[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHYYWhhFpzA[/youtube]

“From radical turntablism (Otomo Yoshihide) to laptop music innovation (Numb), via classical instrument hijacking (Sakamoto Hiromichi), Tokyo’s avant-garde music scene is internationally known for its boldness.

While introducing some of the greatest musicians of this scene, “We Don’t Care About Music Anyway…” offers a kaleidoscopic view of Tokyo, confronting music and noise, sound and image, reality and representation, documentary and fiction. “We don’t care about music anyway”…

In other words, “we make it and that’s all”. Beyond the music and beyond its performance, the future and mode of existence of a city, and society as a whole, are in motion.”

For the lucky BK people this gem shows this coming Friday 16th at 8pm as part of the Rooftop Film Summer Series at the Old American Can Factory 232 3rd Street, Brooklyn, NY (info).

the Dutty Artz digital familia grows! Sisters and brothers let’s welcome Carlos! Like Cauto, Carlos is based in Barcelona, a city he calls home alongside Houston, TX. Carlos and I first vibed out over chopped & screwed Houston rap gems like S.L.A.B. but we quickly discovered shared affinities for drone/noise, flamenco, and I’m happy to say I introduced Carlos to the wonder of Bcn’s Moroccan music shops… He starts off in style with a post about flamenco. – /rupture

Flamenco is a famously conservative style of music. The voice, the guitar, clapping, stamping and jaleo (literally ‘ruckus’) are the key ingredients, and new additions to the mix are often met with some skepticism. This is less true now than it was before 1979, when Camaron de la Isla‘s album La Leyenda del Tiempo pulled sitars, rumba, jazz, and electric guitar into the music, but to this day, most flamenco acts willing to open their palettes to new colors do so tentatively, ultimately sounding like polite, virtuosic jazz fusion music.

This makes Enrique Morente‘s artistic path all the more remarkable. A veteran and patriarch (see: daughter Estrella Morente) of the flamenco game, he’s brought out the duende in its traditional form:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZr4YfVopH8[/youtube]

But in recent years, he’s been more interested in seeing what other shapes the duende can take, often through collaborations with surprising artists. Take this duet, with Rebel of Rai Cheb Khaled, where he gives proponents of the Flamenco is the Arabian Blues Declaration a reason to salivate, in appropriately regal settings (the Alhambra, which I used to live right next to). What I like most about this tune is how relaxed it sounds, when a meeting of two giants so often tends to be an overblown affar:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM2wC7sv6xU[/youtube]

But for freaky noiseniks like me, perhaps the most mind-blowing project(and definitely the riskiest, in terms of flamenco cred) was his collaboration with Sonic Youth. They played several concerts together, but to me the gem is the performance below with just Lee Ranaldo, Steve Shelley and Morente’s “family”. Here Morente takes a more subdued role, clapping and wailing and staying in the background and Lee Ranaldo does his thing (the video’s out of sync with the audio and you can’t see Morente, but it’s the only uncut video of the whole thing):

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-SSBK9rNrw[/youtube]

PAT ROBERTSON VOODOO DOLL! Proceeds Go To Haiti relief

I’m unsure about the execution (voodoo-blackface?) too, but this is a great idea, no?

American televangelist/Christian evangelical ‘douchebag‘ extraordinaire Pat Robertson blamed the catastrophic earthquake in Haiti on the on the Hatian people and their religious/cultural practices– voodoo. Additional article: What is Pat Robertson Really Saying About Haiti?

***

& here’s my request to johnnyvoodoo and all America voodoo doll makers, please make a doll of this man, David Brooks of the New York Times

If you read his Op-Ed column last Thursday, I’m sure you will sympathize with me/my request. For a better understanding, Matt Taibbi clears the thickets by translating excerpts of Brooks’s essay so we can further appreciate his timely insight —

“This is not a natural disaster story. This is a poverty story. It’s a story about poorly constructed buildings, bad infrastructure and terrible public services. On Thursday, President Obama told the people of Haiti: “You will not be forsaken; you will not be forgotten.” If he is going to remain faithful to that vow then he is going to have to use this tragedy as an occasion to rethink our approach to global poverty. He’s going to have to acknowledge a few difficult truths.
The first of those truths is that we don’t know how to use aid to reduce poverty. Over the past few decades, the world has spent trillions of dollars to generate growth in the developing world. The countries that have not received much aid, like China, have seen tremendous growth and tremendous poverty reductions. The countries that have received aid, like Haiti, have not.
In the recent anthology “What Works in Development?,” a group of economists try to sort out what we’ve learned. The picture is grim. There are no policy levers that consistently correlate to increased growth. There is nearly zero correlation between how a developing economy does one decade and how it does the next. There is no consistently proven way to reduce corruption. Even improving governing institutions doesn’t seem to produce the expected results.
The chastened tone of these essays is captured by the economist Abhijit Banerjee: “It is not clear to us that the best way to get growth is to do growth policy of any form. Perhaps making growth happen is ultimately beyond our control.”

TRANSLATION: Don’t bother giving any money, it doesn’t do any good. And feeling guilty about not giving money doesn’t do anyone any good either. In fact, you’re probably helping by not doing anything.

Read more @ True/Slant

flickr_little_fatma_medium
[picture of Little Fatma from Photoma’s World]

[display_podcast]

LAMIN FOFANA – FATMATA WAS HERE

INGREDIENTS
Bvdub – Return To Tonglu
RHy-s on – 2
Bijan Mofid – Shahreh Ghesseh, I & II
Co$$ feat. Blu – Angelic
Jamie Vexd – In System Travel
Zomby – Tears in the Rain
Dred Man-Gi feat. Nell – Não Ta Se Entender
Kasai Allstars – Tshitua fuila mbuloba
King Midas Sound – Cool Out
Alpha Blondy – Jerusalem
Cauto – Despartar
G-Side – Alpine Tick

it’s here & here & here also – big up Dave, Chris, and thecrookedclef for the uppage. in between the multiple daily posts of other people’s stuff, i manage to patch together a series of sounds, and it runs deep! i made it a few weeks ago, recorded some of it at WFMU-FM, edit in Logic.

ayatollah

[audio:http://nyc.duttyartz.com/mp3s/Jackie_Mittoo-Ayatollah.mp3]

Jackie Mittoo – Ayatollah

[audio:http://nyc.duttyartz.com/mp3s/The_Willows-Moses_Version.mp3]

The Willows – Moses Version

[audio:http://nyc.duttyartz.com/mp3s/Barington_Levy-Rock_and_Come_In_Scientist_Extended_Mix.mp3]

Barington Levy – Rock and Come In Scientist Extended Mix

If you like these shattered songs, do come in early tomorrow! I’ve got loads more (rare vinyls in digital format), and I plan to to play a dub-heavy set tomorrow night, 10PM – 11:30-ish.  I might drop in two or three recent favorites/freshness, but I’d like to keep it 97% dusty and mystical! Also, I don’t feel the pressure/anxiousness I felt last/first time I deejayed (although NY Tropical 6 was quite massive!) The nervousness is dissolving, and quickly being replaced by excitement and optimism.  If I lapse into a state of irreverence or just absolute enjoyment… I’m only letting the music take over.  Reality is hard right now, goal is to get lifted and transported. Enjoyment!