theo parrish s/d

looking forward to this appearing on my year end list again...

http://www.discogs.com/release/955865

C1 Twisted Friskie Biscuits

did he retitle this track or remove it altogether?

A question: is the sound on the Ugly Edits bootlegs OK? Presumably they were just mastered from the original white labels, rather than a proper master so I'm thinking not. They're much cheaper, though!

the original ugly edits sound kinda poopy as theyre just recordings of records chopped and sampled into low bit rate samplers. boots of them sound even poopier. if you can get the OGs, get them.

So are any of the Ugly Edits currently available from places like Forced Exposure (these: http://www.forcedexposure.com/labels/sound.signature.html) "legitimate"? How can one really tell? For instance, this one (http://www.discogs.com/release/123113) is obviously one of the bootlegs, but are the ones with the spray painted catalog numbers the real thing?

"but are the ones with the spray painted catalog numbers the real thing?

-- matt2"

yes, those ones are real. the first batch of 1-5 did not have spraypainted numbers on them, i have 4 and 5 as straight up white labels and i know 1-3 came that way as well. then from 6 on, they did the spray paint for all of them, as well as the second batches of 1-5 (which is where i got my originals of #1-3). afaik, none of them have been repressed in at least 3 years now.

Thanks for the info pipecock. I've got downloads of most all of them, and just haven't made myself pay the $17+ per 12" for the vinyl yet. I wanted to make sure get the real ones when I did.

what are you guys even talking about? it's not like TP paid for those samples and I wouldn't be surprised if random people reissued it seeing how easy & lucrative it can be. I like some of those OK but the whole thing was kinda sordid from the start.

i only have 7 and 10 i think? maybe its not ten. which one has 'journey to the light'?

what are you guys even talking about? it's not like TP paid for those samples

I think the questions were just meant to be about sound quality, not sampling & bootleg ethics

i.e. if you buy a boot of a boot does it sound like shit

"what are you guys even talking about? it's not like TP paid for those samples and I wouldn't be surprised if random people reissued it seeing how easy & lucrative it can be. I like some of those OK but the whole thing was kinda sordid from the start.

-- blunt"

well, no matter what the legal aspects are, the original Ugly Edits were relatively bad sounding. the bootlegs of them (recorded from vinyl) sound even worse. and people try to pimp them off as originals, which means you are paying more for a worse product.

anyway, why does your irritation extend only to the Ugly Edits? nearly all of the early KDJ and Sound Signature records are basically illegal disco edits, they just have a color label on them. who cares? bootleg edits are part of the culture, deal with it.

illegal edits are the unsung heroes (well, maybe not anymore) of dance music. i'm no theo parrish scholar, but some of my favorite things by him are the underground cd-r dj mixes he did. the edits are like condensed versions of those.

blunt, I understand what you're saying, but that's why I said "legitimate". Cause I had heard before that the bootlegs (of these already rough sounding bootleg-ish edits) had even worse sound quality.

those mixes are the bawm. yeah I think the ugly edits are vastly overpriced. the early kdj/ss releases are generally too rearranged to be considered edits, in a typical or reverent sense IMO, they're often stripped to bare loops of a disco break.

xpost I'm not really worried about the sound of those records, as you guys can tell by now. crank that mutha up & eq the hell out of it!

my favorite ugly edits are the wonky ones a la d.byrd loop/"got a match?" dialogue etc

I've had the 2xCD version for five days now, and I'm pretty much ready to go ahead and declare it a masterpiece. He definitely made it to be listened to as an album, shortening and mixing together many of the previously released tracks and with interludes/bridges all over the album. And while I absolutely want the new tracks to be released on vinyl, I'm glad that he released all of this as essentially two mixed cds. Of the new stuff, I have to say that "Black Music (I Love You)", "Love Triumphant" (this one may easily become an all-time favorite), "Sundown Town", and "The Interplanetary Gangster Edit". Incredible release.

Um, this part:

Of the new stuff, I have to say that "Black Music (I Love You)", "Love Triumphant" (this one may easily become an all-time favorite), "Sundown Town", and "The Interplanetary Gangster Edit".

Should be:

Of the new stuff, I have to say that "Black Music (I Love You)", "Love Triumphant" (this one may easily become an all-time favorite), "Sundown Town", and "The Interplanetary Gangster Edit" really stand out.

i saw him out two weekends ago, the last hour or so of his set was just straight theo productions, new and old. he really is an exceptional dj, even if his mixing can be pretty iffy

Yes I agree. I've only seen him dj once, but spotless mixing is really not the point (neither in his dj sets nor his productions actually). He has an incredible way of making you move, though.

"a slow lurching shuffley house groove replete with out of time massively swung hi hats and a guy singing "we're going downstairs, we're going downstairs" or something for like 15 minutes."

assuming you figured this out by now?

my question is: why should i care? is this when theo jumps the shark?

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y83/unclebutta/TheoHuxtablemessedupshirtCosbyShow.jpg

alright, alright! i jumped, ok?

"assuming you figured this out by now?

my question is: why should i care? is this when theo jumps the shark?

-- moonship journey to baja"

what are you talking about?

we're going downstairs? who cares?

I'm as dedicated to Theo as one can be and I have to agree with vahid on this one. I'm pretty certain I wish "Goin Downstairs," "Stomp Yo Feet," and maybe even "The Interplanetary Gangster Edit" were all dubs. In each of these, I feel like the vocals distract from what the track is doing and don't really add anything of interest (to me). Still really like the album, but I realized yesterday that I want those three to not have the vocal stuff going on. That is decidedly not the case with "They Say" and "Soul Control" however.

so the CD labeled "CD 1" contains the tracks labeled "CD 2" in the booklet, and vice versa

does that make mine collectible?

Nah, I think they're all like the vahid. Discogs mentions it and mine's that way too.

wow, i don't know what to say about that but that "going downstairs" track is completely bananas. i think it was Rick Wilhite who dropped it at DEMF last year, it was one of the highlights of the festival. at the time, i didn't know who it was that did it, it was only when the CD came out that i finally could ID it. it is a dancefloor monster.

Don't get me wrong, I still love the track just not the vocals.

finally got my fancy stereo unpacked and set up after moving, had the first chance to listen to the new album in an, uh, acoustically favorable setting (ie not on an ipod, car stereo or boombox) ... and fuck, it's goooood.

"love triumphant" is incredible, but i couldn't even *hear* the african percussion until now. definitely a devil-in-the-details type of track.

wow @ "cry freedom" speech in "sundown town"

Yeah, "Love Triumphant" has definitely ascended to the upper echelon of Theo tracks in short order. Still loving the album as a whole.

Just in case interested parties haven't seen this, here's another potentially controversial statement from Theo: http://www.moodmat.com/?p=977

Pipecock's blog has some discussion here:
http://infinitestatemachine.com/2008/07/14/interesting-interview-with-theo-parrish/

Dissensus has some discussion here:
http://www.dissensus.com/showthread.php?t=7992

"The curtain that supposedly hides all this is the bullshit illusion that dance music has no race, no gender, that its about the celebration of some sort of utopian concept. This mere notion wasn’t even circulated until some white folks were made to feel uncomfortable at a party they had no business being at, and came face to face with the fact that this music like all other music is originated on african/black experience, and that perhaps they were very much like every other Elvis and Eminem that ever came or went, That perhaps they too, are tourists, but they still want to be superstar-dj-such-and-such."

I love Theo like crazy but really dude WTF

"this music, like all other music, is originated on african / black experience" - whatever dude.

No one on ILX really believes this, right?

Ronan weighs in: http://ronanfitzgerald.net/houseisafeeling/2008/07/15/theo-parrish-interview/

If Assholes Could Fly This Place Would Be An Airport

nice work ronan

i do enjoy theo's pts about using afros on album covers and sending bitten work to the artists you bite from as a 'tribute' tho

Ronan, do you write for White Guilt Monthly?

Not to derail this fine thread about Theo and his music, but really, reading that, I didn't know whether to laugh or feel sorry for you.

The only climbdown from all this relativism is that I think a black person really does have more of a right to comment on cultural appropriation or discrimination than a white person

What about a white Jew? How about a white homosexual?

why are you even reading this thread

I don't feel guilty about being white, just a bit cautious about commenting on what a black person should think about how they are treated by white people.

I know that raises issues of sitting on the fence, I don't like either position to be honest.

What do you think about the Theo piece Mr Airport? It's pretty easy to criticise in this without setting out a stall.

I love Theo (though not feeling the new one as much as some folks here) despite his dumb ass opinions. I ain't mad at him. House music needs shit disturbers. I'm glad he's expressing himself, at the very least.

really the question is why the fuck would anyone want to appropriate anything from Jews?

as a homo, i sometimes get a little miffed that people have no fcking clue about the real roots of a lot of disco and house music, but as long as those performing it do-- dude from Hercules and Love Affair has done interview with BUTT magazine, for example-- i can't care less.

that said, i agree with theo about a lot of what he says.

House music needs shit disturbers. I'm glad he's expressing himself, at the very least.

people keep saying this, and maybe it's true, but the so called shit disturbers in dance music almost always end up just backing up dumb negative opinions instead of dumb positive ones.

why can't we have a few genuine contrarians who come out and combine diametrically opposite views and genuinely challenge people....in techno a "shit disturber" seems to be any one of the 100 producers a year who does some bitchy interview about the genre du jour, OR A GUY FROM DETROIT.

sounds like one paranoid ass motherfucker that got baited by theakston into putting some dumb generalizations on the record

who is theakston anyways? if you're gonna do a "one question interview" aka give him a good rope you should at least insert a byline.

i think that the UR guys are shit disturbers to the max, and though they certainly have similar talking points to theo's, they're much more positive and inclusive.

I totally disagree.....I think it's a stuck record.

what's more....these guys ARE the status quo! they are the shit! (no negative aspersions intended)