Sorry I'm late...
So I took most of a month off, and if you were waiting for another post, my apologies. Life gets hectic, and I intended to post something last week, but it just didn't happen. It's a reminder of how much life has changed since when I was running a somewhat popular blog in the late 00s. I was devoted to writing something every day or so, and my life was a bit simpler back then. Now I have a job that doesn't afford me all the free time I could want between work, and while a lot of us have had more free time than we've expected to since around March, the last few weeks have been a mess for me. They're still kind of a mess, but a very big hurdle has been leapt which makes things a bit easier.
I was going to wait until tomorrow to work on a post, but fuck it screw it, here we go.
This one is a bit of a tribute to my early days on Soulseek. If you haven't followed what I've said about it previously or looked into it yourself, give it a go if you're feeling adventurous. Coming out of the Napster era, where I wasn't necessarily looking for the newest releases as much as obscure tracks, b-sides and remixes that I worried I was the only one who remembered, Soulseek was a wonderful extension of that denied bliss. They didn't try to stick any annoying ads into the code, no one was trying to make any money, and the whole thing was decentralized so even if you pulled down one user, it had no real effect. It still being around today, despite WebSheriff (RIP, hopefully. The P is for piss.) and other services designed to hunt down potential copyright crimes, is amazing, and here's hoping it goes nowhere.
One of my favorite users to run into on Soulseek was a Frenchman with the screen-name niceandcomplete, named after a line from a Beastie Boys song. I reached out to him after hunting for more stuff from Hot Chip whom I had just been introduced to after getting the US single for Over and Over. He was the only person I'd seen around with the Barbarian EP, which was basically an extended single for Over and Over with several more songs. He was nice enough to hook me up and then got me more demos and rarities along with Hot Chip's The Warning album when it initially leaked. We shared a lot of music with each other and he introduced me to a lot of things I wouldn't have necessarily heard otherwise. Unfortunately, I don't know where he's gone to now. The user name doesn't seem to be active any longer and, despite me keeping the same user name I've had for years, it doesn't seem to have helped us reconnect. Assuming I probably never hear from niceandcomplete again, here's hoping you're doing alright and thanks for the mp3s!
This is from the aforementioned Barbarian EP. Please forgive the R. Kelly reference in the opening lyrics as the rest of the track is a banger. I'll never understand why someone thought making certain tracks exclusive to certain regions and never releasing them elsewhere was a good idea, because this, along with the title track, deserve better than to disappear into non-streaming history. It's not like Hot Chip aren't still alive and kicking, though I'm sure some asshat at whatever label now controls their EMI output would probably have an opinion like "whatever, who cares about those 00s indie dorks?" Fuck that, Hot Chip rule!
Kreeps - All I Wanna Do Is Break Some Hearts (Mungolian Jet Set's Exit to the Jaja Mix)
This is another one that niceandcomplete introduced to me. The original single (which was released on the sadly deceased Output label. Great label!) is quite good and all, and there is a Boys Noize remix or two I'm sure some trendy club DJ thought would be good for their sets, but the Mungolian Jet Set remix is where it's at, slowing down, speeding up, getting warped silly and making a wonderful mess! I was going to share this one in a previous post, but it is readily available via digital retailers so I hesitated. I decided to, once again, say fuck it screw it and post it anyway. If you like it, go find it and buy it. I had the vinyl of this too but the pressing simply wasn't very good, which is a real shame for something as bass heavy and all over the place as this track is!
Mungolian Jet Set - Sonnenaufgang (Rough Mix)
Another one from MJS, I don't believe a version of this was ever released. I recorded this from their MySpace page way back using the analog hole. It sounds good, but I wish I had it in higher quality. I guess it may have been intended for a tribute compilation. These were the days when 128k aac was my preferred format and I was using a 32 gig iPod. In retrospect, I wish I had saved everything, even lossy analog hole rips, in FLAC or at least WAV formats. Anyway, that's all getting away from how wonderfully nice this track is. Smooth but peaceful, probably good for someone's lovemaking mix/playlist or whatnot. MJS aren't the most consistent group, but they always bring their all, so I'll always watch out for whatever they're doing next.
More soon, promise!
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