Rufus Thomas

The Hit Pack, “Never Say No To Your Baby”

A Motown track from 1965, the heavy horns here really sound a little more like Stax than like Motown, especially from 1965.

Rufus Thomas, “Funky Mississippi”

Yeah, see, those horns!

DJ Vadim, “Your Revolution”

DJ Vadim’s second album, U.S.S.R. Life From The Other Side, found the abstract hip-hop producer working with MCs on most of the tracks, which largely was an improvement. I think abstract hip-hop can sometimes get a little lazy, and having to make sure things will work with someone actually rapping makes sure that he tightens things up.

All frequent fliers today!

Public Enemy, “Lost In Space Music”

This comes from Man Plans God Laughs, which is deep into the long run of somehwat undifferentiated albums that Public Enemy has been making for years and years now. They’ve lasted long enough and produced enough records that they have way more non-peak albums than they do peak albums. Which is kind of a bummer. It’s also hard for me to fairly evaluate most of these these records. They’re competing with such indelible memories.

Songs over here.

Mudhoney, “Make It Now Again”

It takes a bit for this to turn into a classic Mudhoney song, but once it gets rolling, it’s aboslutely vintage. This is from that rarities collection March to Fuzz, which really is a lot of fun.

Rogue Wave, “Publish My Love”

Underground pop band Rogue Wave kind of sound like an amalgam of about a half-dozen other underground pop bands from the early 2000s. It’s certainly well done, but it never really got me excited. I mean, I only own two albums!

Excellent set today.

Recloose, “Permutations”

There’s something called “Detroit techno” that I only kind of vaguely understand, beyond knowing that Detroit is a city, and techno is a type of electronic music. I mean, there’s a Wikipedia page for it and all, but what does that tell you? Not much. Anyway, Recloose supposedly fits into this genre, for whatever that’s worth. To my ears, this combination of relatively minimalist beat, video game bloops, and slowly building melody is great fun.