Dawn Fragments

I've been silent, words silent, and even though I have no commitment with this blog other than my own whim and pleasure, I allowed silence to take over. But I have been musically busy, either with new arrivals or my home classics, I has sufficient time to record and prepare some podcasts that now should start showing up in this space over the next fee weeks. So there's another reason fo you to stay tuned. 

My latest excursion was launched today at Masajazz's Spanish edition, but will also be availabe here through the link below. This time I decided to quit my usual taste for party music and night rhythms, welcoming a bunch of sunrise sensations, daybreak moods, springtime feelings in the midst of weather chaos and viruses booming. They are a series of intimate sights coming from artists who - unconciously or not - one tends to come back to when you feel the urge to listen to yourself, crouching behind other people's music. They are just around 50 minutes that I sincerely hope will help you to connect with optimism  at the beginning of a new day.

Enjoy it, friendo.

Másàjazz ... Dawn Fragments

TRACKLIST: 1.- "The Makings Of You" - William Parker (from The Inside Songs Of Curtis Mayfield: Live In Rome) 2007,Rai Trade.
2.- "Flood Plane" - Dave Douglas (from Moonshine). 2007, Greenleaf.
3.- "New Dawn" - Azymuth (from Butterfly) 2008, Far Out.
4.- "Mighty Wicked" - Exchange Bureau (from Via Air Mail) 2006, Exchange Bureau Music.
5.- "Goodbye Tomorrow" - Erik Truffaz & Sly Johnson (from Paris) 2008, Blue Note.
6.- "Where Would you Be" - Yaw (from The Magnificent Sampler) 2008, Chisoul.
7.- "Speak Low" - The Roy Hargrove Quintet (from Earfood) 2008, Emarcy.
8.- "Earth Contorted" - E.S.T. (from Leucocyte) 2008, ACT.
9.- "Is This America?" - Pat Metheny Trio (from Day Trip) 2008, Nonesuch.

Màsájazz - Dawn Fragments by Másàjazz

Dego & Kaidi: shame on you!

It’s hard to believe but it seems that some artists have very little or no respect at all for the ones who feed them: the audience. This is the case for Mr Dego Ranks (4hero) and Kaidi Tatham (Bugz In The Attic, DKD, etc). They must feel very bored with their own routine or simply unfamiliar with the minimun respect and love necessary to keep one’s head up in a world of thieves and criminals. Why am I saying this?

On sunday 2000 Black was coming back to play live in one of the most original and daring music events which have come out in Madrid in the city’s few last (boring) years. I’m talking about Black Book Sessions: a sunday evening joint were music lovers of anythin from good broken beat, soulful house, funk and hip-hop have been lucky enough to enjoy Gilles Peterson, Bugz In The Attic, Platinum Pied Pipers, Mark De Clive-Lowe or Dj Krush. A heroic initiative were many have come to discover a differet horizon beyond peak hour pumping techno.

The second visit of the band was joined this time by Benji B and Domu who gave us an exciting two parts session with a rich variety of today’s Londond sounds, and in many respects the underground european scene… But 2000 Black arrived without tis two core founding members: Dego and Kaidi. Why? The organisation told me they had provided escuses such as (in Kaidi’s case) “I can’t find my passport…” Can we belive this? Not really. It all sound to me as anothe episode of deep laziness and disrespect for an event who lives very much from taking care of every single detail in music, timing, decoration or desing Ç(not to mention ever event features an exhibition of contemporary art in the likes of street aert, design or photography).

I can only manifest my shock and disgust with this, but I’ll also make all my best to make sure every promoter in this country and internationally knows the kind of manhood we can find behind Mr Dego and Mr Kaidi’s artistry. Like I said: shame on you!

2000 Black... in Black Book Sessions

The Grandfather Paradox: a trip by Schwarz, Ame & Dixon

Choose any way you can, through the results or the makers, but there's very little margin of error when it comes to music signed by these three sorcerers. Further more if you stop to think how their primary source of inspiration and elevation maintains a firm believe in the wonders of minimal techno. A hypnotizing, cold and abstract exploration of early electronic music such as tecno-pop, transfigured into a 21st century danceable shape. Once the ultimate underground electronic scene, now a connoisseur flavour for alternative souls.

If you have had the chance to experience any of these three names live (Ame equals two more, being a duo) you will surely agree they offer some of today's most accurate and sharp electronic sounds, ranging from futuristic ambient strokes to robotic trancendental house music. Their productions and recent collaborations have caused a regular conmotion in the club scene, and every new release is expected with almost religious anticipation. And here's another example.

Apart from the spot on choice of the tittle (as taken from the science-fictional paradox about time travel ellaborated by the writer René Barjavel in his 1943 book Le Voyageur Imprudent (The Imprudent Traveller), this compilation of minimal music inspirations and masters (great praise for choosing Steve Reich's Electric Counterpoint) shows and tells the intriguing, fascinating and illuminating possibilities of an obscure but irresistible genre for anyone with a minimum (ha!) love for chips and robotica.

The call comes in two options: a duoble cd with an enjoyable non stop mix plus the original tracks in an additional cd; or the luxurious beautiful lay out doube lp whre you can only find  five of the selected tracks, such as O's "Atomit" (Niels Bohr edit), Robert Hood's "Minus", La Funk Mob's "Motor Bass Gets Phunked Up" (Richie Hawtin's Electrophunk mix), I:Cube's "Acid Beatless" (A Critical Mass edit), and my own persoanl favourite: Yusef Lateef's "TheThree Faces Of Bala".

Get complete information at label BBE's website. 

Or the video EPK: 

Bye-ya.

http://www.myspace.com/masajazzblogs

Dj Hell and The Angst

Here's a man who became a star with the launch and globalization of the ultimate fashion superstar disco style: electroclash. Fashion only lasts a blink, as he very well knows, and like his co-starlette Miss Kitten, Hell decided to move to the massive and commercially succesful territory of electro house. Oh, well... What can I say? I enjoy good music and creativity in almost every genre but it's very rare these days to find a good track in the land of techno, minimal or electro house. But prejudices are meant to be broken.

Dj Hell has a new album ready for 2009 that will come under the concept of "Night" or "Day": a boundary so misused that one finds very little to be excited about behind this concept. Not even the use of German language (Teufelswerk ) for the title Devil's Work. But what really got my attention is the first release from the album: The Angst. A minuendo in-between minimal and nu-folk, divided into Pt.1 and Pt.2 (quite unnecesary), but heavily suppoted in the B-side with (who else) an excellent rework with the one and only Henrik Schwarz.

The track has been offered up and down with partial free downloads (google that) and an intriguing video promo full of  dark spaces and sexy dreams. It's a winner track altogether and possibly a turning point for those electro-heads who feel the formula was going nowhere.

Judge for yourself.

Here´s the video:

  

Stay... with the DjCam Quartet

The man is back, with company and flavour. Those familiar with the alternative face to Dj Cam's solo adventures probably know about the Quartet ensemble. A small jazz combo organised under the likes and directions of one of the original inovators in the fusion of hip-hop and jazz. A true soft jazz acoustic quartet, smooth in the architecture of ambient moods and easy listening in a sort of updated form of west coast jazz via 21st century electronic home studio.

The good news is Laurent Daumail has somehow recovered the energy, passion and inspiration he once had for these fusion sounds, and also the business side of things thanks to his invigorated label Inflammable. He has re-released all his classic material and he added up last year his excellent Lost & Found compilation. As you can check regularly on his Myspace page he's persistently working with his long awaited new solo album Seven, which should be ready some time around the second half of 2009. But in the meantime, we have now received another set of the Dj Cam Quartet called Stay.

It's an eight tracks excursion into the familiar affinities of moods and elegance by Dj Cam, but also a promising confirmation of good musical shape in the arrangements considering the way the french man has cooked up Sade's "Sweetest Pain" or Burt Bacharach's "Look of Love". I guess you can call the whole thing predictable, mainstream or airwave jazztronica but when it comes to classic downtempo you can't get better than this.

Judge for yourself:

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