Catching The Waves

Time Off For Good Behaviour

Some CTW readers might have been frustrated recently by reading my reviews of the fabulous Professor Kliq here and here only to find that they can't listen to the praiseworthy music. To cut a long story short, Patrick Haour, the very nice if tremendously hirsute Head of Music at Jamendo, suggested to the Prof that it might be a good idea to withdraw his albums because they contained a few samples taken from commercial works and therefore contravened the original artists' copyright agreements. The Prof duly complied, and hence I had to leave notes on the relevant reviews apologising for the absence of top-notch funky, ambientish Big Beat.

However, the recidivist has returned and is ready to pay his debt to society. The Prof has reworked some of the tracks from his albums and compiled them into a completely fluffy, legal and non-litigious collection of tracks entitled Community Service 2005-2009. As a certain shame-faced muso admits at the end of Apt 808, the first track on the album: "I, er, got an email from Patrick and, er, [nervous chuckle] yeah, looks like we got some cleaning up to do." Cue the sound of a vacuum cleaner. Heh.

A minor quibble: the album's mastering level seems a little high compared with Le Kliq's previous records, and occasionally there is a preponderance of high frequencies that are a tad harsh on my battered ears. This might be a consequence of the tracks' remodelling or, more likely, my impending decrepitude but worry not; overall, they're still a pleasure for the eardrums.

Having spent no little time on reviewing his previous criminal records - look, there's no way I was going to resist that pun, so deal with it - I'm not going to bore you further with my opinion of the Prof's retooling of old works. All I will say, apart from the fact that Der Kliqster must be the love-child of James Brown and FatBoy Slim, is that you should kliq (Ach, CTW, you kill me viz dis ting you call “hughmer”) the list in the Jamendo player and play Bust This, Bust That and The Most Beautiful Day. (RSS subscribers, you'll just have to don rubber gloves and strip-search Catching The Waves if you want to hear the music.) After that, thank the heavens for the wonderful world of Creative Commons, download Community Service (2005-2009), and share it with your friends, families and parole officers. You might also consider leaving a small donation at Professor Kliq's Jamendo page to help him with his rehabilitation into society.

Remember, play these tracks first (click on the album's title and you'll get a pop-up list): Bust This, Bust That = big beat/electronica nirvana, and The Most Beautiful Day = big beat/superb downtempo funk/nutty voiceover. If you don't play them before the other tracks - well, I know a guy called Otis who's feeling a little lonely now the Prof is free to walk the streets.

Professor Kliq - Community Service 2005-2009

Professor Kliq website

Jamendo

Knit One, Pearl Two

So, being an internet hipster, you'll be wanting a bit of the ol' boom-bap. Rise from your slumbers and emit a half-baked "yay", for fLako (German beats via Berlin & London) and Noir (New Orleans rap) have combined to produce Pearls, a six-track EP released by the righteously funky Kwatro netlabel.

Disappointingly, only two one of the tracks are is available to hear outside of the zipped free full album. Kwatro are so hip it hurts, but it's awkward to get hold of their music. Pearls is available via a zShare account, which will strike fear into anyone not particularly au fait with the net - like my good self. It's ostensibly a matter of following the download instructions, but that's not the point. Netlabels, trust me on this: we surfers (ok, me) are mostly simpletons - if you want your releases to be heard, make it easy for visitors to download them. Netlabels with a one-click download system are the way to go, though I'd like to make it clear that I'm extremely grateful to all and sundry for the free music. End of moan. Are we still friends? Handshakes? Hugs? How about a quick -

*slap*

Sorry. I got carried away.

Back to the sounds: Milky Way is a low-key tale of crime and commerce backed by fLako's understated rhythm and smooth soul; Paparazzi sees a Hammond organ massage a dreamy background vocal and a gentle beat before Noir crashes in, as rappers do, with a snare drum and his opinion of fame and fortune. Edit: Paparazzi is now available only as part of the zipped album file. Don't hit me.

fLako x Noir - Milky Way by flako

While fair tracks, I would have chosen some of the other four on the EP to entice listeners, particularly Cosmic Theory and the head-nodding wOoop, the latter title doubling up for the sound you'll make when the beat drops. None of these outings are longer than three minutes so there's little chance of the beats outstaying their welcome.

Now, you might be one of the many who love hip-hop and find nothing more immediately satisfying than a dusty drum-beat that's tighter than my budget, but who ...hate rap. C'mon, own up. Noir makes a good job of spittin' (Yeah, kids. CTW is down with the, er, lingo) on Pearls, but, like it or not, some people want to get to the main course without interference from a maitre'd. What to do, what to do? I know, let's see if fLako can help to find us some beats that don't feature bad language and...

Sigh. Still, that's the only swearword on the whole fucking album, wherein you'll find twenty (Recession? What recession?) snippets of instrumental hip-hop goodness. Most of the twenty tracks on The First Space Shit On The Moon are less than two minutes long, yet they're not just extended loops; they're instrumental hip-hop miniatures that are wonderfully varied, from the rankin' Shake It Harder to the slinky Crying On The In. What vocals there are consist of the merest snippets that act as a musical counterpoint rather than the dominant theme. Whether you're a hip-hop listener or producer, there's a lot to enjoy and learn from. How much variety is there among this fistful of beats? Let a master wordsmith paraphrase for you:

All right, we got white boom-bap, black boom-bap, Spanish boom-bap, yellow boom-bap, we got hot boom-bap, cold boom-bap, we got wet boom-bap, we got [sniffs] smelly boom-bap, we got hairy boom-bap, bloody boom-bap, we got snappin' boom-bap, we got silk boom-bap, velvet boom-bap, Naugahyde boom-bap, we even got horse boom-bap, dog boom-bap, chicken boom-bap! Come on, you want boom-bap, come on in, boom-bap lovers! If we don't got it, you don't want it! Come on in, boom-bap lovers!

You can't beat Shakespeare.

But there's a small problem. You've guessed it - only two tracks to hear outside of the free zipped album. These are Sparkling Dust, a cheerful, dub-ish slice of boom-bap, and Desert Ride, a dusty beat with a hint of rock music - a track that'll hint at the variety to be found on The First, etc. Again, they're not the tracks I'd have chosen, but we all know that I am to discernment what ice-cream is to athleticism.

fLako Sparkling Dust by flako fLako Desert Ride by flako

The loose, almost sloshed, nature of some of the rhythms and synth sounds remind me of the previously reviewed Comfort Fit, whose new commercial release, Polyshufflez LP, is available from Tokyo Dawn Records. (Incidentally, TD's 24-carat back catalogue contains an almost unknown entity: free and genuinely good hip-hop. Run, Forrest, run.)

My thanks to the good volk at the always superb Phlow, where one of their many album discussion threads pointed me to fLako. So, if you don't mind braving the aforementioned pestilential download scheme, please scoop up these two lovely slices of beat-based distraction from real life.  Stick your chest out and have a go. After all, it's one small shit for man...

fLako x Noir - Pearls (scroll down the page, find the download link, go to zShare, press "download" and wait 50 seconds. Bleurgh.)

fLako – The First Space Shit On The Moon (straight to the zShare link)

fLako and Noir on MySpace.

Kwatro netlabel

Getting Down To A Fine Art

It seems that every other album I review has a pristine white background. But don't worry your pretty little head about it: instead, come home from work/college/the pub/prison, select Blue Swerver's The Art of Collapsing from your extensive collection of CTW recommendations, flop onto the sofa, sip something good (tea, beer, wine, life partner) and listen to smoky vocals drift over eleven electronic blues-jazz morsels. Yeah, baby. For those of you out there wondering how to blend jazz and the blues with electronica, look no further than the first track, the spookily good Untempo, which morphs from jazzy blues to downtempo IDM to electronica before culminating in a short slice of trip-hop and an ending that suits the final lyric perfectly. Less than four minutes long, its many changes in tempo and mood provide real value for money – if that's not a surreal thing to say about a free CC album. Don't blame me if you wake up tomorrow surrounded by empty wine bottles, a full ashtray and a trilby you've never seen before. As I said, it's the first track (apologies to feed readers - I'm waiting for Jamendo to do something about its invisible media player):

The Art of Collapsing is a disciplined album from Blue Swerver, a five-strong band from London. There's no egotistical jazz twiddling (which is something I love, when in the mood): all the musicians serve the song. Nick Street's electronic trickery and Robin Grey's (for it is he) bass provide a firm bedding for Adam Green's whispered/slurred vocals and Jules Fenton's judicious drumming. Ben Oliver is a dab hand at jazz-blues piano. According to them, the god Orpheus helps out on triangle. So they've got that going for them.

A true fact about track seven: Zinedine Zidane is not the name of a French footballing wizard but is actually a formula invented by Louis Armstrong in his bid to discover jazz's equivalent to the theory of relativity: Satchmo found that those five syllables, pronounced in that precise order, immediately increased a singer's hipness by a factor of cool. He died too soon to publicise his findings – so thank CTW for the research. Adam Green's vocals in the verses totter along the ragged edge between ultra-jazzy and off-key, but the chorus is the coolest, catchiest thing you'll hear all week. (Find Zinedine Zidane by clicking on a track name in the Jamendo player and choose from the pop-up playlist.) It ends with a marvellously pithy line: The rest of the week was much better/I finally had it out with my neighbour's dog/He's been pissin' on my roses/for way too long.

Speaking of which, what a pleasure it is to hear such distinctive lyrics. This from Job, where a jazz piano and light electronica help to tell the Biblical tale: They said, “Crazy, you're crazy still praying to Him.”/He said, “God is my shepherd even though he burns my skin.” Or there's this from At The Movies: Side by side at the movies/disappointing pizza and a slow walk home.

There are a couple of beauty spots in the album's otherwise flawless complexion: the vocals suffer from too much sibilance and my crappy sound system distorts the trumpet solo in Tasky, though the latter's verses of beat poetry come through very clearly, which, depending on your taste for wordplay, may or may not be a good thing.

Right, this review is getting longer than my alcohol-deprived tongue, so I shall leave you to discover the other tracks with the advice to stick the album on your "chilled Anjou/Muscadet/Gewürztraminer/Buckfast Cider" playlist, if you have one. Please think about making a donation to Blue Swerver to thank and encourage them - it's easy to do at Jamendo. I can't remember if I found The Art of Collapsing via the peerless Free Albums Galore, but that's not going to stop me from a drive-by plug. ;)

Blue Swerver - The Art of Collapsing on Jamendo & Modifythevan (zipped album & individual files)

Blue Swerver on MySpace

Modifythevan netlabel

Motor Skills

Professor Kliq - Trip Home from Harald Walker on Vimeo.

The video is closed because the Prof is sorting out some minor copyright problems. *wags finger* Naughty boy. Never fear, he's going to republish his music in the near future - and this time it'll be pure Kliq. I'll let him explain.

Harald Walker (of the very accomplished Sonic Walker, source of countless fine netlabel mixes and a much nicer blog than mine, damn him) has made an excellent video for Trip Home, Professor Kliq's ambient-ish triphop ode to the surreal experience of getting back to the family home/wigwam/igloo. There are lots of nice touches, such as the blurred scenery that accompanies the introduction of ice-cool flanging drums, which show that Harald really knows how to track the mood and tempo of a song. The flashes of humour, like the bicyclist riding while holding an umbrella (who does that?), and a couple's snatched kiss, balance the trippy effect that comes from a sideways look at life flashing by.

EDIT: The comedy cycling routine is apparently quite common in Holland. Spot the odd one out: Rembrandt, Cruyff, a tolerant society, great beer, a cricket team capable of beating England, unicycle with red nose and huge feet. You see now the error of your ways. Stop it and get wet like everyone else.

Trip Home is a track from Professor Kliq's most recent album, The Scientific Method, Volume II, (available from Rec72 netlabel & Jamendo) and displays his recent penchant for splicing ambient sounds amongst his rock-solid rhythms and melodic wanderings. CTW has already reviewed the Prof's wondrous penultimate platter, Guns Blazin' and once again recommends readers to give it and The Sci-Meth 2 disc a try. If you like Fatboy Slim, big beat, funk, and hip trip-hop, you really should investigate him and brighten your weekend.

The Prof is a little under the weather at the mo, so let's hope he enjoys this, the first video ever to grace the hallowed halls of CTW Towers. My sincere thanks to Harald for his exceptional patience in advising me how to use my motor skills and opposable thumbs. You could also brighten Harald's weekend by visiting his website to see how a real Creative Commons music blog should be done. Git. Nice work, H.

Professor Kliq (link to review of Guns Blazin' and other info re. the Prof)

Sonic Walker (as professional as CTW is amateurish - so it's very professional)

Undercover Brother

The heart of Sliptone's six-tracker lies firmly in that nebulous genre of music known as, er, “old school funky disco-ish latin/big beat sort of thingy – oh, go on, you'll like it”. My reasoning? Witness the wah-wah guitar chops, electric piano, clavinet riffs, slap bass and movie dialogue that are sprinkled liberally throughout Funkagent 1. If I may be so bold as to venture an opinion, the most successful track here is the opener, Birds and Bees, which immediately drops the hammer and begins a head-nodding enquiry into sex education from a time when men smoked pipes and women just smoked. The track is tight, contains vinyl crackles, a bluesy piano riff, a kick and snare that swing, and chopped vocals: just some of the many things that keep CTW happy. Guinness is another, if anyone's offering.

An electro bass at the start of Mrs Brown presages the odd scream from Mr Brown, the Godfather of Funk himself. It's joined by a slap bass; an unusual combination but one that works. A clavinet joins in the fun, and it quickly becomes impossible to say which musical decade has influenced Mrs Brown the most. Then a Hammond organ turns up and I decide to use the Grove Dictionary of Music to stop my kitchen table wobbling.

If Funkagent 1, the disco-ish title track, were to lose two minutes it would gain a lot; brevity is the soul of hip, as Shakey almost said. The samba piano of Melos Liberal brings Latino funk to the table, though Sliptone abandons it for a trip-hop interlude only to return with a lo-fi flanging effect that goes down as nicely as the previously mentioned pint of porter. A fun break-down section is marred slightly by a snare that is just too late to sit comfortably in the pocket.

Sugar throws trumpet, organ, funk guitar and breathy female vocals at a bass guitar and lets them fight it out. Strangely enough, it's the bass, normally rock-solid in these type of workouts, which to my ears sounds slightly ahead of the beat. But then, my rhythmic sense is as reliable as a politician's promise.

/bitterness towards lazy, corrupt governments and opposition

Don't Stop does what the rest of the album does: it settles into a rhythm and ...doesn't stop. (These tracks are less songs, more extended grooves in a laid-back funky Big Beat style.) Its rolling drums, echoing sax and 60s style vocals bring the EP to a satisfying conclusion. Yeah, baby.

Sliptone's philosophy is to keep things sounding natural; he'll tolerate the odd, er, slip if the performance feels alive. Consequently, Funkagent 1 is raw-boned in places; a couple of tracks need their screws tightened - but there's definitely enough of the good stuff to pass the time pleasantly/move your money-maker. Unfortunately, I can't show you what I mean because Budabeats, in their Hungarian wisdom, supply only a zipped file of the album. True, you can listen to the stream of this straight-outta-Carlisle EP at their website (please do) but it does make things difficult for hip and happenin' blogs who would otherwise be only too happy to spread the word. I'll try some Magyar:

*clears throat*

Kérjük, vessen mp3 link "Madarak és a Méhek" a honlapjára. Köszönöm.

I can tell you're impressed. ;) There's no tip box for the talented Sliptone or the tasty Budabeats so please consider sending an email thanking them for the free virtual platter of funky fun. It would brighten their day as much as Funkagent 1 did mine.

Sliptone – Funkagent 1 (link to zipped album only)

Sliptone's MySpace

Budabeats

Pretty Advanced

Few things get me off my sickbed quicker than the National Health Service prospect of a decent electronica album. Bitbasic, already the recipient of a CTW review (the lucky beggar!), has provided the medicine and called it, er, Leonard. He made it in a month as part of the RPM Challenge, netaudio's equivalent to National Novel Writing Month. Now, don't curl your lip. The Beatles' early albums and Mozart's last three symphonies all took less than a month to come to fruition. Leonard isn't quite in that class - but it's still a boatload of glitchy, grooving bliss.

My first (gasp! You mean there's more than one?) recommended track, Choice of Harp, ably demonstrates that sampling doesn't have to be all about chopping a choice hook or stuttering a vocal to within an inch of its life. It's one thing to slap a hip-hop beat over a sedate conversation about harps; it's another to add sub-bass and phasing synths and thus create electronica that conveys emotion.

Bitbasic - Choice of Harp

Wanton artiste that he is, Bitbasic has divided one of his songs into three parts and placed them at the start, middle and end of the album. Called Might...As Well...Not Bother, it will force those of you with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder to put them together on a playlist. It will also compel fans of Radiohead's Kid A era to send it to their nerdy perceptive friends.

*taps screen*

I said Radiohead. Wake up at the back there.

To save space, here's a summary of what else is here: Treeboy (jazz guitar & glitch); Skuppered (glitchy breakbeat with a lovely dash of chiptune); Mignon Forestry (crushed beats and soothing synths); Cdr882 (huge pads, a mid-section straight out of Pink Floyd and a headlong rush to sonic destruction); Six Junglists (breakbeat and suitably fast accompaniment); I Love Flin (chiptune, glitch, breakbeat and comedy carhorn) and Ode to Seed (ethnic percussion, reverberating sweeps, ring-modulated* percussion).

One of Bitbasic's most appealing characteristics is his gadfly nature; he can turn his hand to so many electronica genres that it's impossible to predict what's going to pop up on one of his tracks. For example, Plinks and Plonks for Stonks is a glitchy groover with acidic Daft Punk overtones and a ridiculously gorgeous sinewave-ish refrain. I can't resist giving it an outing.

Bitbasic - Plinks and Plonks for Stonks

Some of my trillions of readers flipped over Bitbasic's Grating Rainbows - they'll definitely want to meet Leonard. Although there's no tip jar or Paypal icon at Bitbasic's site, please think about sending him a "thank you/I want your babies" email.

Bitbasic - Leonard (link to individual mp3s & zipped album)

Bitbasic website

Bitbasic on MySpace

Rec72.net netlabel (German supplier of beats to the gentry)

*This is me attempting to sound knowledgeable and making a complete fool of myself.

I've been to a marvellous party

 

Still hibernating? Yes, me too. Now, I could be cruel and blast you out of your hammocks and have you on deck like the dishevelled bunch of ne'er-do-wells we both know you are, but I'm too cuddly for that. Instead, I shall grant you another forty winks courtesy of Mentz's Relocate, a little jewel of an EP that is smoother than a disgraced banker's defence lawyer.

Mentz, otherwise known as Stephan Raab, comes from The Hague and, unlike some residents of that fair city, is entirely innocent of crimes against humanity. However, he is guilty of producing some down-tempo jazz that is so laid back it's frequently roused from shop doorways in the early hours of the morning. You need proof? Your Honour, allow me to submit track no.2 from this absurdly soothing collection of four:

Mentz - Sleepy 

Yes, that was just one minute and thirty-nine seconds of coma-inducing jazzy bliss. Put it on a loop over the PA at the United Nations and the world will be a friendlier place.

For something a little livelier - only a little, mind - turn to Tumble, a smoky, brush-laden saunter through four minutes of music weighed down by little more than the odd piano chord, chimes, harp and some light percussion. It should come with its own table in a kasbah bar but instead you'll have to wait for next year's Apple conference and the unveiling of hard-light holographic drinking dens.

The final track, Shackles, drags the whole EP, tyres screaming, into life without parole for being a genocidal maniac second gear. There's a cinematic feel to it, thanks to the shimmering strings in the background and the reverberating hi-hat and cymbals. A trumpet wanders up and down a music scale looking for Harry Palmer circa 1965.

Finally, we come to Introduction, the first (heh) track, which lasts all of 34 seconds but still manages to hitch an extract from a strait-laced Xmas story to a smoke-wreathed jazz combo, thus making one cooler and the other holier. You can decide which is which.

Relocate was originally issued on the much-missed but soon-to-return Tokyo Dawn Records; Fant00m netlabel, in their wisdom, decided to reissue it (a rare thing in the netlabel world) and I'm jolly glad they did or I would have missed out on a sublime listening experience. It would be fun if they released more "lost" netlabel records of all genres, including opera. I hope so, 'cos then, if asked, they could say that they were Fant00m - of the opera.

*runs*

Mentz - Relocate EP (link to individual files and zipped album at archive.org)

Mentz on MySpace

Fant00m netlabel & Fant00m e-zine

Tokyo Dawn Records

Ears Burnin'

Frustratingly, Guns Blazin' is unavailable at the moment due to a slight copyright problem. *folds arms at the Prof* Naughty boy. But don't worry - he's cleaning things up and planning to release a squeaky-clean version, plus more besides.

Brace yourselves. I am now sitting stark naked at my laptop. My clothes, once Savile Row's finest, smoulder on the floor behind me, rent asunder by a force of nature. No, I haven't been at the chilli dip again. You see, I made the mistake of turning the volume up a smidgen when listening to today's recommendation. In Guns Blazin', Professor Kliq has produced an album capable of protecting the planet from rogue asteroids.

If you're a fan of big beat (hitherto believed extinct), hip-hop, trip-hop, electro and all-round catchy electronica, take my advice: this album will make your backbone slip. Professor Kliq is influenced by Bonobo, Coldcut, Amin Tobin, and loves jazz and hip-hop. He's also influenced by the 30 hours a week he works at a gas station and is understandably looking forward to studying Audio Production & Design at Columbia in Chicago. I think he can skip "Pounding Beats 101".

Guns Blazin' sounds rather like a scrumdown between the Chemical Brothers and Propellerheads. It's got beats that cascade over robust bass lines, extensively sampled greats like James Brown (and other people/bands who I won't mention) and spliced movie dialogue. It sounds like Fatboy Slim and Mylo's lovechild. It's loud, funky and fun. It sounds like a record made by an absurdly talented 21-year old bursting with energy. He says, "I'm just a kid in my bedroom."

The Prof understands when to leave a great beat alone, when to drop it, and when to drop it with a slab of stone-cold electro-hop. He also realises that there are few things better in music than adding to a rhythm until it reaches Ground Funk Zero, that place where the listener surrenders and waves his arms in the air like a happy orangutan.

Jamendo, which is otherwise near-perfect, doesn't supply individual mp3 links to wild-eyed loners like myself who want to use their own media player on the world's greatest free music blog that has a surfing catchphrase for a title. [EDIT: Incorrect. I'm an idiot. But now the player's in this post, it's staying.] Instead, I'll have to use Jamendo's rather pretty media player. Here goes nothing.

Good God, it worked. (Not in RSS feed readers, it didn't. *sigh* You'll have to visit CTW, my legion of fans.) To celebrate this small miracle, I'm going to recommend more than just my usual single track (on the understanding that they're all far north of rather good), so try these: Ode to Charles, in which Professor Kliq exploits Charles Manson's rantings and produces an atmospheric, guitar-drenched, thumping head-nodder; The Dirtiest - three and a half minutes of religion, energy, sex and drum breaks; Street Wisdom - a no-nonsense display of hip-hop wizardry with a chemical flavour, and the electro-tinged and rhythmically-adept big beat of Bust This Bust That.

The Prof's latest platter, The Scientific Method, Volume II, (now also available for free from Rec72 netlabel) ties in ambient noise and field recordings with the aforementioned innate funkiness. Its rhythms and mesmerising atmosphere made me drool like a hungry dog, but space prevents me from reviewing it. Maybe later. Anyway, it might be a redundant review; if you like Guns Blazin', you're going to scoop up everything this artist has done with a Kliq of your mouse. Ouch. Sorry.

To summarise: Guns Blazin' prised cash from my gnarled, clenched fingers. Now that, ladies and gentlemen, means it's good. If you feel the same, please think about leaving a suitable donation in Professor Kliq's charity box at Jamendo.

Now, you must excuse me. I've got a splinter.

Professor Kliq on Jamendo

Professor Kliq (homepage/blog)

Professor Kliq on MySpace

...the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.

    

Dimomib is a Greek producer of dubby, technoish, ambient-flavoured stuff that might sit well on your shiny new works-ok-but-has-a-crap-battery-life mp3 player. His 10-tracker, Lo-Fi, is a platter of calm grooves and deep reflection that will calm anyone who's just realised that there are less than seven shopping weeks until Consumerism Christmas Day. (The rest of the world can carry on regardless. As Dave Allen always said, may your god go with you.)

CTW can't showcase a track because the album, released on the otherwise entirely wonderful Dead-Channel, is zipped. When are netlabels going to understand that there are millions of people on the net who still use dial-up? Why exclude potential fans?

/grumble

EDIT: Dead-Channel has sprung Lazarus-like from the audio underworld and provided me with a clip from Clipping Digits, a track with a dusty vibe, a cavernous reverb and a kick that's a chest-thumper. If you like it, please have a listen to my recommended track, which is mentioned approximately five centimetres due south of this sentence. Thank you for listening, D-C.

D'you see the power of CTW, people? DO YOU SEE?!? I WILL CRUSH MY ENEMIES AND DRIVE THEM BEFORE ME AND HEAR THE LAMENTATION OF THEIR WOMEN!!!

*cough*

Sorry.

So, anyway, to discover for certain whether Lo-Fi is Hi-Def, please visit the album's release page on Dead-Channel netlabel and play Double Shuffle on their media player. You'll have to trust me on this one, folks. The first two minutes sound as though Dimomib is rummaging through his "spare samples" drawer; the middle two constitute some thoroughly decent dub; and the final two minutes unveil a wonderful reverse-sounding synth riff that, just like The Dude's carpet, really ties the room together, before ending in an uplifting chord sequence. I suspect it'll take about three plays for the track's excellence to sink in. It's one of my favourite internet finds.

Another one to try out is Testing Soundsystems, which, with its forceful, glitchy kicks and sub bass, will do exactly what it says on the tin.

Those three tracks should let you decide whether you want to download the entire album, which is a big decision if you don't have broadband. But I think Dimomib and Dead-Channel have combined to give us something that, despite the name, is most definitely high quality. Much obliged, gentlemen.

Lo-Fi is an example of hi-def, slow-burn, ambient-esque, dub-like trip-hop. Give it a whirl before I run out of hyphens.

Dimomib - Lo-Fi (link to zipped album, with apologies to dial-up users)

Dimomib

Dead-Channel - a netlabel from the north of England, but we won't hold that against them. ;-)

And finally, monsieur, a wafer-thin mint...

CTW interrupts its gentleman's-calling-card-on-a-silver-platter service to announce a credit crunch antidote for all you cheapskates peasants lovers of music who find themselves unable to fill the spare corners of your 1trnGB iPods due to the global economic downturn. Fret not - today, thanks to the hard-working people of netlabel land, CTW can recline with a cool drink and reap the benefits, as can you. It's a parasitical relationship, admittedly. Well, if bankers and bond traders can get away with it...anyway, here's a few morsels for you:

Ideology, fluffy German purveyor of hip/trip/dub-hop & dance, celebrates its 50th release with the unsnappily titled Re-iD.d 2, a remix compilation by the iD.EOLOGY Allstars. This slice of jazzy cinematic noir-hop should give you the idea: Zengineers - Un Taxi la Nuit (Dub One! la première fois). The office party must have been a good one, because Ideology has also released...

...the much more palatably titled Frühwerk, a compilation of tracks from the label's early years, when Ideology's artists were dipping their collective toes in the water.

Regular readers will already know of Phlow's Finest Hour compilations (Vols One, Two & Three):

   

...but might not know that fab Phlow has also given us Destination Cologne, a taste of the burgeoning Cologne (I nearly said Colonic) netlabel scene. Here's a track from it that's tighter than a cat's bottom: Phonout - Jutro. But Phlow haven't stopped there. Because they're rather good at what they do, and because they're evangelists for the netlabel cause, there's also...

 

...their latest compilation: Nivel del Mar - Sounds for Soulsurfers, a chill-out compilation that's well worth listening to, especially as it features some tracks from poor suckers who've already endured a CTW review. This one escaped a review thanks to my extreme laziness, the lucky blighter: Crookram - Hostile. Did Erik Satie know he could get his groove on? I like to think so.

 

Netlabelism, Belgian keeper of the Creative Commons flame, has unleashed the first in a new series of compilations based on genres. The new baby is called Netwaves Bytes: Electro 1 and concentrates on, er, electro. Try this and see if it's to your taste: Pero - El Ghost.

 

You could always join the never-ending story that is BlocSonic, who now offer 17 free compilation albums and will keep adding to this number until the internet explodes. No. 17 is entitled Refined Excursions For The Discriminating Listener.

 

 

If that isn't exciting enough for you, how about the very latest in netlabel chic, the hot-off-the-electronic-press Netaudio London 2008 Festival Compilation from the trendiest music event on the planet? (Apart from this blog, obviously.) Download the low-fi 128 Kbps mp3s from Last.fm and, if you find something you like, grab the high-quality FLAC files from archive.org.

I have yet more music for you, but I think this post has already veered dangerously close to "OMG, CTW is blowing my tiny little mind with the near-infinite possibilities of free netmusic and I shall have to propose marriage if this post goes on much longer" territory. Don't worry, my nubile slaves - CTW will let you recover for a while before providing another dose of netaudio lurve. In the meantime, to preserve the general public's morality...

*dons bow-tie and tuxedo, adopts BBC received pronunciation*

If you'd like to thank the netlabel community for the above offerings, please consider crossing their palms with silver - or copper, wheat, sugar or any other sellable commodity now that the world's financial system is kaput. Even a simple "thank you" goes a long way. Remember the unofficial motto of Creative Commons buskers:

"Netmusician - will work for praise, but money helps."

You're watching BBC 2. For our last programme of the evening, we invite you to sit back and enjoy a weighty philosophical dialogue that posits the significance of an innocent after-dinner mint. Goodnight.