Me and John doing a 74 minute special for OUR FINAL EVER BLOGARIDDIMS. THERE WILL BE NO MORE FROM US! Unless someone drops out and droid needs someone to fill in rapidly. But yeah. Blogariddims is coming to an end and after a fair few bashes at the rss feeder, this is our last one.
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John has already posted a magnificent overview of this so I shan’t try and cover the temporal reality of the mix too much. So lets talk method first of all. John kicked it off with a rough live mix of everything he wanted in there. We cogitated on that, reflecting on what selections to make, and threw it away. He then did another recording session where he captured most of the tunes from the first mix, many of them in an unmixed fashion but with a load of mixing as well. I sifted through these CDs and stacked up the material in an iTunes playlist, made copious notes on what I wanted to do with them and what order to do them in, added a load more stuff to fit with what he’d done, and made a new final playlist. this left out a help of good stuff. I then dumped everything into Live, deleted most of his mixing (the mixes that made the grade were excellent though) and started looking at blends. That was when the magic started to happen – seeing how the material would form itself into something fresh. This was a pretty fast mix to do; I think I finished it in a month, even though there were some new techniques this time, like proper dj-style crossfder abuse within Live, as well as live sirens and FX. There’s a lot more performance in this one, which is a good thing, even though there’s a few sends that should’ve been edited out.
00:00 Introduction
00:26 Neckle Camp feat. Jammer, Rinse FM
01:02 Turbulence acapella
02:06 Turbulence – Notorious (THC Muzik 7”) 2005
02:40 Trim & Radioclit – Turbulence remix (from Soulfood vol 1) 2007
I love this whole intro section and though I say so myself, I’m delighted with how the Jammer loop combined with the Turbulence acapella. Having the Jammer radio excerpts really lifted the mix and I’m grateful to John for providing them. There’s a definite tip of the hat to Prancehall here too!
06:45 Richie Spice – Marijuana (from Spice In Your Life 2004)
08:25 Jammer – Burning (from Are You Dumb vol 2) 2007
A heavily edited Richie Spice leads into Jammer riding Coki’s riddim – the only reference to dubstep on the whole mix, and of course it’s pretty grimey dubstep. A bit of a step back in energy from the loud arrivial, too.
10:45 Bob Marley and the Wailers – So Much Trouble in the World (from Survival, 1979)
14:05 Mercston – Trouble (from Da End of Da Beginning) 2006
16:31 Skepta – Blood, Sweat and Tears (from Greatest Hits) 2007
Magnificent! Too many trendy white boys slag off Marley. Whatever the critique of Marley in JA as dancehall took over the lawns, it was a generally a critique founded in love for the man and his music, rather than a wish to appear more trendy than thou. This is of course a fantastic tune and I had to be physically restrained from including the live version from Babylon By Bus as well. I love the extra fx on this too. It merges perfectly into Mercston, whose version is appealingly pitched down. Nice flow into Skepta’s fine conscious grime tune.
19:32 All In One – Flows (from Bless Beats – A Hard Days Graft) 2008
21:14 Frisco – Skeng Man Mode (from Peng Food) 2008
23:24 Slix – Maniac (from Down vol 1) 2006
Into a couple of tunes that really powerfully express the “grime as 21st century dancehall” thesis, a gloriously transcendent riddim that draws out all manner of lyrical invention. And then Maniac’s fantastic skanking riddim, exploited to the full by Slix. Marvellous
26:12 Neckle Camp feat Jammer, Rinse FM
Jammer on his own, ancient take on foundational digi riddims – tempting to add more Sleng Teng from both dubstep and 80s Fast Chat, but John hates the Cotti version and we’ve done Fast Chat already, so we just rejoice in this awesome bit of radio that leads us perfectly into a couple of classic crossover bashment tracks, the first being the Joyride riddim. This is actually at 100 bpm, so rather than go all gabba om your ass there’s some tempo track editing here. It’s a banger isn’t it? The original set of sides went on rather long so there’s some vicious editing here. Naturally the women stomp all over the homophobic toss of the men. They’re John’s records so fuck it, I don’t care, I just cut ’em up.
27:39 Baby Cham & Mister Easy – Funny Man (Mad House 7”) 1996
28:53 Lady Saw – Sycamore Tree (Mad House 7”) 1996
30:01 Frisco Kid – Rubbers (Mad House 7”) 1996
31:05 Buju Banton – How It Ago Go (Mad House 7”) 1996
32:08 Tanya Stephens – Yuh Nuh Ready Fi Dis Yet (Mad House 7”) 1996
33:37 Slew Dem – Joyride Vocal (Slewdem Productions 12”) 2005
And then the Pum Pum riddim. Doogz AND Harry Toddler AND Flow Dan on one riddim? That’s it. Game over. Grime IS bashment.
35:13 Dutty Doogz – Pum Pum Stealer (Night Flight 12”) 2003
36:35 Harry Toddler – Good Good (Night Flight 12”) 2003
36:49 Flow Dan – Galist (Night Flight 12”) 2003
37:16 Jamaka Bi – Zoom 4 Pum (Night Flight 12”) 2003
But Buss It Up is just something else. I rejigged the whole mix to make room for it. This utterly overwhelming slice of super-sophisticated grimey dancehall devastation is mind blowing. Totally amazing. Kano can release as many duff hiphop CDs as he wants as far as I’m concerned – this record truly is one of the great achievements of western civilisation. Love the loooooong mix from Pum Pum.
39:15 Kano and Vybz Kartel – Buss It Up (679 7”) 2006
And after another nifty radio slot from Jammer, we’re into the glory that is the One In Ten riddim. When ub40 gets reversioned by other reggae acts, the (often all too real) quality in the original comes shining through. Loads of tweaky edits in the mix into Rossi B and Luca, which itself filters seamlessly into Ini Kimoze, and the scorched earth power of NASTY Crew. This is a “good bit”, my favourite part of the whole mix.
43:16 Neckle Camp feat. Jammer, Rinse FM
44:01 Yami Bolo – Top Shotta (Black Diamonds 7”) 2002
45:48 Junior Reid – Rise Up (Black Diamonds 7”) 2002
46:32 Half Pint – Bounce (Black Diamonds 7”) 2002
47:37 Lukie D – One In Ten (Black Diamonds 7”) 2002
49:12 Rossi B and Luka – Nobody Knows (from The Legacy EP, Heavy Artillery 12”) 2007
51:29 Ini Kamoze – World a Reggae Music (from Sly and Robbie’s Taxi Sound, Auralux LP) 1984
53:03 Rossi B and Luka – Run 4 Cover instrumental (12” white label) 2005
53:48 Rossi B and Luka feat. Nasty Crew – Run 4 Cover (12” white label) 2005
Anyway. Yes. Ice Rink. Only in dub. With fuckloads of sirens. And some hot cutting. Ain’t bad really is it?
56:45 Neckle Camp feat. Jammer, Rinse FM
57:13 Breeze – Ice Rink (Wiley Kat 12”) 2003
59:16 Tinchy Stryder – Ice Rink (Wiley Kat 12”) 2003
60:36 Kano – Ice Rink (Wiley Kat 12”) 2003
63:56 Riko – Ice Rink (Wiley Kat 12”) 2003
And then to the iconic male star of reggae and his extremely wise decision to show off a gentler side in the most spare production imaginable. Dripping with raw emotion, it’s the perfect foil for Jammer’s nervous matey-ness, before Rhianna comes in to give them both a right kicking. Superb voice. And how tempted was I to download the funky house refix? Not enough to inflict it on John!
65:58 Sizzla – Give Me A Try (from Rise to the Occasion) 2003
67:18 Jammer – Give Me a Try (from Are You Dumb vol 2) 2006
71:04 Sizzla Vs Rhianna – Give Me A Try (remix) 2007
That’s it. Our last bloggariddims. End of an era really. Fab to do another mix with John. Thanks to droid for keeping it moving.