Like my boy L.L. said: “Don’t call it a comeback, I been here for years!”
For my first podcast of 2012 (!) I wanted feature a bunch of tracks that are really speaking to me these days. The sounds looks forward, the samples back, and the result is healthy blend genres, new and old, the likes of which didn’t really exist before 2011. Its like we just threw some Hip Hop, soul, R&B, classical, electro house, alternative rock, dub-step, moombahton and breaks all together into a 110 BPM sonic smoothy. Yuuuuuuuuuuuum
Enjoy, and don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast! We’ve got a bunch of new stuff we’ll be rolling out over the summer v(^-^)v
I came back last week from a month long trip in Korea & Japan to the nicest San Francisco Bay Area weather you could possibly imagine. It was so beautiful even oblivious, indifferent and inscrutable God passing through would be moved to shed a tear of joy. We couldn’t possible ask for better weather to star off the summer season.
And on that note, here are a few tracks that bottle up this fabulous summer vibe, to be enjoyed over the long hot days and warm nights to come.
Speaking of mashups, I’ve gotta include this Fugees/Kool & The Gang jam by DJ Twister. I’ve been playing this almost every week since last year but haven’t shared it yet with you Beatery Faithful yet!
I don’t know much about “HÔHME” except that he’s from New York, lots of people comment on his tracks on soundcloud, and he blew my mind with this electro-progressive mashup: “Eagle Eyes”.
I don’t think it’s gonna make quiiiite as much money as The Avengers, but there’s another movie out that throws together established superheros into some kind of ad-hoc collaboration, hoping that the sum of their parts will turn into something transcendent, something greater than any of them could have achieved on their own. In “Re:Generation”, a documentary brought to us by The Grammys and directed by Amir Bar-Lev*, our five superheros are Skrillix, DJ Premier, Pretty Lights, Mark Ronson, and The Crystal Method and their mission is to reinterpret five traditional genres of music with their on unique style and flair.
* I had no idea “The Grammys” presented anything besides The Grammys. And Bar-Lev also directed “My Kid Could Pint That” & “The Tillman Story”
As a big fan of genre bending in general I was all in when I heard about the project, and with one exception* all the tracks turned out great. As for the movie itself, it ranges from “well worth watching” to a “must see!”, depending on how much you follow these modern day musical superheros. As a super fan of all these guys it was thrilling watching them so far out of their element and really having their sound pushed to the limit.
*Crystal Method, I’m looking at you.
I appreciated all these tracks more after I watched the whole movie so really I hope you’ll make the time to do that, but let’s just take ‘em for a quick spin:
Skrillex vs. Rock (and featuring the living members of the Doors*) - “Breakn’ A Sweat”
Mark Ronson vs Jazz (featuring Erykah Badu, Trombone Shorty, Mos Def, Zigaboo Modeliste, and Members of The Dap Kings) - “A La Modeliste”
DJ Premier vs Classical (Nas and The Berklee Symphony Orchestra) - “Regeneration”
Pretty Light vs Country (featuring LeAnn Rimes and Dr. Ralph Stanley) - “Wayfaring Stranger”
To watch the movie and get all these tracks check the official website:
“50 told me: go ‘head, switch the style up and if they hate then let ‘em hate and watch the money pile up” - Kanye West
With Kanye West and 50 Cent proudly looking on, it gives me great pleasure to officially “switch my style up”. I’m breaking my DJ/production personality in two: Austin Gregory plays progressive house and trance. Period. Check him out, he’s awesome. Hella Beats, though, is not restrained by genre labels.
Under my new DJ persona I am freed to play whatever new hotness catches my ear: uptempo or mid; broken beats or fixed; grimy or pristine; house, breaks, funk, wobble, Hip Hop, dubstep (yeah, I said it) or moombahton; it’s all on the table. Which brings us to this set right here.
The new sounds catching my ear of late are: nu-funk, mid-tempo wobble, Ghetto Breaks and moombahton. Don’t even trip if you haven’t heard of these, we’re talking micro EDM sub genres here. What’s important is that they all go about 100-110 BPM and get heads bobbing, booties shaking and bodies grinding.
I am totally drinking this mid-tempo Kool Aid and I invite you to try a glass. It’s refreshing, cool, and ohh so funky in the best of ways! Drink up!
Over the past few months, I’ve noticed the same ridiculous name popping up time and time again on my mid-tempo funky breaks shopping list, which means it’s probably time that one Funk Ferret get his due propers here on the Beatery. This dude is the shit. Not much more to say than point out the fact that he has a knack for taking classic old school rhymes and throwing them over thick funky basslines. In fact, the thick funky baseline in the first track below comes from one of my favorite movie soundtracks. I’ve got a free prize for the first person to name it.*
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