My Life In Records

I discovered when I was a kid that I could re-play entire albums in my head if I had spent enough time with them. Odelay was the first one I remember "listening" to all the way through, no skips. The phrase "turn(s) shit to gold" comes from Mutations but best describes Odelay. 

Another Dust Brothers-produced album, another album from Los Angeles. I've heard the artistic vision came from Matt Dike, who sort of faded into the background afterwards, and was in a bathrobe most of the time during. I like that this record is a party album that is equally suited to washing dishes or driving. Another Dust Brothers-produced album, another album from Los Angeles. I've heard the artistic vision came from Matt Dike, who sort of faded into the background afterwards, and was in a bathrobe most of the time during. I like that this record is a party album that is equally suited to washing dishes or driving. 

We had a bit of an awakening upon moving to New York-- we realized that all the samples from Doomsday we thought were weird an obscure are just plain ubiquitous here.  On the street, in the grocery store, easy to be found. MF DOOM is a genius. 

Young, brilliant super-talents creating during one of the golden eras of recorded music, in a period of cultural and political unrest, surrounded and helped along by the progenitors of the Tropicalia movement in Brazil...Their recordings have more beauty and playfulness than any I can think of. 

I was thinking that if Picasso was able to pay for expensive meals by doodling on the receipt, Dilla could have done the same with his beat vignettes, battery-powered turntable and mini-sampler. What I appreciate about Donuts that may not already have been said is that it is its own language. There are messages embedded in there. To express heartbreak, love, work, death, and playfulness without taking a breath and all through the less-than-human technology of the sampler is a true achievement. I wish it could have been the first of a long serial release, like War and Peace! 

Sometimes a record puts you in the room where it was made. This record was made in Los Angeles (this is becoming a trend), and is like falling asleep mid-day to the sound of your friend singing along to Mexican radio. 

Kenneth Higney was a guy also who recorded these songs in 1976, first take best take method, as a means to showcase his song writing abilities. Savant lines like, "When you sign your name / It's an autograph / When you speak your mind / It's a paragraph... No I can't love a woman like that" point to his child-like brilliance.

This album has a huge effect on my mood.  I was driving a reclaimed cop car through rural Oregon and listened to Rae and Ghost with rapt attention. By the end the album I was driving uncontrollably and had begun chastising slow Oregon drivers with the car's inherited cop horn ("bwoop bwoop!")... I had become mad with power. George pulled me over promptly and gently commandeered the vehicle. 

I was lying down on what I think is called a divan, wearing a bathing suit, listening to music on mushrooms. George came in the room and said, "What the hell are you listening to?" and proceeded to put on The Dixie Cups. It was perfect-- dry drums, relaxed harmonies, light subject matter, spring reverb. 

While living in Bushwick one summer, my roommate and I discovered Slim Whitman sounds best when you take the pitch as far down as the turntable will allow. It slows down all the reverbs and takes his high falsetto parts down to mid-range.