unkle. c/d

"psyence fiction" > "third"

discus

Both have pretty great production, Third has much better vocals and lyrics.

BITCH NIGGA WITH THE AUDACITY TO BLASPHEME ME

James Lavelle was pretty upset at being called that.

i've listened to third maybe ... 50 times this year? or more? and i don't remember any lyrics except the portugese bit about the rule of three.

I kind of agree, but Portishead lyrics are helped by not being at least in part written by Mad Rick. I would take Gibbons on Third over any of the vocal performances on Psyence Fiction, personally.

kool g rap > your life

"i'ma break it down in the unkle style / drums of death that are worth your while" - mike d

gibbons' foetal mewling is way overrated

xpost That track also featuring Jason Newsted :-)

http://www.metallicaworld.co.uk/images/logos/12.gif

http://www.mowaxplease.com/dear-james-lavelle/

I have a friend with nearly every Mo'Wax release. Most of what's there is actually worth owning, but it's sad because if you lay them out in a line it makes an arrow that points to Lavelle's ongoing wankery.
― mike h. (mike h.)

missed this at the time. LOL!

i am only at like 75% of the catalogue

i really like the early unkle EPs / remixes and psyence fiction. and some of the dj mixes are great too. but i stopped paying attention awhile ago

hearing this for the first time now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVM_a785e_o

http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/29/11320786/artist-and-repertoire-dj-shadow-documentary-interview-unkle-sxsw-2016

Psyence Fiction was in constant rotation in my high school car, but I could never really get into anything that unkle or dj shadow put out after that. not sure if they got worse or if i just moved on or something

the world passed them by a bit. there is so much 90's stuff that nobody listens to anymore. it will take future generations to unearth it.

that sounds good, i love frustrated musician movies.

no trailer for the movie. i think for a lot of those guys the answer would have been to reinvent themselves as celebrity DJs and play obscure library funk tracks and garage rock or something. be the venerable legend. people pay money for that. trying to stay current is hard when you got famous for your dusty beats and samples. (maybe those guys did DJ a lot in the 2000s, i have no idea...)

I feel kinda bad for DJ Shadow. He can't really do the thing he used to do that he was amazing at (although I feel like the climate around samples has relaxed again, unless you're making Kanye/Jay-Z money? But he's still done it many times over already, and doesn't want to be retro.). He's released recent tracks without samples that are really well produced, but that sort of make him just another Soundcloud trap/EDM producer.

He did do a big DJ tour a couple of years ago where he was playing all current music (beat scene, footwork, etc), that was cool.

too future

http://pitchfork.com/news/49027-listen-dj-shadow-shares-the-too-future-mix-that-got-him-kicked-offstage-in-miami/

lol damn that sounds horrible

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSVeqb6-NWU

miami bass mix shadow did for the bbc as unkle promo in 98 is still great if anyone's never heard

I saw James Lavelle DJ back in 01/02ish. He was a prick and the set was horrible. Basically he played really obvious progressive house and tech house. That night instantly ended any concern I had for him or his music.

Psyence Fiction has really grown on me over the years, i like the songs i didn't use to like. i think maybe my estimation of it is higher since shadow's output got less and less good after it came out.

i'm a disgusting richard ashcroft stan, however.

did anybody listen to that multi-disc "the four track years" set of pre-endtroducing stuff?

jeez there's this thing too:

https://www.discogs.com/DJ-Shadow-Total-Breakdown-Hidden-Transmissions-From-The-MPC-Era-1992-1996/master/463345

(maybe those guys did DJ a lot in the 2000s, i have no idea...)

Shadow continued to tour a lot, alternating live-ish shows playing his own stuff with high concept four-deck DJ sets in collaboration with Cut Chemist. 2014-15 they were touring with [selections from] Afrika Bambaata's own record collection, so you could hear the same skips and pops that a 1981 audience did, but mixed and scratched elaborately.

Lavelle's DJ sets used to be him smoking while between 1 and 3 of the Psychonauts mixed records; he started mixing himself in the '00s to universally terrible reviews. And formed a semi-consistent lineup of UNKLE for the first time, that played doomy rock music, and toured with that. Presumably smoking while someone else played keyboards.

I actually really liked the last (?) "doomy rock" album they put out.

I bought the first Unkle album because of the hype, but it turned out to be indie rock instead of the sort of instrumental rap/blunted beats Mo' Wax had put out before. (The only good track was the first one with actual rapping.) Didn't fall for that trap again.

That doc sounds like it could be genuinely interesting. Saw Lavelle DJ about 2005 under protest, it was crap, but he managed to pack out a normally quiet venue.

i will never be able to thank that guy enough for the major force vinyl box that he put out. it's one of my prized possessions and i will be buried with it in my tomb. such an inspiration to me to this day. also, i had no idea he was 18 when he started the label! that impressed me.

Yeah, that Major Force box is one of the top 10 compilations of all time.

the 'Superstar DJs' book reminded me what a kicking the first Unkle album got in some places. from the book; ".. he was crestfallen. those reviews hurt. worse, deep down he knew they were right.. then everything started to go wrong.." good book all told. cautionary tales left right and centre.

Ah, I'd forgotten about Psychonauts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJXcO9h5zH4

i think for a lot of those guys the answer would have been to reinvent themselves as celebrity DJs and play obscure library funk tracks and garage rock or something.

i would suggest that shadow, along with cut chemist, actually kickstarted the lost library/funk/garage mixtape groove thing off with the (still brilliant) brainfreeze releases.

oh, and for the record, i really like the doom goth grooves of war stories/where did the night fall/another night out.
if its a guilty pleasure for nick cave, then it is good for me.
the mix of electronics, guitars, bad moods, ian astbury, and bowie samples is always going to tickle my sweet spot.
in fact, i listen to the instrumental versions of the albums more than the guest stuffed versions - they sound amazing.
i care not that james supposedly does sweet fa in the studio/live.
he is the person putting it all together and using his address book to get to the end result.

all that said, as someone who has followed the story for a long time, its clear that he has struggled,
and the current state of the kickstarter campaign, comes as no shock.
i was very tempted to join in, but was worried it would end up like this.

tl:dr = i would like to see this film.

wonder if i still have dj shadow-era unkle live sets somewhere. lots of interpolation of album tracks, the samples, scratching, some of his own material

i mean, with a couple exceptions, that first unkle album was basically endtroducing 2 plus vocals with james lavelle sitting around telling shadow which samples to use. after he bailed, it was lavelle standing around behind different dudes, like sic said

I really liked this mix at the time, no idea how it holds up: https://www.discogs.com/Psychonauts-The-Time-Machine-A-MoWax-Restrospective-Mix/master/33010

even after all this time i have never seen a cd copy of that mix in a shop.

Musically, I always considered Psyence Fiction to be right there with Endtroducing.

oh, and while everyone thinks that others did all the work,
other than that mix, the psychonauts didn't exactly score big with their own material.
the same could be said for richard file.
so, yes, james was the wired or fugged to max studio layabout,
but it seems he knew how to get the good stuff out of his collaborators.

I think that cd is pretty rare? my friend was one of those mo'wax beardo types who owns nearly every one of the releases

its very rare.

the mo'wax aftermarket must be in a slump, on discogs:
13 For Sale from $11.31

oh wait, that's on vinyl (?!)
£15.00 for cd

£15 is a lot for those of us that live in the world of zoverstocks.

oh, and just for the record, the UNKLE vs QOTSA stuff is ace.

but it seems he knew how to get the good stuff out of his collaborators.

motivating others was always his skill, from selling records in a shop to signing acts to his not-yet-existent label to hustling Mo'Wax releases to the press.

also see Alex Paterson, very nearly as musically and technically incompetent as Lavelle, yet no matter who he's working with, the end result sounds distinctively like The Orb and not that person's other work.

did George Clinton do anything practical in terms of music-making once the Parliaments stopped being a harmony group? either way, his array of insanely talented players rarely wrote a stunning or memorable song outside of his orbit