Darlene Love - Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)
As many of you will know, I saw Steely Dan live a month or two ago. Their touring band is smoking hot - three lovely backing singers, a Grand piano, and a four piece horn section all feature. Their trumpet player is Michael Leonhart. He has been with the Dan since 1996, both in the live band and as their arranger, performer, and conductor on Two Against Nature and it's follow-up Everything Must Go. As a solo artist Michael has released six albums. He won a Grammy at the age of 17. He has performed and/or recorded with many acts, including A Tribe Called Quest, Arto Linsday, Bill Frisell, Bill Withers, Brian Eno, Busta Rhymes, Caetano Veloso, David Byrne, Henry Mancini, James Brown, John Barry, Joshua Redman, Lenny Kravitz, Levon Helm, Mark Ronson, Michael McDonald, Mos Def, Todd Rundgren, and Wynton Marsalis. He recorded with Yoko Ono as a featured member of the Plastic Ono Band for her 2009 album Between My Head and the Sky, and appears on upcoming albums by Sharon Jones and the Dapkings, Foreigner, Sean Lennon, and Yuka Honda.
Jacksonville FL's DJ NickFRESH is my interwebs friend. I have never met the dude in person, but we have bonded over music via this blog. We like a lot of the same stuff - he has eclectic taste like me. Years ago he asked me to post Doot Doot by Freur, a relatively obscure '80s track. I was happy to oblige and the rest is interwebs friendship history. He makes cool little mini mixes you can listen to on his YouTube page. He also runs a Soul Train fan group. You can follow him on Twitter. If you're ever in Jacksonville and he's spinning be sure to check it out. Here is his latest "Late Night Mix - #3" for your audio happiness...
The Rakes have decided to call it quits. A statement from the band reads:
I woke up this morning to a world blanketed in white. Yikes! The trees haven't even fully changed color and winter has decided to stop by early. This calls for heat, so here is a hot S-File electro mix filled with faves from Miike Snow, Boys Noize, Fever Ray and more to keep you warm and happy!
One of my favorite '80s acts is Echo & the Bunnymen. What has proven amazing about the band is how they have managed to keep making records and touring for the last twenty plus years. Even more amazing is the fact that these later year albums don't suck. The last year has seen the band playing it's 1985 classic Ocean Rain at the Royal Albert Hall, with similar shows following shortly after in New York at Radio City Music Hall and the massive new arena in their native Liverpool. The sell outs garnered great reviews. And now comes a brand new record, "The Fountain", out on October 12th in the UK. The band are also touring the US in late October & early November.
Synth pop duo Junior Boys are touring the US and Canada during Oct/Nov in support of their latest album Begone Dull Care. There is also a new single coming this fall on Domino Records, featuring Modeselektor and Prins Thomas remixes of “Bits and Pieces” and “Work”. The label sent an mp3 of the very tasty Prins Thomas remix for your auditory pleasure...
Strut's celebration of Ze Records' rich catalog, Ze 30: Ze Records Story, is a great snapshot of some of the influential label's classic jams - and it's been in heavy rotation @ SIART for the last month or so. I've always loved Ze's mix of rock and funk and disco and soul and post-punk and the truly diverse and cool roster of bands. UK DJ and remix artist Leo Zero sheds light on even more quality tracks on his great promo mix, the Ze 30 Mix. It includes several tracks not featured on the Ze 30 compilation. The mix also acts as a window into Strut's next collaboration with Ze - an album of DJ edits of Ze tunes. It will include edits from Leo Zero, as well as Pilooski, Todd Terje, Rub N Tug, Idjut Boys, Optimo, & many more - out later this year on Strut. In the meantime get yer groove on to this great 30 minute mix of tunes!
My new favorite band in the whole world is the Afro-futurist four piece BLK JKS. From Johannesburg and Soweto, South Africa, these guys take the progressive rock blueprint and twist it and turn it until they have made it their own. TV On The Radio is a good reference point, but BLK JKS expand on the sound, adding township blues, avant jazz (with horns supplied by the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble) and edgy dub to their art rock/post punk brew. 
Idle Hands - Cosmic Dancer
Jumbonics - Last Night
This week brings the release of the new Joakim album Milky Ways. It is a fine, fine album that mashes up disco, post-punk, psychedelia, electro, new wave, exotica and old school computer music and a whole bunch more into a cohesive package. Kind of like the sweet mix he has made to commemorate the album release. John Foxx, Vanessa Paradis, SPK and The Beatles all rolled into one? Yes please! Sound clash mix up of classics and current killers? You got it! Enjoy...
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The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart - Higher Than The Stars (Saint Etienne Visits Lord Spank Remix)
The Dynamites feat. Charles Walker - If I Had Known
As many of you already know, I saw Steely Dan in Chicago a couple of weekends ago. It was the Chicago Theater - smallish, intimate, the perfect venue. Suffice it to say the band was smokin'. They played the classic Aja in it's sequential entirety, and then proceeded to romp through 14 gems from the extensive back catalog. Donald Fagen is a great band leader, orchestrating the 13 strong back up band while pounding on his Fender Rhodes or strolling the stage tootling his melodica. The crowd got boisterous and the band fed off of it - I've seen the Dan 3 times now and I've never seen so much interaction between Donald, Walter Becker and the crowd. Drummer Keith Carlock is a force to be reckoned with, capable of both extreme precision and loose grooves. Some of his solos were blisteringly good, as were those of the horn section and guitarists. All round worth the big dollars. The full set list is posted below, as well as a few clips of the show that I found on YouTube, all pretty decent in quality. Listen to some Dan songs here.
(Photo by me on theiPhone)
