The Sesame Street special I did with Jonny Trunk in 2004 for his weekly OST excursion into soundtracks, library and other esoterica is now available as a podcast from Resonance FM. This features a lot of material from the unreleased ‘D Is For Dig’ compilation I put together for Sesame Workshop in 2003 which never came to fruition because of legal matters.
Radio
Mine and Yppah‘s mix from last night’s Solid Steel – without chat, you can listen to me and Jon fluff our lines over on StrongroomAlive if you want. Yppah’s mix contains tracks all released in 1981, and, coincidentally, ends with Kraftwerk’s ‘Computer World’ before we get a taste of half of the Kraftwerk Kover Kollection vol.7 which debuts here tomorrow in full.
There will be a preview of some of KKK7 tonight on Solid Steel between 7-9pm (GMT) on Strongroom Alive. I’ll be joining Jon More from Coldcut and we’ll have a mix from Yppah focussing on the vintage music year of 1981 – his new album title – and a competition to win a copy too.
Last nights’ Solid Steel mix from Strongroom Alive, sans speech, DJ Format provides an exclusive 30 minute mix and I finish the hour with the same. Tracklist:
– DJ Format
Natural Yogurt Band _ Pot Head _ Now Again
Beta Hector feat. Shane Hunter _ Oracle Bones _ Tru Thoughts
Edan _ Rap Beautician _ Humble Mag
SPOX-PHD _ Brilliance _ Correct Technique
Hero No.7 _ Roots Of A Hero _ Hero Records
DJ Soul Shock _ Wild Beats(edit) _ Solid
Nino Nardini _ Malaysia _ Crea Sound LTD
Mr Chop _ Monolith Voodoo Vibes _ Jazz & Milk
The Jon Bartel Thing _ Freak Show _ Capitol
Them _ I Keep Singing _ Happy Tiger
– DJ Food
The Stepkids _ Suburban Dream _ Stones Throw
Steinski _ Some Dreams Are Meant To Happen _ mp3
DJ Shadow _ Border Crossing _ Island
Pepe Deluxé _ The Storm _ Catskills
Eagles Of Death Metal _ I Only Want You _ Ant Acid Audio
C-Mon & Kypski – More Is Less (DJ Food re-edit) (unknown)
Tom & Jules – Version Galore Solid Steel jingle (mp3)
A-Ko _ dfuuu _ mp3
Jacky Chalard _ Superman, Supercool _ Cache Cache
David Vangel _ Sandpaper Script _ Equinox
The Creatures _ Mad-Eyed Screamer _ Polydor
A-Ko _ brake _ mp3
DJ Format _ Spaceship Earth feat. Edan _ Project Blue Book
After my guest appearance on Jonny Trunk’s OST show on Saturday I should point out that Resonance 104.4 FM‘s annual on-air fundraiser is running now, right up until midnight on Sunday 19th February. They’ll have auctions of unique and wondrous items, special live events, celebrity guests, spontaneous competitions and much more. I will be donating the last remaining postcard record from the recent exhibition to Jonny’s co-host, Robin the Fog, for his fundraising show on Saturday 18th Feb at the regular OST time of 4.30-6.30pm GMT. I’ll also be donating a one of a kind DJ Food 12″ splatter vinyl controller record from the same show and Jonny will have an unreleased Basil Kirchin soundtrack to ‘The Shuttered Room’, which is one of only 29 copies made, up for auction too.
If you love Resonance 104.4 FM and shows such as OST, please support them via a donation, pledge, bequest, gift or purchase from their shop. The alternative – for the station to take regular on-air advertising – is something they’d all prefer not to contemplate. But Resonance urgently need funds to continue its work. Visit resonancefm.com to make a donation of any size or to view their list of auction items. Also, if you’re an artist and want to donate an object for them to auction then please get in touch with Robin.
More on the radio front, both mixes and interviews:
The big news is that Solid Steel is back on the air, live in London, on a Thursday night via new station Strongroom Alive. DK (Solid Steel) and Jon More (Coldcut) will be spearheading this each week with myself when I can make it. The usual selection of old and new, guest mixes and the odd interview will be happening as well as some new features. . Listeners in London can tune in to 87.9 FM on the radio (and Freeview channel 111) between 7 – 9pm each Thursday and across the world you can hear it on www.strongroom.fm
As previously mentioned The Arctic Circle Radio interview with Ben Eshmade is now available as a podcast.
I did a 1 hour mix for the Laura Leishman Project on Le Mouv radio in Paris the other week that aired on Friday (Feb 3rd). This was done with only one turntable as I’d left my Serato controller discs at home and they could only find one, I’d mix one track in and then jump it across to the other virtual deck and cue up a new one on the real turntable. The first half is more clubby and the second a showcase for parts of the album, including some of the forthcoming Amorphous Androgynous remix of ‘The Illectrik Hoax’. The mix is available here – via soundcloud.
The Selector – the 25 minute mix of UK-based artists I did for the British Council is now up on Soundcloud, the 55 minute version follows this Friday (Feb 10th)
Strongroom Alive also hosts a mix show with Pure Evil aka Charles Uzell-Edwards on a Friday and his debut show (Feb 3rd) contained a gallery walk-through by myself conducted the day the show I’ve currently got on at his gallery with Henry Flint opened. The music Charley plays is a fantastic selection of mostly ambient electronica classics from the 90’s with a few oddities thrown into the mix like Black Sabbath. The show is up on mixcloud for those who want to listen again.
In fact I’m going to embed it here I enjoyed his selection so much, some of my Planetarium mix plays at around 1 hr 30 mins including the 2econd Class Citizen remix of ‘The Illectrik Hoax’.
This Sunday (Feb 5th) on Resonance FM I’m interviewed at the same exhibition by Jonny Trunk cohort Robin The Fog for the Panel Borders show about comics at 8pm which will be available to stream or download too.
This coming Saturday (Feb 11th) I’ll be dropping in to Jonny Trunk‘s OST show, again on Resonance, playing space-themed records and giving away a limited edition copy of my album. Resonance 104.4FM. Saturday 4:30pm to 6:30pm. Repeated Wednesday 3:00pm to 5:00pm
You can now download the edition of Arctic Circle Radio where I was interviewed on the eve of the Planetarium gig by Ben Eshmade.
The 30 minute mix* I did for The Selector is now on Soundcloud featuring a section of the forthcoming Amorphous Androgynous remix of ‘The Illectrik Hoax’ plus a new unreleased 2econd Class Citizen track amongst others
Show 547 – DJ Food in the mix by British Council
Tracklist:
Neil Norman – Re-Entry
DJ Food Vs The Amorphous Androgynous – The Electric Images In My Mind (Never Die)
DJ Food – Prey feat. JG Thirlwell
2econd Class Citizen – Stop 2 Wonder
Jane Weaver – The Fallen By Watchbird
Plug – Mind Bending
Fracture & Neptune – Trapped In Time
*This is actually only half of the mix, the full, hour-long mix will go online in two weeks
As previously mentioned, I am featured in interview with Matt Johnson on a special ‘Deep Space’ edition of his Radio Cineola podcast. In 2010 Matt produced twelve podcasts, one a month, usually themed and sometimes featuring a guest – all revolving around new and old The The music. All the episodes can be found in the newly revamped shop on TheThe.com
Most of the selections were either unreleased work, demos or alternate mixes as well as cover version and collaborations. We met up in New York, just before the infamous police raid on the club we were about to play for the Ninja Tune 20th anniversary, to conduct part of the interview. Things being what they are with us slow workers, plans changed and thus, here is the lost in (deep) space episode of Radio Cinéola.
Ninja have put a radio edit of my album version of ‘GIANT’ up on their Soundcloud too.
DJ Food – ‘GIANT’ (Album Edit) feat. Matt Johnson by Ninja Tune
Here’s the Soundcloud stream of the interview I did with Dexter for the Ninja Tune podcast, talking about the new album, collaborators and choosing my top 5 favourite records
Solid Steel Radio Show 20/1/2012 Part 3 + 4 – DJ Food interview by Ninja Tune
I’ll be featuring on several radio shows and podcasts in the coming weeks – around midnight on the 19th, BBC 5 Live had a short post-planetarium piece too with Jamie Stangroom
Listen again here at about 46.00 minutes in.
Friday 20th I’m featuring on Solid Steel, talking to Dexter on the Ninja Tune podcast about the new album, artwork, collaborations and picking my top 5 records. I’ve heard the final cut of the show and it’s all seamlessly arranged by DK, a real labour of love. Solid Steel.net. iTunes podcast non iTunes
Monday 23rd should see a special space-themed podcast from Radio Cineola to relaunch the new TheThe.com. I’ll be talking to Matt Johnson via a satellite link up and previewing the ‘Deep Space’ version of our cover of his song, ‘GIANT’.
Next I’ll be talking to Ben Eshmade on the Arctic Circle Radio show on Resonance FM on Friday 27th at 9pm.
Arctic Circle Radio. Resonance 104.4FM. Friday 9pm to 11pm. It’s also on Chill FM (on digital) on Tuesdays at 10pm-midnight. It will be podcast a few days after the event as well. All ACR shows and mixes are available via jointhecircle.net/radio – Download the podcast here!
The Selector – again Friday 27th – The British Council/NME Radio will debut a 25 minute mix of UK-based artists with a 55 minute mix on their The Selector worldwide channel two weeks later. These mixes will feature exclusive new material including part of the Amorphous Androgynous remix of ‘The Illectrik Hoax’, plus unreleased tracks from 2econd Class Citizen and DJ Format‘s forthcoming albums.
On February 11th I’ll be dropping in to Jonny Trunk‘s OST show, again on Resonance, and playing space-themed records and nonsense, probably nerding out and talking all sorts of trainspotter stuff as I’m want to do whenever Jonny and I chat.
The OST Show. Resonance 104.4FM.
Saturday 4:30pm to 6:30pm. Repeated Wednesday 3:00pm to 5:00pm. Listen again here
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Check these out, a friend of mine made them, lovely work and tribute to Rydgren radio.
Oh BTW, that was the 500th post too.
Seeing as today is the 1st of September – and fans of Foetus will know the signifigence of this – I just clocked this amazing photo of JG Thirlwell (who appears on my forthcoming EP – out Nov 7th) as part of an interview on the Impose site. Photography by Alex M. Smith. JG also featured on Vicki Bennett’s weekly Do Or DIY show last night on WFMU, debuting a rare DJ mix of his own material including an amazing cover of ‘Warm Leatherette’. You can listen to the archive here in a number of ways.
Vicki contributes to ‘The Sound of Fear’ (part 1) this weekend at the Purcell Rooms, London with a cut-up of horror films in her inimitable style. There may still be tickets left…
I could listen to this for ages, a simple yet fascinating idea, personalised for a number of North American cities, like a real time rolling KLF chill out piece.
New Jersey-based radio station WFMU is completely run by donations, each year they have a week long Marathon to raise money to keep the station operational. Their approach to music and breadth of programming is one of the best in the world. As they are paid for by the listeners they are not accountable to advertisers and the usual daytime radio playlists so many stations are. You can make a pledge and pick up some decent items in the process, I just got this Tim Biskup T-shirt for my troubles but over $75 gets you a handmade ‘DJ Premium‘, an artifact made specially for the marathon, usually a mix compilation of rareties or oddites.
Their Beware of the Blog pages are also crammed with so many audio treats it’s ridiculous. If you don’t know the station then now’s a good time to dive in, I mean, these guys let people like Steinski and Noah Uman have shows!
This little piece of history has been going viral over the last few weeks after being put up on Soundcloud by a user called mjs538.
*UPDATE: Another user: DJMOOG1 has put up a better quality version which I’ve embedded above.
Although not actually by mjs538, the pieces have a strange and convoluted history in themselves as well as portraying the history of pop music based on all the #1 hits in the US charts since 1958. Both mixes use up to 5 seconds of each and every #1 since the mid fifties, in order, up until 1981 in Part 1 and into the early nineties in Part 2. Whilst a herculean effort, even in this day and age of digital editing and online stores to source the material, it’s all the more impressive that the bulk of Part 1 was made in the late seventies using reel to reel tape and a razor blade.
The piece – known as ‘Time Sweep’ – was part of an extensive radio show called ‘The History of Rock n Roll’, made by Drake – Chenault Enterprises for radio in the US which utilized 52 hours to bring the first comprehensive history of rock music to the airwaves. Each year was prefaced with a medley of that year’s #1 hit singles (a ‘Chart Sweep’) and the whole was compiled into a ‘Time Sweep’ to end the mammoth series. The engineer responsible was Mark Ford (above), a veteran of radio jingles and production. He compiled and edited all the selections up until 1977, not only cutting and splicing but also EQing and time stretching sections to make them fit together sonically and selecting and pairing little couplets of lyrics at certain points – Roy Orbison‘s “Pretty woman, walking down the street”, segues into “there she was, just a walking down the street”.
For a little ‘behind the scenes’ info, check out this link on the making of the special
But the story doesn’t end there. For those paying attention, just after the Meco version of ‘Star Wars’ in Part 1, the sound quality noticeably changes in both the stereo field, quality and editing. The reason for this is that a teacher from Maryland University called Hugo Keesing extended and updated the concept of the Chart / Time Sweep for his classes as each year finished up until 1991. With all due respect to Keesing, he isn’t a sound engineer and it shows in the application of edits and production. This is where the piece stops being art and turns to documentation and, as such, loses the essence of its greatness. Keesing was using a Wollensack tape recorder to edit with and had no way to clean up or EQ the tracks. So, the majority of Part 1 is Mark Ford’s original (up until 1977) and then Keesing’s extension, which runs the entirety of Part 2.
Five Seconds Of Every #1 Pop Single Part 2 by mjs538
How this piece came into circulation on the web was via a tape with Keesing’s name on it that was passed to the Evolution Control Committee‘s Mark Gunderson in the 90’s and the piece was widely believed to have been by him in it’s entirety by the cut and paste fraternity unfamiliar with the History of Rock n Roll programme. Eventually Keesing was tracked down and you can read an interview with him over at Jon Nelson‘s ‘Some Assembly Required’ blog.
For a comprehensive overview of the whole story check here, there is also an update of the whole concept from 1993 to 2010 if you can’t get enough of this kind of thing.
I’ve just uploaded this from my archives to my Soundcloud account
The Shamen doing a Synergy mix live on Colin Faver‘s show on Kiss FM from 1991. It’s essentially DJ Sticker and (I think) Mixmaster Morris /The Irresistible Force with Mr C. MC-ing. Only about 50 minutes long, the only tape I had was a free one from a magazine so the last 10 minutes is cut off. An excellent selection of tracks if you can put up with C’s terrible freestyling and patter/patois :).
A pretty influential set for me in my student days when I first moved to London (as were Colin Dale and Colin Favor’s shows). It indirectly hooked me up with Coldcut and Ninja Tune as I went to a Shamen gig because of this, met Mixmaster Morris there and he put me in touch with Matt Black.
That old devil Steve Stein aka Steinski – who should need no introduction to readers of this blog – has been hard at work on the musical and spoken word front recently. Firstly, go to his site – Steinski.com – and download the monster of a spoken word podcast he’s made for New York’s WFMU station entitled ‘Walkin’ & Talkin’. It’s a wild and varied ride through all manner of spoken word material whether from the Beats’ hip poetry to Hip Hop or a surprising amount of British Pop from the 80’s. Steinski guides you through the whole thing and, if you’re so inclined, you can follow it up and watch a lot of it via the mammoth post he’s made on his site illustrating most of the content with YouTube clips. It’s a very rewarding 2 hours plus and I suspect the site content will take just as long to hoover up.
On the music-making front Stein has just given some new Dennis Coffey material the remix treatment, one track of which will be released as a 7″ on Record Store day. A full album of new material and covers by Coffey is coming on Strut on April 25th featuring contributions from Mayer Hawthorne, Paolo Nutini, Kings Go Forth, Mick Collins of the Dirtbombs and more. Check the cover referencing artwork too.