This Wednesday, with the all-volunteer help of Spectacle Theater’s Akiva, Cassie D, and Zoe S, and WFMU’s Mike A, Bill B, and Dave E, we were able to continue our strange and occasionally bumpy journey down the path of live radio built from video clips & staged before an audience.
It’s an uncanny performance mode, talking to a roomful of bodies seated before Spectacle’s screen but knowing that many many more are listening at home, and attempting to create a path that works for both. Feels ‘experimental’ in the word’s basic sense: something for which the process and its possible outcomes aren’t yet established.
For the first of these radio-Spectacle nights, I screened Khaled & Cheb Mami rai comedy 100% Arabica, then in December it was Nass El Ghiwane documentary Transes.
And this Wednesday, on the first day of Black Mystery Month, I teamed up with Lamin Fofana, Chief Boima, and Old Money to host AFRO-SPECTACLE, two hours of live radio constructed entirely from DVDs & VCDs purchased in African-run stores in New York City, followed by a screening of Nollywood-NYC film God’s Own Country.
Are here are two selections from the evening: a jam Lamin & I have been into forever, a perfect song basically, based on an international collaboration between Sékouba Bambino & Kandia Kouyaté.(Lamin’s Brooklyn-purchased video version had much higher quality that this youtubery, alas.)
And my contribution to AFRO-SPECTACLE, a Don Cornelius homage in the form of David Bowie performing ‘Fame’ on Soul Train.
Last night’s radio show provided a particularly serpentine path through the fields of decentertainment, although sometimes things feel stranger than they actually are. Maybe always. End of show went elegy for Greek director Theo Angeloupolos, airing several selections from his long-time collaborator, Eleni Karaindrou. Streaming now:
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Brian DeGraw generously took the time to listen back and reconstruct his set list from the January 18th show. GGD’s BGD was really working with the mixer and FX (I brought my Pioneer DJM-800 for the occasion); here are the raw ingredients:
the KLF- Dream Time in Lake Jackson
Luciano- Los Ninos de Fuera
Lift Boys- Anarchy Village
Ku-Bo- Dingo Riddim
Joker- U Been Beta(demo version)
D Double E- Streetfighter Riddim
Javier Estrada- Crazy Indian
Nyamwezi (tribe)- Manyanga 2
Sonny Sharrock- Black Woman
Drumline Soundtrack
Paper Route Gangstaz- Woodgrain
Zomby- Digital Fauna
Debruit- Nigeria What?
Onipa Nua- I Feel Alright
Eski Instrumental
the KLF- Dream Time in Lake Jackson
We are kicking off (B)Lack History Month in style:
On Wednesday February 1st, at 7pm, DJ Rupture and Lamin Fofana will host a special 2-hour live radio show from south Williambsburg’s Spectacle Theater, with Chief Boima (new jams on the way!), Old Money, and a our favorite African video shopowner.
Following the live WFMU broadcast — built primarily from African music videos purchased in the cornerstores of NYC — we will screen God’s Own Country by director Femi Agbayewa. GOC presents the story of a young Nigeria lawyer who immigrates to NYC to discover that life in America is not like he hoped… As Boima explains, “It’s firmly in the Nollywood tradition. The story line is a New York story, and I think it’s the perfect context for the non-Nollywood initiated to get introduced to the industry. . . it is also referencing the tradition of the American hood gangster flick like Belly. Almost an amalgamation of the two.”
Palm wine and kola nuts are included with the $5 admission. Space is limited, so come early!
This Wednesday, Gang Gang Dance’s Brian DeGraw stopped by my WFMU show to drop a deep hourlong DJ set. Brian does electronics in GGD and is deadly on the decks, too. Open ears will be rewarded. Now only that, but during the interview we learn that lately Brian has been feeling the tribal guarachero from Mexico! The radio show is now streaming:
Be sure to check out Brian’s visual art as well; he thinks across stylistic & formal boundaries, with consistently fresh results.
I was orbiting in a space station above Las Vegas a few days ago, so I was unable to get on the mic during last Wednesday’s radio show. But fire is fire. And no voice means more music, which speaks for itself. You can stream it here. Highlights include an exclusive debut of the new Los Rakas single, ‘Pimpin Smokin Dro featuring E-40′. Cue airhorn:
& for next week’s show, January 18th 8-9pm, I’ll have Brian DeGraw from Gang Gang Dance on-air! We’ve successfully rescheduled and got him all the gear needed to do a DJ set live in-studio. Muddy gifts never stop.
The Embassy is the name of my weekly WFMU radio show. We broadcast at 91.1 FM in New York and 90.1 in the Hudson Valley, and of course we on the internets. You can stream last night’s show and check here for the playlist.
A trio of visionary DJ/producers from Chicago graced Mudd Up radio on WFMU last night: we had DJ Rashad, DJ Manny, and OG Traxman. They did back-to-back mixing, everyone playing unreleased original productions — a true glimpse of what’s to come!
Footwork spread in 2011, speeding up and weirding out dancefloors in NYC and beyond, so it was a real treat to have these guys come through to share the new.
Radio last night was lively, with large exclusives from Traxman and DJ Matabaya, upcoming soca power from Poirier, the overlooked Luciano remix of a Salif Keita & Cesaria Evora song, and an overall energized future lean like Jay Electronica’s crushingly expansive Eternal Sunshine (The Pledge). Lets’s get open! Here’s lookin’ at you, two thousand one two! Streaming:
WFMU is a wonderful institution. The longest running freeform, independent community radio station in the United States! I’m excited and very much looking forward to doing this once a week this winter! We’ll staying true to WFMU’s commitment to unstructured-format broadcasting, and we’re going everywhere all the time. Listen in.
The first show in Mudd Up Radio’s new Wednesday night time slot is now streaming! SOAP BLEACH SOFTENERS. Gentle beginnings. New music from Cauto, Vladislav Delay, Ghanain gospel, Erothug, and, yes, Lana del Rey:
WFMU’s Winter 2012 schedule shuffle means that, starting this week, Lamin Fofana will host a show right before me on Wednesdays! We’ll do our best to give you good apocalypse in 2012. Our ice cream comes in 5 flavors: regular black, mudd, noir noir, soft bop, and dust bowl.
December 7, 2011, Mudd Up! w/ DJ Rupture on WFMU – tracklist:
WFMU’s Winter 2012 schedule kicks into effect this week, so tune in tonight to catch my WFMU radio show, Mudd Up!, in its new Wednesday night timeslot. Same hour: 8pm.
The audio from Monday’s live broadcast @ Spectacle Theater was lost to a database glitch, so that show will live on in our hearts and minds — but not as digitized stream of endlessly repeatable sound.
And because the belly of the web is always hungry, here’s a 7-minute excerpt from my 2007 mix, Secret Google Cheat Codes (available on split CD with Filastine, “Shotgun Wedding Volume Six”). Drawing that line from Neko Case to Sister Nancy to Caroline Bergvall to Carolee Schneemann to a little bit of Kat from The Ex singing in Hungarian. Also Yung Joc.
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Whoeover wants to hear David Lynch singing through a vocoder for seven minutes, please raise you hand.
– and then complied with the raised hands I couldn’t see.
This happened after I had played many other songs, all of which you can stream:
Listen out for a debut of Venezuelan indie act Algodón Egipcio’s incredible remix of Cardencheros de Sapioriz / Cantos Cardenches, which I got to witness him create over the course of several amazing days in Monterrey, Mexico, with the Norte Sonoro project. When the Cardenches heard Algodón’s live version, they were visibly moved, saying “nuestra música va a vivir para siempre”! So great when “remixed” and “remixer” can listen together and rock the same stage.
[Brian Degraw, Untitled John Lee Malvo, 2005, pencil on paper, 36 x 28cm]
As part of our ongoing efforts to keep radio exciting…
Tune in to Mudd Up! on WFMU next Monday, November 14th, for a show with special guest Brian Degraw, visual artist and musician from Gang Gang Dance! It’s gonna be a good one.
And below you can stream this week’s show — a live FM broadcast (& YouTube/film screening) from Spectacle Theater. New formats to help us unfold.
Big thanks to the behind-the-scenes team who made the 100% Arabica night a success: Bill, Dave, Mike, and Liz from WFMU, Spectacle’s Akiva, Tony, and the theater volunteers whose names I didn’t catch. Generosity mob!
Once we were actually broadcasting live and direct, I got overexcited and bumped up the volume without bothering to check the meters — the the 2nd half of the show has a bit of (nice) distortion, and a few minutes of unintentional overlapping audio chaos. Fidelity realism! Can’t be beat.
Adding the element of visuals and a live audience to the usual radio experience was thrilling — so we’ll return to Spectacle at 7:30pm on Monday December 5th for another live Mudd Up! remote broadcast and film screening. Details soon!
Last night’s radio show is now streaming. You can listen to it on your computer or cellphone!
WFMU – independent, listener-supported, FM radio with incredible live internet streams and endless archives – is nearing the end of our first silent fundraiser. If you like Mudd Up! radio and feel like sharing the love, please consider a donation – all the on-air DJs volunteer their time (as do our amazing guests). All funds raised go to keeping WFMU afloat and free.
As always, you can subscribe to the Mudd Up! podcast for downloadable versions, issued about a week after FM broadcast: , Mudd Up!RSS. Also useful: WFMU’s free iPhone app. We also have a version for Android (search for “WFMU” in the marketplace).
This trill cannot be duplicated says Venus X — and Drake retweets! — but it can be streamed. Last Monday’s radio show with special guest Venus X had the future turned up real high, just the way we like it. She did two fantastic, imaginative, busy-on-the-decks sets that put y’all lazy/conservative/chase-the-genre-of-the-minute DJs to shame. During the interview section we learned all about the American Gothic, Venus’s DJ roots,and lots more.
Check it out:
WFMU — independent, listener-supported, FM radio with incredible live internet streams and endless archives — is in the middle of our first silent fundraiser. If you like Mudd Up! radio and feel like sharing the love, please consider a donation – all the on-air DJs volunteer their time (as do our amazing guests). All funds raised go to keeping WFMU afloat and free.
Mudd Up! 
