So no "Back To Mine" this week as it's time once again for another dip into to the hirsute waters of "The Bearding Hour", my bimonthly hour long podcast of the folkier side of my record collection (and a great excuse to buy new bearded skin in Second Life). Annoyingly, Torq was playing up again and was stretching and warping the tracks, the worst effected was Bon Iver's "Re: Stacks" which I couldn't let lie, so I've reedited it Audacity to pluck the offending track out and replace it with a far cleaner version (yes I get that probably this only matters to me). Oh and the first one's for Bill, the last is for Bruno. Here's the...
Tracklisting
Hawkwind - Hurry on Sundown
Origamibiro - Bloodpulse of the Hungry Fingertip
Beak - Cup
James Yuill - You Always
Bibio - Great are the Piths
Peter Broderick - And It's Alright
Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova - Falling Slowly
City and Colour - Confessions
Snowblink - Human Nature
Bon Iver - Re: Stacks
Jason Steel - Baby Bay
Sam Amidon - Relief
Sarah Jaffe - Black Hoax Lie
Rachel Ries - You Only
Mountain Man - How'm I Doin
First Aid Kit - Ghost Town
Tunng - Code Breaker
This weeks podcast finds me much rejuvenated after a very relaxing weekend away in the French countryside in a delightful french farmhouse, alongside some excellent friends. What the doctor ordered; or, more accurately, what doctors should order for people to cure their ailments: "Take two days in the Normandy countryside. Take close friends, eat well, drink Beaujolais nouveau, sit by a fire and complete jigsaw puzzles. You'll be right as rain." It's set me right up for the forthcoming winter, I feel. Many thanks to Miko, Simon, Kirsty and Jane for their high levels of awesomeness and to Lady V who is just great. :) A special shout out to Lanne for making the recording of this weeks set so jam packed full of people, it's great to see Back to Mine packed to the rafters with an awesome audience. Here's this weeks
Tracklisting
Gold Panda - Snow and taxis (Glitterbug Pink Snow)
Lee Jones - It Is, Isn't it
Roland Appel - Cold Blooded
Four Tet - Love Cry (Joy Orbison remix)
Rocketnumbernine - Matthew & Toby
Mount Kimbie - Fifty Mile View
Glasser - T
Ultravox - Vienna
Nosaj Thing - Quest (low limit rmx)
Lorn - Grandfather
WTF & DEAD PREZ - It's Bigger than Hip Hop
Benga - Night
Joy Orbison - So Derobe
MJ Cole - Sincere (Nero rmx)
Nosaj Thing - US (Jon Hopkins Remix)
Gold Panda - India Today
Sorry for the lateness of the update - I've been very busy! Here's just one of the things I've been up to:
L'Autre Pied, Blandford Street, Marylebone, London.
Miko and I went off to L'Autre Pied for Lunch to celebrate her birthday and our 13th Wedding Anniversary.
We arrived at 1pm and after perusing the menu we plumped for the "tasting menu" which was a 7 course affair, at £55 per head. Miko asked for a vegetarian version.
After a delightfully light "amuse bouche", the first course arrived
Jerusalem Artichoke Velouté, Wild Mushrooms, Hazelnut Oil
What a way to start a meal! The jerusalem soup initially tasted far too salty but once we'd picked up the courage to dig deeper in to the plate, a fantastic layer of pasta and some beautiful beans (not too sure what type) underneath balanced the salty flavour and heaven was had in the mouth. A stunning and remarkable starter.
Second starter
Line Caught Cornish Mackerel, Organic Ginger Carrots, Shaved Fennel Salad, Coriander Cress
An awesome dish. Though I'm no fan of fennel, it perfectly complimented the mackerel and carrot.
Fish
Pan Fried Cod, Roscoff Onions, Ragout of Sweetcorn, Chanterelle Mushrooms, Lightly Smoked Sabayon
A beautifully cooked piece of cod which was supported and complimented with the corn and enriched with the very lightly smoked sabayon. noms.
Main
Roasted Breast of Gressingham Duck, Shallot Fondant, Fondant Potatoes, Roasted Fig, Pistachio Jus
This was a weird balance; my pallatte was confused by the duck, the fig and the pistaccio being on the same plate together. It wasn't bad, just confusing. My wife had a pumpkin taggiatelli that was outstanding. I note that on the menu now, the fig has gone and is replaced with a pear which might make all the difference.
Cheese course (unphotographed) we were presented with a selection of 6 or 7 cheeses including a goats cheese, some hard smooth english cheese, a stilton style and a couple of french camenbert style cheeses, we chose three of them but none really amazed us.
First Dessert
Vanilla Panacotta, Raspberry Purée and Pear
Ok. A slight mishap here as I'd finished the dessert before photographing it, but the photo does speak for itself. This was delicious. Smooth and slightly sweet with the sharpness of the raspberries cutting through the panacotta and then smoothed and sweetened by the pear. Absolute genius.
Second Dessert
Caramel Parfait, Chocolate Streusel, Black Treacle Ice Cream
This is the second and last desert. Though we both enjoyed it, my wife and I disagreed on this course - she found the parfait too cold and I didn't. We both loved the treacle ice cream, though. However, the panacotta was the star of the desserts.
Petit fours (not photographed) were freshly baked micro cookies served very warm on a warm slate. Utterly beautiful.
The whole meal took just under 3 hours to be served. The service was warming, welcoming, informed, funny, friendly and well timed. The total bill including a glass of wine, an apple juice spritzer and water for the two of us was just under £150 (service included) and was worth every penny.
Not much to say this week so we'll just jump right in to the
Tracklisting
Mount Kimbie - Tunnelvision
aKido - Carrousel
Tycho - From Home (Mux Mool Remix)
Bonobo - Distant Lands of the Heart
Yoshinori Sunahara - The Good Timing of The World Of Love Song
Yoshinori Sunahara - The First Step
Susumu Yokota - Saku
Pantha du Prince - Welt Am Draht
Proem - Blacker the Berry
Grasscut - The Door in the Wall (Bibio rmx)
The Beaufort Scale - Ray Tripper (Mixmaster Morris Hayama Edit)
Horizon Fire - Piney Hills Blaze
Memotone - Walking Flying
Squarepusher - Square Window
The Books - I am who I am
Jonsi - Animal Arithmatic
Dan Deacon - Of The Mountains
Wisp - On the Rails
aKido - In Needles
First off - my apologies to Joy Orbison and to Richard Snitch for the dreadful tempo slides during their tracks - amateur stuff and I should've been paying better attention. Trust me I'm chastising myself quite hard about this. Bad Toad.... baaaaad toad...
A quick plug for the awesome Ghostly International label who love you and show you their love by giving you free music. The Christopher Willis track comes on their "Ghostly Essential rarerities 2" LP which you can download from here for absolutely nothing. Ghostly have on their artist roster Lusine, Gold Panda, Tycho and School of Seven Bells all of which make regular appearances on these podcasts, so if you like Back To Mine, you like Ghostly. :) Also that Apparat track is also a freebie as part of the promotion for his DJ Kicks release on !K7 and you can get that from here. Now, lets tell you the whole
Tracklisting
Max Cooper - The End of Reason
Peter Broderick - Human Eyeballs on Toast
Christopher Willis - Orange Lit Spaces (electricwest Rmx)
Tycho - Sunrise Projector (Nautilus rmx)
Apparat - Sayulita
Lusine - The Stop
aKido - Epoch (Get High)
Pantha du Prince - Water Falls
Kraftwerk - Electro Kardiogramm
Simian Mobile Disco - It's the Beat (Luke Vibert remix)
Luke Vibert - Stern Facials
Vital Substance - Inside of Me
Joy Orbison - Hyph Mngo
Mount Kimbie - Carbonated
Posthuman - The Grey
aKido - Paper Chase
Snitch - This Condition
Zinc - Wile Out (DJ Marky remix)
A shorter set than normal this week due to some technical issues with Second Life, which also glady covered up the fact that though I was happily DJing for the first 10 minutes I wasn't actually broadcasting. (d'oh). Anyway... enough of my incompetance. :) This week it's mostly a Garage (Future/UK/Speed Garage/UK Funky/Bassline/Dubstep/2step/4x4... whatever! You can argue about specific genres amongst yourselves) selection, fuelled by a trip to Juno the day before and picking up a tasty selection of 135bpm dance music. I have to say the online shopping experience at Juno was really good: the ease of use of their player, their instant recommendations, the length and quality of the samples and the general site navigation was all very, very good indeed - the only thing that was a slightl let down was their download manager, which needed a prod and poke or two to actually download all of the tracks and it was a bit shonky while doing that, but apart from that it all worked well. To be fair to Juno, it's still a Beta product so I'm not that fussed by it. Here's the...
tracklisting
Fourtet - Love Cry (Joy Orbison rmx)
Joy Orbison - So Derobe
Lee Jones - Aria
501 - Bring the styles back
Kraymer - Brothers
Zinc - GTAC
Katy B - On a Mission
Dark Sky - Drowned City
Phaelex/Hxdb/Psychonaut - invisible Touch
Al Tourettes & Appleblim - Mr Swishy
Joy Orbison - Hyph Mngo
CRST - Dial the Operator
SCLIST - Cyanide
Zinc - 128 Trek
Lorn - Void i & ii
First off, sorry about the clipping on the first half an hour or so of the recording, it's not too bad, but it is annoying - I've tried to adjust the levels in audacity for you so it's a more even listening experience for your sensitive but highly tuned lug holes. There's not a lot of news from me, this week. I mention in the show that I'd add the Akido's Gamechanger LP link for the free download so here it is if you like physical media, the cd art work looks ace, too. The other freebie is the Secret Station Records Compilation "Broadcast 3" which you can get from here as well as many other great goodies, but don't be too greedy - remember to buy some stuff too. News of both freebies came to me via the excellent ASIP . Now, with no further ado, lets get on with the...
Tracklisting
Akido - Turnaround
Drexon Field - Rainbow Not So Bright
Lawrence - In Your Eyes
Mount Kimbie - mayor
Pantha du Prince - Sach mal Baum
Gold Panda - You (Minotaur Shock rmx)
Bonobo - Bossa Baja
Input Junkie - Seven Bells
Mount Kimbie - Carbonated
Proem - Splutterfly
Lorn - Glass & Silver
Yimino - Bintliptick
Akido - Radium Girls
Fink - Sort of Revolution
City and Colour - As Much As I Ever Could
Volcano Choir - Still
Specta Ciera - Sunflower Stuff
Tycho - Sunrise Projector
Here's the latest of the shows which, to my mind at least, definitely is beginning to sound autumnal in it's track selection. Here's a couple of very necessary plugs and links for you, too: Input Junkie's latest LP "Further Studies" is available from bandcamp. Dialog>'s remix of Gel Sol's "Cool Sweet Awesome Yay!" is available from hermetic as a part of a free download and that awesome "Dub be good to Me" (that I picked up from ASIP you can get for free on soundcloud . But before you digest all that ,here's the
Tracklisting
Input Junkie - Headwaltz
Yoshinori Sunahara - Life & Space
Gel Sol (dialog > rmx) - Cool Sweet Awesome Yay!
Beats International - Dub Be Good To Me (Syv2 Un1 rmx)
Gold Panda - Suppose I should say 'Thanks' or some shit
Wisp - Laff
King Midas Sound - Meltdown
Mount Kimbie - Field
The Field - A Paw in my face
Memotone - Come with me
The Books - The Story of Hip Hop
Danny Breaks - Another Dimension
Wagon Christ - Boney L
Prefuse 73 - I've said all I have to say about the intro
Vital Substance - Beyond Belief
Telefon Tel Aviv - What it was will never again
Susumu Yokota - King Butterfly
Yoshinori Sunahara - Subliminal
Dntel - Bluegrass (short)
School of Seven Bells - The Wait
The Village Orchestra - Many Rooms in my Fathers House
Ok last week I gave you two sets and this week you get three! That's about 4 and a half hours of mixes for you lovely, well dressed and sweet smelling people. Oh, let me state that this is not a trend. The curve will not continue with four sets next week. No. That will not happen. Just so we're clear on that... ;) OK, well let's take them in chronological order...
Back To Mine Late Night Session, 20100926
Last Saturday night I couldn't sleep so I logged on into Second Life looking for a party to hang out and and none really took my fancy so I decided to hold my own little soiree at Back To Mine and here's the (rather housey)...
Tracklisting
Alucidnation - Technically Warm
The Rhythm Slaves- The Light you Will see (Trentemøller's Dub mix)
Sasha - Park it in the shade (audion ain't got no friends mix)
Pantha de Prince - Bohemian Forest
Bonobo - We Could Forever
Caribou - Odessa
Wagon Christ - Chris Chana
Simian Mobile Disco - Hustler
Yimino - Q Bit
Gorillaz - Dare
LCD Soundsystem - Losing my edge
Subway - Xam
Black Meteoric Star - Death Tunnel
Kraftwerk - The Robots
Hell & Anthony Rother - Electronic Germany
Yoshinori Sunahara - Unconscious Fragment
Mariel Ito - Lone Romantic (3 Channels Rmx)
Dub Logic - Go Lib Club
This is (I hope) the first set in a series of folk/americana/acoustic/country/nufolk/folktronica/predominantly guitar based or (to simplify it) generally "Beardy" music sets that I'm going to play in Second Life at The Green Man, Westminster, Second Life, every couple of months. To seperate it from the Back to Mine weekly sets, this will being given the title of "The Bearding Hour".I'm really happy how this one turned out and I'm really looking forward to the next one. Keep strumming and plucking, people. :)
The Tracklisting
Skallander - Forgiven
Tunng - Woodcat
Sam Amidon - Red
Horse Feathers - A Burden
Bowerbirds - Oldest Memory
Megafaun - Kaufman's Ballard
Didier Soyuz - Joe 90's daydream acoustic version
Dan Arborise - Take Heart in Your Hope
Nick Drake - Things Behind The Sun
Gillian Welsh - I Dream A Highway
First Aid Kit - In The Morning
The Accidental - I Can Hear Your Voice In My Head
John Martyn - Over The Hill
Crosby, Stills and Nash - Helplessly Hoping
Fleet Foxes - Ragged Wood
Snowblink - Green to Gone
Last but by no means least, here's this weeks "proper" podcast of my musical meanderings through my record collection
Tracklisting
Sellotape Unicorn - Naono
Grey Scale - Fennesz
Mind Over Midi - Post Lunch Dip part 1
Yimino - Los Cauz
Mount Kimbie - Would Know
Beak - Sea Pen Meet Anglerfish
Vital Substance - Heart in Hand
Horizon Fire - Denver River Logging
Irresistible Force - Higher State of Mind
Tycho - Higher State of Mind (Hatchbacks Cosmic Caviar Dub)
School of Seven Bells - Babelonia
Broken Social Scene - Sentimental Xs
Fujiya and Miyagi - 16 Shades
Cocorosie - Sunshine
Mount Kimbie - Before I Move Off
Lorn - Cherry Moon
Dark Sky - Ghost Notes
Posthuman - Ottowa (echaskech rmx)
Isan - Channel 10
Yoshinori Sunahara - Infomation of TUA
BTM20100929 by machv
Two sets for you this week, the regular Wednesday music meanderings and a bonus 2 and a 1/2 hour techtronic mix that I played at Akira Seymore's Cafe Wabi Sabi, Tekken in Second Life on Sunday. Hope you like 'em. :)
Cafe Wabi Sabi 20100919
Tracklisting
The Village Orchestra - Lo Pencil (Village Orchestra remix)
Memotone - Like Today
Hot Chip - I Feel Better (Max Cooper remix)
Trentemøller - Chamelion
Datassette - Aviatrix
School of Seven Bells - Camarilla
Cornelius - Clash
Dntel - Acid Works for Me if it Works for You (Dr. Rek: Decapitated Evil King's Fort)
Luke Vibert - Breakbeat Metal Music
LCD Soundsystem - Get Innocuous
Dublogic - Two Sugers
Paul Keeley - I can't (stop)
The MFA - The difference is you (Superpitcher mix)
The Field - I have the moon, you have the internet
Datassette - Micro
Joy Orbison - The Shrew would have cushioned the blow
Dark Sky - Something to lose
Magnetic Man - I need air
Max Cooper - Chaotische Serie
Nathan Fake - Fentiger
Underworld - Juanita
Echaskech - The Calm
Echaskech - The Storm
Tycho - Coastal Break
Mach V @ Cafe Wabi Sabi 20100919 by machv
BTM20190922
Tracklisting
Keramick - Current Black
Origamibiro/The Birobox Workshops - Bloodpulse of the Hungry Fingertip/Quad Time
Beak - Cadrea444
Gold Panda - Before we talked
lum - Glow Fly
Vital Substance - A place in time
Horizon Fire - Glenfield
Sam Amidon - Relief
The Books - Cold Freezin' Night
Honey Weasel - ??
Planet Boelex - New Beginning
Quadron - Unpatience
Tycho - Coastal Break (Lusine Remix)
Yoshinori Sunahara - Subliminal
Rei Harakami - Glimglim
The Field - Everybody's got to learn sometime
Memotone - Another Field
magic number 3 remix - DF Tram
Danny Breaks - The Jellyfish/Junkie for Beats
I am robot and proud - Something to write home about
So, the voting has opened in the UK Festival Awards (run by Virtual Festivals) and we (at Echaskech HQ) are incredibly chuffed to see that our performance at Festinho (photo from miko coffey) has been nominated in the Virtual Festivals Critics' Choice Award which in their words "... is designed to celebrate those special acts who added something a little extra to their festival show. It could be comedy, nostalgia, crowd interaction or just that 'secret ingredient' - basically something that sets them apart from other performers as a real crowd pleaser." It has to be said that we're up against some stiff competition and I don't think we expect to win - the nomination is wonderful recognition enough of our efforts to make this particular performance special - but we do hope that you can find time to register and place a vote for us in this esteemed category. We'll buy you an ice cream if you do. :) Anyway back to this weeks musical melange and here's the...
Tracklisting
Gold Panda - You
Bonobo - Kiara + intro
Beak - amoral mayor earwig
Yoshinori Sunahara - Capacity
Vital Substance - Losing Faith
The Village Orchestra - Jacob/Bad Hand at Cards
Hot Chip - I feel better (Max Cooper rmx)
Max Cooper - Attention Defecit Order
Rei Harakami -300ml (Milk)
The Orb - Perpertual Dawn (Live '93 version)
Horizon Field - Passed Out in a datsun
School of Seven Bells - Crescent Gold
Tycho - Coastal Break
Booker Shade - No difference
Underworld - Scribble
Magnetic Man - I need Air (Digital Soundboy rmx)
Aphrodite vs High Contrast - Racing Spice (Mach V bootleg)
So it's been almost a month since you got a new show and it was really great to get behind the decks once again, fuelled with all the new music that I've picked up from the festivals. So what have I been up to? Well let's start where I left off...
Driving back from the Big Chill I noted that the van's brakes were beginning to grind so I got it booked into a ATS Euromaster to get them serviced - they ascertained that it was the callipers that had seized but despite having the van for a few days, they couldn't get the parts to repair it, so we decided to take it to Green Man and see if we could get it fixed between Green Man and Festinho. Most of the journey to Green Man is motorway so I doubted that it would be that problematic, though coming off the M4 towards Abergavenny/Y Fenni it became apparent that the brakes were getting worse and worse...
Still, we arrived on site at 9:30pm, which was a bit annoying as I was supposed to play records on the Radio at 9pm, but we set up in the pouring rain and bedded down for the start of Green Man.
Green Man is rapidly becoming the best source of new (albeit beardy) music for me. Twice I've looked at the line up and wrinkled my nose at it as nothing seems too familiar, but after some excellent dissection of the program (mostly by Miko, she's organised enough to read it) we came away with a plethora of many new artists - more than I've got from festivals before. On the Americana/folk tip I've learnt about Mountain Man, Mega Faun, The Tallest Man Alive and First Aid Kit, in the psyche rock genre I discovered The Besnard Lakes and on the electronic oeuvre I've picked up on Gold Panda and Bear in Heaven. I spent £80 in the Rough Trade pop up shop just getting cds of artists that I heard at the festival. :) I LOVE THIS! MORE NEW MUSIC PLZ!!! The weather was variable between pleasant British dappled sunshine to torrential down pours, but nothing stops this festival and it's punters enjoying the weekend and the artists. Saturday Night we were all thoroughly entertained by The Flaming Lips who's live show is so impressive (even more so in a field in Wales) - i wouldn't call myself a fan following it, but I would go and see them again, they really are a truly awesome live act. I did a bit of compering on Saturday afternoon on the Main Stage and I loved it. Again: MORE OF THIS, PLEASE!!
Monday rolled around and after an extended morning radio show on GM Radio (3 and a half hours, instead of 2) we packed up, arranged for the van to be seen a LDV specialist that afternoon in Frome (pronounced "Froom") which was sort of on the way between Wales and Weymouth, our destination. The journey was fraught. The brakes were getting worse and worse. We eventually got to the LDV depot and they immediately took the van on to the rack to check out the brakes. The news wasn't good. On both sides of the front axle the callipers were seized, the pads worn down to bare metal and the discs scorched and scratched like an old 78 (and probably just as fragile). The service manager ordered the parts, guaranteeing their delivery the next day at 9am and they rearranged their work schedule to fit us in as a priority job, to get us back on the road to enjoy the rest of our holiday.
In the meantime we needed to find somewhere else to stay - the LDV guys offered their car park, but I had spied a rather plush looking spa hotel between Bath and Frome on the drive down so I convinced Miko that this was the sensible option as the Travel Lodges and the like would be all booked up with company reps (and after ringing around, they were) and luckily for us the Spa Hotel had a room (£159 for two of us including breakfast and access to the spa) so we booked ourselves into the Homewood Park Hotel. We asked the LDV staff for a cab number, but they didn't seem to like that idea so one of their staff gave us a lift to the hotel instead. How nice is that?? :)
We weren't really packed for staying in such a posh palace, but after a bath and wrapping ourselves up in lush dressing gowns, swim suits and slippers we extensively hydrated ourselves in the jacuzzi (oh sorry "hydrotherapy pool") and in the heated swimming pool, and in the sauna, and in the steam room. All of these were included in the cost of the room. Awesome stuff. In the evening we decided to stay in and order room service however the quality of the food that was delivered to our very comfortable room was good good it surpassed what you'd expect from room service - placing most hotel restaurants to shame. One thing I did notice was that I still had the keys to the van, so I was all prepared to take a cab to take the keys back to the LDV place and sit in their rather sparse waiting room while they worked on the van.
In the morning, we rang the depot and told them about the keys, and they sent a parts van up to the hotel to pick them up, saving me another taxi journey. In the meantime we checked out and asked the reception to look after out luggage while we swanned about the very stately homely reception rooms waiting for the work to finish. At about midday we got a call with some bad news - one of the calliper bolts had seized and they would need to order another, but that meant we'd need to stay another night in the hotel. Oh Dear! What a calamity. :) So we booked ourselves back in to the luxury we were rapidly becoming accustomed to, this time booking ourselves into the restaurant for dinner.
Aaaanyway to cut a long story short (and yes I could go on and on about this, but I realise it's only Tuesday and we've still got two more festivals to cover!) we picked up the van on Wednesday morning, paid the bill (that was less than quoted) and set off on the road again. We'd cancelled the Weymouth Caravan park as one night wasn't really enough to justify the trip and booked ourselves in to a caravan park just outside of Woodstock in the lovely and familiar county of Oxfordshire.
We set up at Bladon Chains (pouring rain) and I set about grabbing my laptop so I could work on the video for the two Echaskech gigs at the weekend... only to find that I'd left the power supply at green man. I wasn't too happy. In fact I was in tears. The pressure of the van repair, the amount of money we'd just spent in two days (well over £1000 - the holiday was only supposed to cost us £60!) , the state of my very red bank balance were all weighing down on me, the dreadful weather and the cramped state of the van (i can't stand up in it - it's very frustrating) and to be let down by my own stupidity (even when I'd made a concerted effort to remember it, only not to) broke me and I wasn't a happy chappy. I wasn't in the best state.
Thursday was a new day with sunshine (mostly) so we packed up and drove to Milton Keynes to visit the Apple Store to pick up a new power supply (I'd tracked my old one down - it was experiencing a week in Edinburgh) and a new leisure battery from Halfords for the van as that had died on us, too. Then onto Festinho! I was already trying to ingratiate myself to somewhere (ANYWHERE!!) that could offer me a power socket so I could work on the set for Festinho but it wasn't going down to well - things were quite fraught with the production team - an appalling lack of volunteers and stewards had really piled on the pressure so the last thing they needed was little ol' me wanting to get in the way of it all. But with a huge amount of thanks to Simon, a corner of the desk was found on Friday afternoon and I set about preparing video for the evening's performance. Which went rather well. :)
Festinho is awesome - I could wax lyrical about how incredibly special, initimate, friendly, well organised, loving (and a million other superlatives) Festinho is, but seriously the only way is to experience it first hand. It's hard to find a more warm, smiling group of both punters and staff. Here's miko's photos of the weekend if you need some encouragement. :) I haven't felt this way about a festival experience since going to The Big Chill's Enchanted Garden Festivals. Yes, it's that magical. :)
Saturday afternoon I met up with Dom and Andy and we packed Dom's dad's car and drove to Silloth in Cumbria where Solfest was - we got there at about 8:30pm and bimbled about, catching a bit of The Wailers and Eat Static. I slept for about an hour and then we got about playing our set in the fantastic Dogs In Space tent, finishing at about 5am - Huge thanks to Michael Dog (yes, he of Planet Dog and MegaDog Fame) at which point we packed the car back up and drove immediately back to Festinho. We really didn't want to miss anymore of it, because Festinho was all full of friends and love and fun and good times and in agreeing to do this Solfest gig we were missing the best part of it - Saturday night! We got back at 10:30am, and I got into the swing of things and had a wonderful Sunday, managing to stay awake until the end of AGT Rave crew awesome set and then slept for 11hours. :) Home on Monday, back at work on Wednesday.
there.
that's about it - (amazingly) there's quite a lot of detail I've left out, but you'd never know. ;)
Anyway I hope you like this weeks offering, here's the
Tracklisting
Verulf - United in Two Variations
Origamibiro - Quad Time/Bloodpulse of the Hungry Fingertip
Beak - He Descended into his Memory
First Aid Kit - Ghost Town
Sam Amidon - Way Go Lilly
Moon in the Gutter - Jack Rose
Gillian Welch - Everything is Free
Sarah Jaffe - Even Born Again
Quadron - Far Cry
Bonobo (ft Andreya Triana) - Eyes Down
The XX - Night Time
The Arcade Fire - Modern Man
The Besnard Lakes - Chicago Train
Lost Idol - Wish I was there
School of Seven Bells - Dust Devil
Yoshinori Sunahara - The First Step
Lusine - Auto Pilot
Echaskech - Shatterproof
Portishead - Roads (Max Cooper rmx)
Future Sound of London - Max
We've just got back from a week of festivals (more on that later) only to find that the lovely ali jamieson has encoded an old ambient drum and bass mix I did about 10 years ago (maybe more) from it's original cassette format into mp3s (in two parts, so you can enjoy that "turn over the tape" moment again) for you to stream, download and listen to. Hope you appreciate it in all it's glorious mid rich TDK AD90 Dolby quality. :)
Music for sleeping Robots by @alijamieson
In other news, after a small prod from the lovely Penny Jones I've just uploaded an old bootleg of mine on to soundcloud - The remarkably silly "Bring the Schnauss" is now available free of charge to you, dear reader.
Ok, so festival No.3 - Big Chill Festival at Eastnor Castle - is now out of the way, and I'm half way through the festival line up for the year. Playing at the Big Chill has always been a highlight and without their support I doubt I would've continued DJing for so long, or had the career that I've had. The majority of my friends have all come about because of The Big Chill, so the emotional ties are stronger with The Big Chill than any other organisation. No other organisation has had such a profound effect on me, and that effect will last for many years to come.
Earlier this year Chillfest, the company behind The Big Chill, went into liquidation and it was looking decidedly dodgy for their future. In stepped Festival Republic (the organisation behind, Leeds, V, Reading, Latitude, The Electric Picnic and Glastonbury to name but a few) and they bought the brand, keeping on creative director Katrina Larkin. With such a corporate company stepping in to save it from dying two things were obvious:
1) The Big Chill wouldn't die, it would be around for a long while yet
2) It would be radically different from previous incarnations.
So it was with a curious and skeptical eye and ear that I attended this year. Sadly, my role as a Compere had vanished so I'd ingratiated myself into the Big Chill Radio crew, but I was also booked as a DJ in one of the cocktail bars - The Monkey Shoulder Treehouse (see pic. thanks to Debbie Keen). The following text is what I posted on the Big Chill Forum as part of the feedback about peoples experiences ( http://forum.bigchill.net/index.php?/topic/698769-big-chill-2010/page__view__findpost__p__2290334 ) :
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On the whole: Not bad. I had a good time.
It's certainly gone through a radical transformation in both the front and back stage areas and often it felt that some one had pretended to put on a big chill, building the site up from photographs from previous years.
Goodings
The site seemed to work quite well, in moving people about from one end to the other and it looked lovely, with many little touches like the ziggurat and the globe lights. The Enchanted Garden certainly had a lovely vibe about it and I'd wished I had more time and energy to explore it in greater detail than I did. I loved the lampshades on the festoon lighting
The loos (and this only applies to in arena public ones) were on the whole, fine. Mostly well stocked, and with wash basins out side and lots of that instant handwash. They were well lit and I rarely had to queue.
The Bars seemed busy but service was quick and the staff seemed happier too.
Crumpets. NOM!
Explosions in the sky, Thom Yorke, Massive Attack on Friday was just fantastic line up. I was so happy.
Toddler T at the Starburst stage. AWE + SOME.
Tracklisting TSO's ambient set. Double Plus Great.
I had one of the best DJ experiences in my life up at the Monkey Shoulder Bar on Saturday night. It was the first time playing out with Torq and it went really well (in so much there were a couple of technical issues, but I fixed them and it worked fine from there on in). The view from the bar was beautiful, overlooking the whole site and there were plenty of smiling, gurning, gyrating punters at the bar, dancing in the sunset and occasional showers. Nice drinks too.
Camping in Production was such a great escape from the festival and it meant I could get decent spates of sleep as and when required between my radio shifts.
Working on the Radio was awesome. Made new friends, worked hard, listened to awesome music and have a million and one stories to tell. For instance, I tracklisted Sir Norm's set on Sunday so managed to watch him in action, move from a quietly unhappy and hurt man, to a smiling, ebullient and chilled musical genius. A genuine rare and unique opportunity and I was proud to be part of the crew that turned his experience of the weekend around. And it was a top set too.
A lack of gas & balloons.
It was great to catch up with so many good friends, many of them I only get to see in a field these days.
Lots of very nice people saying how much they missed me talking between acts on the main stage (you made me cry)
It was great to see so many young people on site. You're the future of festivals and it's great to see you coming along.
Disco Shed - one big throbbing love for you guys.
Katrina resplendent in Blue (clothed).
My van.
Baddings
It seemed that the programming was done by people with no idea of who the actual artists where are where they would work best, and more about how much each artist had been paid.
There seemed to be an incredible lack of respect for artists - Norman Jay being soundchecked over, the late night DJs on the main stage playing a half an hour after the last live band, and then the stage crews working with work lights striking the stage down for the night while they played - Joe Goddard played to an empty, rubbish filled field; Bonobo (a 12 piece band) playing on the smallest stage you have ever seen. Chillfest always made you feel special and welcome at any of their events, it appears that Festival Republic couldn't give a sh1t about them.
The Clash Stage was so small it was beyond a joke. It looked like some teen with a rich daddy and no class had knocked it up. Burn it. Seriously.
A lack of love/joy/care from the top of the chain that just filtered down to all the staff. I didn't meet many working people (both paid and voluntary) would wanted to be there, nor who felt that they were wanted.
No flexibility from event staff.
Being forced into buying a live in vehicle ticket that I didn't actually need. :/
'There is no "Last Year"'.
Watching a head honcho ball out menial staff in full view of everyone over trivial, minor matters. Get a grip.
"Alan" but yea, ok I was young once too and damn I was a precocious brat at that age.
My showing of First Light (360 degree edit) was (on a personal level) incredibly disappointing.
Sailor Jerry's "brand new" shanty town bar, with security. This was the new Rizla stage and I didn't want to be part of it.
Sky TV adverts.
No screens or cameras on the main stage. The sound system on that stage had been ramped up too, and I have no idea why.
A distinct lack of visuals.
But on the whole I did have a good time at the Festival, I just didn't really think it was a "Big Chill" festival. Faux Chill, more like.
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Anyway, that's enough Big Chill navel gazing. Next week is Green Man and then the weekend after that is Festinho and Solfest, so expect a little radio silence until September. Until then, here's this weeks
Tracklisting:
The Orb - Live '93 - A Huge Ever Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules From The Centre Of The Ultraworld (Loving U)
Echaskech - The Calm
Wagon Christ - Receiver
Magnetic Man - I Need Air
Dark Sky - Something to Lose
MJ Cole - Sincere (Nero remix)
Joy Orbison - The Shrew that could've cushioned the blow
Todd Edwards - I might be (MJ Cole remix)
The Books - Chain of Missing Links
School of Seven Bells - I L U
Vital Substance - Roswell
Lusine - Everything under the Sun
Zero 7 - Sleepr
The Books - A Wonderful phrase by Gandhi
BTM20100812 by machv
So Festival number 2 is now done (in a series of 6) and what a weekend it was! This one was The Secret Garden Party in Cambridgeshire and I could not believe the transformation. I last went to SGP about 6 years ago when it was a rather rough, simple affair with 3 entertainment areas, about (rather posh) 1200 punters and an awful lot of rubbish - not my ideal weekend, it had to be said. Over the last few years friends have been increasingly speaking highly of the event, much to my skepticism so, riding on the coat tails of Echaskech (another day time gig so I happily took the role of roadie for the weekend again) I went with low expectations. At least this way, I figured I wouldn't be disappointed. Though to be honest, I would have had some pretty princessy expectations to come away from this feeling let down. The site has expanded to accomodate at least ten times the audience I'd seen previously, and comfortably at that, The weather turned out in spectacular fashion, as did the beautiful festival people who attended the weekend. The site crams in so much entertainment, blending stalls and stages next to each other interwoven with many pieces of site specific art. It's so difficult to describe the vibe of the place, but if you took Bestival and dragged it through the Green fields of Glastonbury you'd get close to what it's like there. A lot of organically grown fun. The musical line up might not jump off the page on first glance, but with so much going on round the site at any one time, it was pretty easy to find something of interest. Anyway, it comes highly recommended. Big thanks to CJ, Toby, Dave and Dave, Erin, Penny, Chris, Chris, Ginny, Sarah, Vera, Saul, Alex, Liz, Chloe, Jools, Roger, Rupert, Nick, Hugo (hope I got everyone) for helping make the weekend very special and special thanks to Dom and Andy for being the best techtronica band on the planet and playing an absolute blinder on Sunday. :) Anyway - as mentioned on the show below - it's Big Chill next weekend so, no show next week, but in the meantime here's this week's...
Tracklisting
Stornoway - Watching Birds
Radiohead - 15 Step
Animal Collective - No More Running
Underdog (save me) - Turin Brakes
Beak - How a Hot Air Ballon Works
Tunng - it's because... we've got hair
The Long Lost - Amiss (Tunng rmx)
Shugo Tokumaru - Mushina
Cornelius - Watadori
The XX - Islands
LCD Soundsystem - One Touch
Hot Chip - Hand Me Down Your Love
Datassette - Humans
Jonsi - Animal Arithmatic
Dntel - In which our hero is decapitated by the evil king
Datassette - The Aviatrix
Sarah Jaffe - Under
The Village Orchestra - Love Theme from "Two Man Rumble"
Freescha - The Sun Is Still... Still
The Field - I have the moon... you have the internet
No time to chat, just enough time to tell you the..
Tracklisting
Fennesz - Black Sea
Dntel - In which our hero begins his long and ardous quest
The Village Orchestra - Jacob/Bad Hand at Cards
Datassette - The Aviatrix
LCD Soundsystem - You wanted a hit
Booka Shade - Teenage Spaceman
Posthuman - Ottowa (echaskech remix)
Datassette - Micro
MJ Cole (Nero remix) - Sincere
Dntel (Thaddeus Valk rmx) - Casuals
Aphex Twin - Delphium
School of Seven Bells - Half Asleep (Lusine remix)
The Field - Yesterday and Today
Unai - Oh You and I (trentemoeller rmix)
School of Seven Bells - Babelonia
Stornoway - I saw you blink
Festival Season kicked off last weekend with a journey into the country to visit Blissfields, who were celebrating their 10th year of festivalling - a worthy birthday to celebrate, especially in this "current climate" which has seen so many well loved festivals die a horrible death. Blissfields have kept going by staying small and true to it's roots and more power to it. Sadly Echaskech were booked to play during the daylight hours so not much for me to do this time, but I did make up for it by djing on The Bubblebus again, which was a lot of huge fun - thanks to Caro, Jasper and Tom for their hospitality and generosity. :) Anyway... Here's this weeks
Tracklisting
Lusine - Ask You
LCD Soundsystem - Dance yourself clean
Gorillaz - Empire Ants
Little Dragon - Never Never
Murcof - Memoria
Bonobo - Eyes Down
Pantha du Prince - Lay in a shimmer
The Village Orchestra - Lo Pencil
Beaufort Scale - Dreaming in Perivale (echaskech remix)
School of Seven Bells - Windstorm
Beak - Limozeen
Drexon Field - Limoncello Liquor is wonderful
Stornoway - The End of the Movie
Apparat - Over and Over
Echaskech - Every Touch
Digitonal - Emberkreiss
The Orb - Star 6 & 7 8 9
Sorry for the lack of update and podcasts lately, life's been super hectic and with the festival season about to kick off I will admit that these shows might become a little irratic (tell us something we don't know!) over the next few months and for that I appologise. Let's hope I can make some amends to you with the
Tracklisting:
Eluvium - Amreik
Daisy - Erin Lange
The XX - VCR
Fever Ray - Coconut
Transient - forest zone
Bonobo - Prelude & Kiara
Computer Saw - Elektrocentric
Jonsi - Lilikoi Boy
Dan Deacon - Surprise Stefani
FUR - Friends (Drexon Field rmx)
Caribou - Odessa
Panthu du Prince - Bohemian Forest
Bonobo - 1009
Underworld - Luetin
Ace of Clubs - Classid 1
LCD Soundsystem - Dance yourself clean
Kelpe - Eye Candy Bath
There's definitely something up with my track recording set up - at present I manually update the track titles in Nicecast and that gets picked up by a console log file but it's not picking up each one and it seems to be getting worse... hmm. something more to sort out... anyway lucky for you, dear podcast listener that you get the full and proper (but probably misspellled)...
Tracklisting
Snowblink: Don't stop till you get enough
Massive Attack: Psyche
Lost Idol: Lightwerk
Alucidnation: Technically Warm
Helios: Halving the Compass
Lusine: The Thick of It
Prince: 17 Days (Professor LaCrois remix)
Justice: New Jack
Prodigy: Wake Up Call (ft Kool Keith)
The Gossip: Spare me from the Mould
Yacht: We have everything we wanted
School of Seven Bells: White Elephant Coat
Red Snapper: Lagos Creepers
LCD Soundsystem: 45:33 (Prins Thomas diskomix)
Kraftwerk: Music Non Stop (LIve version)
Flight of the Conchords: Inner City Pressure
Telefon Tel Aviv: Introductory Nomenclature
Booka Shade: Havana Sex Dwarf
Not much to say today as I'm horrendously hung over, so here's the
Tracklisting
Jonsi - Tornado
Dead Can Dance - The Host of Sepharim
Snowblink - PYT
Goldfrapp - Voicething
Cocteau Twins - Bluebeard
Ochre - Raido
Bonobo - Eyes Down
Burial - Distant Lights
Mint - System Cost (Echaskech Remix)
Working for a Nuclear Free City - Innocence
Q-Tip - We Fight/The Love
The Durutti Column - Brother
The Lost Idol - We can find love
Drexon Field - My Little Snowflake - Dandelion Councils God Made The Wind and The Snow Mix
Verülf - Nocturn in Noise
School of Seven Bells - Half Asleep (Alternate Version)
So no "Back To Mine" this week as it's time once again for another dip into to the hirsute waters of "The Bearding Hour", my bimonthly hour long podcast of the folkier side of my record collection (and a great excuse to buy new bearded skin in Second Life). Annoyingly, Torq was playing up again and was stretching and warping the tracks, the worst effected was Bon Iver's "Re: Stacks" which I couldn't let lie, so I've reedited it Audacity to pluck the offending track out and replace it with a far cleaner version (yes I get that probably this only matters to me). Oh and the first one's for Bill, the last is for Bruno. Here's the...
This weeks podcast finds me much rejuvenated after a very relaxing weekend away in the French countryside in a 
Not much to say this week so we'll just jump right in to the
First off - my apologies to Joy Orbison and to Richard Snitch for the dreadful tempo slides during their tracks - amateur stuff and I should've been paying better attention. Trust me I'm chastising myself quite hard about this. Bad Toad.... baaaaad toad...
A quick plug for the awesome Ghostly International label who love you and show you their love by giving you free music. The Christopher Willis track comes on their "Ghostly Essential rarerities 2" LP which you can 
A shorter set than normal this week due to some technical issues with Second Life, which also glady covered up the fact that though I was happily DJing for the first 10 minutes I wasn't actually broadcasting. (d'oh). Anyway... enough of my incompetance. :) This week it's mostly a Garage (Future/UK/Speed Garage/UK Funky/Bassline/Dubstep/2step/4x4... whatever! You can argue about specific genres amongst yourselves) selection, fuelled by a trip to 
South Circular from 2001
Ok last week I gave you two sets and this week you get three! That's about 4 and a half hours of mixes for you lovely, well dressed and sweet smelling people. Oh, let me state that this is not a trend. The curve will not continue with four sets next week. No. That will not happen. Just so we're clear on that... ;) OK, well let's take them in chronological order...
No time to chat, just enough time to tell you the..