Mix Master Mike

The Slackers, “Like a Virgin”

Several times in the past (no, I’m not going to look it up), I’ve talked about how mostly ska covers do nothing for me. The major exception to that are the Slackers, who consistently kill it. But I’d also listen to Vic Ruggiero sing a menu.

Mix Master Mike, “U Know the Name”

Legendary DJ Mix Master Mike has a few albums out under his name, where he often brings along various guest rappers to tear it up in-between instrumental tracks. Spin Psycle is the best of that bunch, off of a very good guest roster.

Nine Inch Nails, “Just Like You Imagined”

I think I’ve blathered on about The Fragile before, so you can hit up the tags over there and do some spelunking. Or not! But, the novel (?) observation I can make is that as time goes on, this album gets better to me relative to his other work, and at this point, I think it might be his best album. Or my favorite, anyway. Same thing!

Mix Master Mike, “Positive Contact (Mario C remix)”

This is a remix of a track from Deltron 3030, the great left-field hip-hop classic featuring Del tha Funkee Homosapien and Dan the Automator. Mix Master Mike took that and turned it into this remix, which…isn’t as good as the original. Oh well!

Artie Shaw, “Frenesi”

When my oldest started playing the clarient, I decided to try and pick up something which might inspire her, so I grabbed this compilation (The Essential Artie Shaw). And while I don’t think she cared about it at all, it’s a perfectly enjoyable listen.

Bark Psychosis, “A Street Scene”

Bark Psychosis’s first run consisted of this album, Hex, after which they broke up. They did reunite ten years later for another record, but I haven’t listened to it. This album is hard to characterize. It’s kind of dream pop and kind of post-rock, and it’s unabashedly ambitious which is always nice. The compositions are big and the arrangements even bigger. This blurring of genre boundaries and fearlessness about incorporating technology is something that was unusual in pop or rock at the time.

DJ Shadow, “This Time (I’m Gonna Try It My Way)”

DJ Shadow’s third album, The Outsider, is kind of a mess. It was four years after The Private Press and ten after Endtroducing, and all that time apparently created a lot of ideas that all tried to burst out at the same time. That doesn’t let the whole thing hang together as an album, but it does have plenty of fun songs. It’s also an album that I have learned to appreciate more as time has gone on. It turns out that he didn’t need to make another Endtroducing!

Claw Hammer, “The Day It Rained Pigeon Shit”

Have we had Claw Hammer before? I think we have. The tags say we have. Whatever. Anyway, Claw Hammer sort of had a blues-y take at punk, like if you took Mudhoney and dialed up the blues end by a bunch. And, of course, they had Jon Wahl’s idiosyncratic vocal style powering things. This tune comes from their final album, their second for a major label of all damn things. That Interscope thought something as offputting as this was worth signing is one of the clearest signs that the mid-90s saw some very stupid behavior from the labels.

The Flaming Lips, “Assassination of the Sun”

We here at Five Songs are big fans of EPs, when bands treat them seriously. You get a good chunk of new material, enough to be satisfying, but they often come out as a surprise. It’s good stuff! This comes from Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell, an EP that came out in the wake of Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, so during their peak period. The remixes of songs from Yoshimi are fine, whatever, but getting four new tunes from this period is fantastic.

WE’RE BACK AT IT! HIT IT, PLEXASAURUS REX!

Baroness, “Rays on Pinion”

This is how the first Baroness album opens up. While they’re usually grouped with metal, and in particular often brought up in the same breath as Mastodon, they’re not really the same thing. Yeah, there is some serious riffage in here, but the separation between this and, say, some of noise rock or post-punk isn’t exactly clear. Music categorizing is a sloppy thing, y’all. Anyway, this album is good! Listen to it!

SIX SONGS TODAY

Mix Master Mike, “Supa Wyde Laces”

We had a track from Hello Nasty yesterday, today we’ve got a track from the DJ that joined them with that record. Mix Master Mike was a member of the Invisibl Skratch Piklz, the most successful DJ collective around. This is from his solo record, which came out the same year as Hello Nasty, and which at the time, I liked more. Probably wouldn’t be true these days.

It’s a new thing / check out this I bring

Mix Master Mike, “Now You’re Mine”

One of my real weaknesses is horns, as faithful listener/readers of Five Songs know. Prominent horns in a hip-hop track? That is, in fact, my jam.

The Postal Service, “Brand New Colony”

A danger in having written 470-whatever of these things is that it has legitimately reached the point where I have trouble remembering what I’ve said before. And, honestly, I have managed to bork my indexing system, so it’s not easy for me to look things up. So until I unbork my indexing system, you’re at risk of repeat stories. This is relevant, because I have basically two things to say about the Postal Service, and I cannot shake the feeling that I’ve said one or both of them before. So, instead, I’ll just drop this FASCINATING meta-note here. Nothin’ but fuckin’ professionalism on this here blog, my friends!