Tim's overflowing bounty of 2010 pop riches extravaganza thread

I would gladly paypal several dollars to the first ilxor that comes up with a script that blocks deej, whiney, and some dude from seeing each other's posts on any thread. I like reading each of them individually and they all bring something solid to the table, but jesus they bring out the worst in each other.

*hear

weve moved on jon

in this thread, maybe, but i think my comment pretty much stands in general for you three

ugh dont make it worse than it already was

and shortly afterwards gorgeous tribal percussion arrives, and it's like, "and I thought I was enjoying this before?"

^^ man so true

i much prefer the mark e remix of think twice, even if it's not as big a twist on the original. btw the original always reminds me a lot of "music sounds better with you"

The other massive highlight in Schwarz's live set was his (surprisingly machinic) edit of "Wanna Be Starting Something", though his remix of Emmanuel Jal's "Kuar" and his edit of Bill Withers "Who Is He (And What Is He To You)" also sounded amazing live.

i think the detroit exp version IS a distorted weird version of the donald byrd right??
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTpFpRqGFQg

"Flowerz" sample tim!

pretty sure the sax & tpt samples are from that ??

Serani - Skip To Ma Lou

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aArwuAPK1xA&feature=player_embedded#!

My big, belated dancehall discovery of 2010 was Serani, who I already knew obv but really really got into last year, via his two mixtapes The Future and The Future 2 (as at the time of writing I've yet to check out his official 2009 album No Games, out of some curious loyalty to the series I started with). Luckily for this Overflowing Bounty one of those mixtapes was actually released in 2010, and you should all go search it immediately. Love dude's slightly strained, habitually stressed-sounding emotional singing style, which conveys a certain intensity of enthusiasm - or paranoia, or heartsickness, or whatever the song calls for. And the great strength of his work is that the extremity of these moodswings allows his songs to seem much more diverse, stacked in a row, than they would with probably anyone else. I'm tempted to say that most of the time I like Serani in the paranoid/heartsick/whatever modes that allow his earnest wail to flower fully, but it's probably more true to say that Serani sounding aggrieved to the point of tears is just more mnemonic, more what immediately springs to mind when I think of the guy.

Because Serani in happy go lucky mode is also really awesome, as "Skip To Ma Lou" handily demonstrates. I get the impression this was his biggest hit from last year, although we're certainly not talking a hit of "Hold Yuh" style proportions, and I've never heard this tune in public, so I really have no way of knowing. But to me it sounds like a tune that should have been a massive crossover - not in the sense of "if there was any justice X would be a number one hit" where X is Wilco or some Scandavian pop duo or even Cassie, and the failure of this to occur is (in the speaker's opinion) an indictment of the tastes of the masses. Because masses, any masses, would surely like this tune, and its failure to be heard by those masses is a mere technicality. If I'm wrong about this, if it's actually the case that most people couldn't be fucking with a tune so unabashedly cheerful as "Skip To My Lou", please don't pierce my illusions.

But let's talk about things to like here:

1. The hype man shouting out cities around the world, and sounding increasingly flustered and uncertain of his world geography (e.g. "I'm talking about... (pause)... Israel!"), to the point that the question "What about Japan?" seems like more of a genuine question than perhaps it was meant.

2. "It's Serani! Oh na na na na na!" - unbeatable announcement of arrival by song's main star.

3. Its bouncy soca-ish piano groove. Singjay-dancehall in particular often does sound like soca but "Skip To Ma Lou" really captures the sun-rising optimism of the latter style pretty much perfectly.

4. The curiously wheedling quality to Serani's imploring attempts to get you onto the dancehall. Like, no really! Dancing is fun! Don't spoil my night!

5. Serani's white suit and white sunglasses in the video clip are super slick.

In fact the only thing remotely disappointing about this tune is that the dance move described by its title and chorus doesn't appear to involve the partner swapping maneuver implied. Which is kind of a shame because it'd be kind of fun for the tune's effervescence also to invite rampant promiscuity. On the other hand, it might despoil the song's sunshine innocence, and it might make it weird when Serani says that even little kids request it.

By the way Deej yeah I think you're right about Byrd/Detroit Exp.

Marcos Cabral & Shux - Lifetime Groove

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XX5xwoZbjMI

Many of my favourite newfangled (as in: from 2007 onwards) "disco edits" aren't really true to the original notion of a disco edit - when Todd Terje adds tribal percussion and swathes of dub echo and even the Diwali Riddim beat to 80s tunes like "Diamonds on the Soles of her Shoes" or "Walk Like An Egyptian", the phrase "disco edit" is deployed more for its associations with a certain revivalist sensibility than because there's anything about the product that can be distinguished from a full-fledged remix.

"Lifetime Groove" is a disco edit in the fullest sense, its horizon of possibility formed and constrained by the original tune - in this case, New Edition's "Once In A Lifetime Groove". Almost exactly twice the length of the 12 inch version of the New Edition original, the edit's singular qualities built on its relationships of more and less with its source material. "Lifetime Groove" is more in the sense of extending the tune's groove to the limits of endurance, its near twelve minutes unfurling with a glacial slowness speaking of patience, contentment and, above all, trust: trust that whatever is coming will arrive in its own sweet time, and at the exact right time.

It's less in the sense that Cabral and Shux deliberately deny themselves the full arsenal of weapons the original tune extends to them, choosing only those aspects considered most necessary (the rippling bass-driven post-discoid electro-R&B arrangement) and the most succulent (the most sweetly yearning falsetto vocal snatches), and then further denying themselves the chance of gorging on the most succulent selections, hiding the retained lead vocals as a fleeting appearance in the very centre of track, and surrounding them with aching expenses of instrumental groove punctuated only by the hymnal backing vocals "the sun goes up / the sun goes down / searching here / searching there."

And then again, it's more, because the unbeatably executed fusion of these two countervailing impulses - to expand out the groove while forestalling its climaxes almost indefinitely - makes "Lifetime Groove" the most consummately tantric piece of music I can think of offhand, its gradual accumulation of intensity more natural, more inevitable than ever before, until when the scintillating lead vocals erupt it's like a climax you couldn't have prevented even if you'd been warned. I don't think any music in 2010 made me feel as sheerly happy as this tune, as mystically assured that the human capacity to create (not singularly, but through building on others' achievements) something this eternal was somehow inextricably linked to an essential human capacity for goodness. "This kind of love is a once in a lifetime groove", New Edition sing, but this tune speaks not of scarcity or uniqueness but of plenitude, the promise that every desire will be met if you just extend yourself and wait.

ha, "skip to ma lou" is awesome -- i wanna say that it was a bit too kitschy to crossover to the US but "no games" was huge & it's no different thematically than "teach me how to dougie" or w/e -- oh well

yeah that new edition edit is basically the only '10 edit i played into the ground

I'm not familiar with the original but the sense of space in "Lifetime Groove" is beautiful.

I think it's maybe the only ridiculously long disco edit that also couldn't possibly be a second shorter than it is.

The original has all the same elements and is a great song but returning to it after the edit it feels rushed and unfinished.

i know the b-side is way inferior but i'd been looking for an instrumental of "club lonely" for a while so that 12" was a godsend

lifetime groove just possibly might be my favorite so far

With the exception of fantasia which I wrote about early, and the glee tune which was really just something I'd been thinking about, they're supposed to get roughly better as they go along.

how many more do we have to go!!!!

About 10.

At this rate it'll be going until April :-/

THE SUN COMES UP
THE SUN GOES DOWN

<3

Mr. F thanks for sharing this stuff, wow

"lifetime groove" is such a jam. one of those things you hear played out pretty often and never get tired of

Funkystepz ft. Louise Williams - Whispers
Rudimental ft. Adiyam & MC Shantie - Midnight Affair

One trope I'm wary of is that of the "good song" in dance music. This isn't just about hard techno or drum & bass or other genres whose engagement with songs is sparing at best - a slavish devotion to songs runs entirely ashore on those genres, and song-enthusiasts and genre-enthusiasts are left with little option except mutual rejection (not to say there aren't people who think that, say, Lamb are the pinnacle of jungle, but you can spot these types a mile off). More insidious - because more successful - is the celebration of good songs in populist vocal-friendly dance genres, of which the closest to my heart are 2-step and uk funky. It's because this brand of popism run amok can survive or even prosper by latching onto these genres that it does the most damage to people's attempts to get their head around what's actually going on: a viral inhibitor that lets you see just enough so as to allow you to think you see clearly.

Of course pop-minded dance music is full of good songs, and its songfulness is often one of its key attractions, so you could rightly wonder what I'm getting at. The thing in issue here is the form of goodness (or, rather, "attraction") in dance-pop. Really I'm not interested in any kind of dance-pop transcending its roots to make songs that work in any context: the very appeal of dance-pop is its rootedness, the way in which its pop-ambition struggles up out of a dense undergrowth of sonically loaded contextual specificity. Even at its most basic, universalist level - say, Robin S's "Show Me Love" - dance-pop is governed by the logic of the dancefloor, a dancefloor that, yes, has space for singing along and singing to one another as much as it does throwing moves, but nonetheless remains a physical space, a space where sound is first and foremost determined by its physical effects (and how empty would "Show Me Love" be without the specific buzzy desirousness of its bassline).

The critical language of dance-pop needs to remain mindful of this underlying truth that what constitutes a good song in (and for) a particular genre is in large part determined by the sound-values of that genre, that the hallmarks of the song (the big-chested diva, the uplifting chorus) are effectively sonic tricks to be deployed as ruthlessly and as precisely as an arpeggio or breakbeat. Instead of asking, "what is it about this dance-pop that makes us forget about its genre" we need to ask "what is it about this dance-pop that reminds one of its genre", how are the emphases on sonic rootedness and pop-universalism intertwining.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bry6gxGJVnY

These are two good songs.

"Whispers", in time-hounoured tradition, is a vocal mix of a previous instrumental tune, "Trinity Hill", which was a fine, stirring interstitial funky tune, its blurry piano chords and restless, endlessly ear-tickling beat combining to capture effortlessly the tense bounciness of funky, that sense of it as house on its toes, always tumbling forward over and over. As a tune, "Trinity Hill" isn't exactly groundbreaking - it's basically a straightforward combination of strobing piano house and the kind of airy percussive minimal deep tune that Sebo K might have played four years ago - but it was nothing if not likeable, an instant enlivener in any set.

On the vocal version, Louise Williams sings in a drifting, sighing manner that you could almost imagine her concocting on the spot, intuitively responding to the ebbs and flows in the groove. Undeniably, "Whispers" is a wispy song, but this is also its charm, its very tenuousness capturing a certain vibe of dreamy diva distraction, the eyes closed head back deliriousness of depth that the tune's "classic house" tropes always played with anyway. As a full-blown anthem or "tune of the summer" it fails utterly because it doesn't even go there: Louise or the producers or both understand that instead the role of the "song" here ultimately is to further draw out the scintillating interplay or elements. Nearly all the best Funkystepz vocal tunes - see also "For U" and especially "Lovers", released some time this year - have this same not-quite-coalesced quality, the vocal line itself a percussive counter-element flowing against rather than with the groove. It's almost like, if the vocals ever take on a life of their own independent of the beat, then something has gone wrong.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kA0wfeUVliQ

"Midnight Affair" is more typically songlike but hesitantly so, singer Adiyam seeming to put in the minimum effort necessary actually to carry the tune. Even more than on "Whispers", the vocal feels conscious of its necessary subordination to the groove, Adiyam (whose vocals are roughly comparable to Kyla's little-girl-grown-up sexiness, but as if Kyla was shaken awake and handed the microphone in bed) always arriving a beat or two late so as to give the rhythm a chance to announce itself. This is vital on "Midnight Affair" because the rhythm is so voluptuous, so delectable, a stabbing yet delicate take on funky's signature clave rhythm riddled (almost palsied) with micro-tics and hesitations, and a bassline that alternates between menacingly polite and absurdly flatulent.

Again, Adiyam's singing - dreamy, distracted, spare, filled with pauses that the beat is happy to fill - is relegated to the role of rhythmic counterpoint, even more literally than on "Whispers", the barely melodic bridge in particular seeming to drive home the explosions going on underneath. On both tunes, the vocals understand what many pop-minded listeners do not about uk funky: rather than somehow account for or mitigate the music's uncomfortable syncopation, they embrace it, intensify it. When MC Shantie's wordy, spaceless rap arrives the tentativeness of Adiyam's performance is thrown into sharp relief, its true purpose - to offer a variety of different, tensely restrained models for how to respond to the beat - laid bare, the tune itself at last succumbing to the almost unbearable desire to have something smooth to wrap itself around when everything else seems so fractured.

They're supposed to get roughly better as they go along.

― Tim F, Saturday, 5 February 2011 08:44 (3 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

how many more do we have to go!!!!

― gr8080, Saturday, 5 February 2011 20:16 (3 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

About 10.

At this rate it'll be going until April :-/

― Tim F, Saturday, 5 February 2011 20:43 (3 months ago) Bookmark

?? (are these on your fb & just haven't been c/pd or did u not end up writing them? or?)

It got too busy at work to keep doing them and not have it be painful, and there was less audience interest this year I think, maybe the meme had gotten old.

this meme never gets old! but no worries if you don't have time to do it any more.

^^^

maybe just release the rest as a list?

support this idea ^^^ i think ur underestimating audience interest unless u mean outside ilx?

yeah post the list!

i always feel these are wasted being just on ilx and fb, you should think of putting them somewhere proper tim.

im mostly a lurker but i always read this

same here, would love to see the rest of the list

I support the movement for publication of Tim F choice cuts. That bit on Adiyam is spot on.

Alright then. Counting down:

Silkie - 80s Baby
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xK5eyciIy8
At this point it's kind of offensive how underrated Silkie is. Because he really is the best, like, dubstep idealised. Like here, has stop-start riddimization ever been quite so shudderingly precise? Percussion banging it out of order.

Wretch 32 - Traktor (The Mike Delinquent Project Remix)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-B7L6suQtU
The grand return of 2-step! Don't fight it, feel it.

Lil' Boosie - Bottom To The Top
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkQy7o-u8KI
Fucking love Boosie, and never more so than when he's getting all soft (in this regard see also "Green Light Anthem". Adore the uplifting 80s boogie vibe on this one. Hope you get out dude.

Carnao - Get Out
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csh_-ioIcQs&feature=related
Like a private daydream haunted by shadows. Stand by prior claim of strong Terence Trent D'arby vibes on this one.

Tinie Tempah - Pass Out
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzvGKas5RsU
Who could resist Tinie?

Jamie Woon - Night Air
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL0pTo9Z_XU
Corny like all of y'all. Funny how I was obsessed with this but have listened to the album, like, twice.

Rihanna - The Only Girl In The World
http://chloeandeddie.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/9fe7c_afcb2739-448d-4062-9ffe-bd565d077c9e.jpg
So many nights. Private salute to Catherine on this one, which gets both of us all histrionic on the dancefloor.

Screama ft. Farah - Kiss Me
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5zVBRwEGZQ
So want to hang out with Farah. You can measure the precise brilliance of "Kiss Me" by the extent to which Titchy proclaims to be underwhelmed by it.

Benoit & Sergio - Full Grown Man
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVKhwa_zONY
Amniotic high. A certain autumnal elegance at work here (I even crafted a mixtape called "Boys of Autumn" around it).

Kingdom - Fogs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezVNFkGFMUE
Of all the overhyped R&B cut-ups in 2010, this is the one that stuck with me. Also thematically astute, offering the beautiful nightmare inside Beyonce's "Sweet Dream".

Vampire Weekend - White Sky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaTgDgCSh-w
Soz Lex.

T2 - Better Off As Friends (Lil' Silva Remix)

The very definition of apocalypse. If you're underwhelmed by Lil' Silva's stentorian sounds for the one-one, revisit this charming psycho-rave number.

Los Rakas - Abrazame (Uproot Andy Remix)

The part in the video clip where the young couple is dancing on the beach makes me happier than just about anything ever.

The Jacka & Laroo - Don't Be Scared

The feel goodiest of feel good vibes. Especially because it starts off so mournful-seeming.

The-Dream - Yamaha

Sometimes the Indie Choice is the Correct Choice. Though there's several other cuts you could sub in here. Love the way "still got your name tattooed on my back does a rainbow splay that's like the aural equivalent of MJ in the "Blame It On The Boogie" video.

Devine Collective - House Girls 6

That unholy racket.

Husalah - You Neva Know

Holds the record for the tune played and sungalong-to the most times in a row in 2010. Also, wow so pretty.

Yelawolf - Pop The Trunk
Score one for goth. Score one more for literalism in this video clip. Also this soundtracked a pretty dark time at work for me.

Diddy - Dirty Money - Ass On The Floor

Floods each and every one of my pleasure receptors. There's a moment in this - Kevin knows which - that is as fine as music gets.

Roll Deep - Green Light (Ill Blu Remix)

The most massive dance-pop ever made. You know Ill Blu are getting good when they compulsively restructure their source material to make it work better as pop music. But also, like, that beat!

Shy Child - Dark Destiny

I have so many private theories about this song, they change each time I listen, but all of them make me a bit weepy. Whatever "Dark Destiny" is about, exactly, it's clear that its emotional anchor is a love of others in spite of (because of?) their flaws. It's the most generous song of last year.

The Fives - It's What You Do

Amazingly, I didn't really pay great regard to this the first time I heard it. But then the video clip inspired incredibly strong feelings of good will in me, and then somethow the song saved/changed/justified my life. Now inexplicably tied in with memories of Spain.

Okay so ILX doesn't like me positng so many youtube links at once clearly.

Rihanna - The Only Girl In The World
http://chloeandeddie.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/9fe7c_afcb2739-448d-4062-9ffe-bd565d077c9e.jpg
So many nights. Private salute to Catherine.

T2 - Better Off As Friends (Lil' Silva Remix)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgDEqUeVSTE
The very definition of apocalypse.

Los Rakas - Abrazame (Uproot Andy Remix)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyujRXZ2Gms
The part in the video clip where the young couple is dancing on the beach makes me happier than just about anything ever.

The Jacka & Laroo - Don't Be Scared
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRXRvShQlWE
The feel goodiest of feel good vibes.

The-Dream - Yamaha
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRGGFjXUo4Q
Sometimes the Indie Choice is the Correct Choice. Though there's several other cuts you could sub in here. Love the way "still got your name tattooed on my back" does a rainbow splay that's like the aural equivalent of MJ in the "Blame It On The Boogie" video.

Devine Collective - House Girls 6
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDZceeoRZdI
That unholy racket.

Yelawolf - Pop The Trunk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=np3pU-dLok4
Score one for goth. Score one more for literalism in this video clip. Also this soundtracked a pretty dark time at work for me.

Diddy - Dirty Money - Ass On The Floor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90-SWwtpdZU
Floods each and every one of my pleasure receptors. There's a moment in this - Kevin knows which - that is as fine as music gets.

Roll Deep - Green Light (Ill Blu Remix)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyCEO4k3BXU
The most massive dance-pop ever made. You know Ill Blu are getting good when they compulsively restructure their source material to make it work better as pop music. But also, like, that beat!

Shy Child - Dark Destiny
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_SWeQCFTtg
I have so many private theories about this song, they change each time I listen, but all of them make me a bit weepy. Whatever "Dark Destiny" is about, exactly, it's clear that its emotional anchor is a love of others in spite of (because of?) their flaws. It's the most generous song of last year.

The Fives - It's What You Do
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOcefsTgbhE
Amazingly, I didn't really pay great regard to this the first time I heard it. But then the video clip inspired incredibly strong feelings of good will in me, and then somethow the song saved/changed/justified my life. Now inexplicably tied in with memories of Spain.

thx!!

today just got so much better! brb listening to all the music.