Lamin has been steadily working on beats for the past few years, and he’s about to make a public birth.

When we asked him to describe the music, Lamin sent us this sentence: “Yet, he would refer to the Mother Plane, a mysterious space ship with superior beings, giant black gods or something like that, that patrolled the universe, keeping an eye on the devil and ready to rescue Black Muslims from Armageddon.” Sounds like sci-fi, but turns out it’s from the New York Times 1975 obituary (!) for Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad.

Everything is not what it seems, and this music’s mark of greatness is the way it so effortlessly calls for repeat listens.

What Elijah Said EP:

01 Happy 2010 // Dark Days Are Coming
02 “I will admonish you and give you absolution”
03 What Elijah Said // Eye on the Devil
04 Dance In Yr Blood

Artwork: Boy holding fluorescent bulb,  photo by Brendan Bannon, Dandora Dumpsite, Nairobi. 8/29/2006.   Hundreds of trash pickers scavenge the dump for food, plastic, glass, and metal. Areas of the dump smolder from a slow burn of plastics and detritus just under the surface. Local activist have attempted to close the site due to pollution concerns.

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Lamin Fofana  was born in the West African country of Guinea. When the political situation got bumpy, he moved to Freetown, Sierra Leone, where his routine involved listening to Goodie Mob and Organized Konfusion as well as attending Quranic schools/mosques. In 1997 Lamin’s family had to flee worsening conditions in Sierra Leone – losing friends, belongings, documents, a home. They spent several days crossing roads and bridges destroyed by rebels to prevent people from escaping. At the end of the year, Fofana found a new home in Harlem, New York, where he lives today.

“iHop” excels as a futuristic dubstep number with its focus on strong shuffling rhythms, thick bass melodies, and soulful, pitch-shifted vocal sampling on par with UK funky’s finest” – Patric Fallon, XLR8R

“excellent throughout… It’s always possible that he just went so deep into Detroit that he arrived in Africa by mistake.” – Eddie Stats, The Fader

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Matt Shadetek – iHop

Earlier this afternoon, the good folks over at XLR8R liberated a track “iHop” from Flowers, Matt Shadetek’s first solo instrumental album which drops June 8th – just a couple of weeks from now. This will be the first time we announce the album on this blog! We’re all excited about Flowers, which is Matt’s most beautiful and light-hearted work to date.  Read Patric Fallon’s review and download the tune at XLR8R.

“A raspy-voiced and diminutive queer rapper in throwback-eighties-chic screams overtly sexual call-and-response commands. A special-ed teacher with the authoritative demeanor of an army TAC officer instructs you to “Walk it like a dog” and “Do the Jubilee All”, a middle-aged mother yells fighting words at a rival. All of this over frantic, break-neck beats sampled from a small smattering of funk and hip-hop oldies. This is the sound of New Orleans Bounce.  From darkened clubs to tricked-out cars, high school dances to neighborhood bars, family reunions, barbecues and birthday parties, New Orleans locals of all ages have been bouncing to “Dat Beat” since the early nineties, incorporating the rhythms and vocal styling of second-line street parades, undulating Caribbean and African dance moves, and stolen hooks ranging from Beyonce to Bill Haley. It’s the sound on the street in the City that Care Forgot,, the booty-shaking cousin to Miami Bass, Detroit Ghettotech, Baltimore Club, but with the chaos and audacity of punk, a spirit that reflects the chaos and audacity of the Crescent City that birthed Bounce music.

Disasster Prone [27:44 - 320Kbps]

A native Dirty Southerner and long-time New Orleans resident, Deejay Karo offers up this mix as a taste of Bounce from the last several years. These tracks were recorded off of burnt cd’s, traded back and forth by local dj’s, producers and performers and  bought out of car trunks beneath the live oaks of uptown or in beauty supply store parking lots. Because of this, making a track listing would be next to impossible, but here are the names of some of the performers and producers in the mix:
Blaq N Mild, Peacachoo, J Rock, Showbiz CJ, Big Freedia, Sissy Nobby,Magnolia Shorty, 10thWard Buck, Gotti Boi Chris, Katey Red, Smitty Out Da City, Monsta wit da Fade… Respect and Love to everyone featured and deepest apologies those we didn’t rep in this list”

And y’all know why it’s called Disaster Prone, y’heard?
Deejay Karo and DJ Beesknees
Stinging Caterpillar Sound System