The Listening Club - 25th January 2015

Hello, good evening and wilkommen.

All right? Good. Yeah, I know, cold snow brrrr, most miserable time of year around these here parts and all that. Even Kraftwerk had to send out for extra de-icer to keep their robots moving smoothly last week. But still, open fires, toasting marshmallows, industrial-strength curries, snuggling under blankets etc... ya dig? Always something, and I'm glad for that.

Last week, lest we forget, @pamac66 was in the chair, and threw down a mighty fine mix from The Fort Knox Five, Volume 20 of their Funk The World series, which caught quite a few folks by surprise, and resulted in some serious Sunday shaking and slipper shuffling satisfaction. Many thanks to Paul for the pick, and flipping the frisb onwards to @holette, who will be here next week with her pick...

But now, and phew, here it comes.... Yes, it seemed like quite an innocent theme, this "two minutes or less" vortex, but the end result? Well... no spoilers, but I think we've levelled-up on this one folks. 67 tunes, 79 minutes. By 'eck. Tunes have been assembled in diminishing order of length (that's the longest ones first, eh?) apart from the intro and the outro. Quite astonished by some of the segues and blends that pure durational synchronicity have generated. As, I hope, you will be...

Direct download is here (link at top of the page), Mixcloud (haha, let's see you deal with this mr content recognition) stream is here.

See you at 8pm GMT. Bring vodka!

The Listening Club - 18th January 2015

Howdy folks,

Hope you're all doing swell. Positive energy abounds here in Amsterdam despite the winter freeze after seeing Kraftwerk perform "Radio Activity" last night at the Paradiso as part of their Catalog shows. First time they've played in that venue since 1976, fact fans.... and first time I've seen them with the 3D visuals which are seriously impressive. A phenomenal show, indeed.

Back on planet #lc, as you well know, #vortex discussions were had, and the #twominutesorlessvortex (or #tmolvortex ?) has been decided and will happen next Sunday. So I'm looking for short tunes - as short as you like, but no longer than 120 seconds. As I mentioned on the tweets, if you're going to go for really, really short, then feel free to send a bunch, but try not to go over 4-5 minutes or so in total otherwise I think we'll be risking collective brain-fry...

Last week, oh yeah, it was me with the frisbee, which led to Timber Timbre's ace "Hot Dreams" album, which went down very well indeed, I'm glad to report. Despite not doing much tweeting, the knowledge that @pamac66 was applying brush to canvas through the playback made me smile, so the frisbee was spun in his direction. Happily he accepted, so here he is with this week's intro...

"First off, I feel a bit of a fraud being asked to host Listening Club this week when I hardly contributed to the proceedings last week. I was listening (honest) and loved EC's pick but I was too busy to tweet - sorry.

But, hey, it's not often I get to listen at all on a Sunday these days. As for setting one - it seems an annual event for me.

So, what have I chosen for you?

When I heard that I was setting this week I knew straight away which album I would pick. It's been on my phone for ages and I love it. It's by a group of DJs/musicians/producers based in Washington DC. But, in doing a bit of research about them I found some mixes that they've put together. I'm currently going through these mixes and when I heard this one I thought you'd all love it too.

My last couple of picks have been hit and miss affairs so hopefully this'll go down better. Enjoy."

Okaydoke. Direct download is here (link at top of the page), Mixcloud (may well say nasty things about your mother) stream is here.

See you at 8pm GMT!

The Listening Club - 11th January 2015

Hey hey hey,

Ah, holiday time winds down and bleak midwinter beckons; here in Amsterdam it's been blowing a mighty gale, much to the annoyance of cycle-parkers city-wide. Despite that, it's a good time of year to be in the city, as tourist levels are at their lowest, and stay-at-home-ness is at it's mostest, making for very calm, quiet streets to wander through (mighty gales notwithstanding)...

Looking at the calendar I see we have a #vortex coming up a little sooner than expected, thanks to 1st Feb falling on a Sunday, so I'll be coming amongst you later this evening with the ideas plate, fishing for contributions - feel free to chip one in if you have one.

Last week @faberfedor was back in the chair, playing with everyone's heads as usual with the instrumental version of The Beatles "Sgt. Pepper", which led to some very interesting revelations and, yes, quite a bit of singing along... Thanks to FF for the pick, and for flipping the frisbee across to, well, me. So here I am with the intro... (*quickly dons wig & fake moustache*)

"Ahem. In true #LC style I thought I had this one nailed immediately, but over the course of the week, as always, a ton of additional options presented themselves, all of which seemed like they'd do the trick splendidly. Unable to decide, and very close to rolling a dice or picking one at random, I thought it best to wait till the day to see what kind of mood I was in. Last night was filled to bursting with Belgian beer and retro soul and funk till the early hours, so today I'm not surprisingly on a mellower tip, therefore a mellower selection you all get, m'kay?

Don't want to say too much by way of intro about this one, which popped up in a playlist of albums from last year that passed me by at the time, but within half-a-minute of track one starting, the spider-sense was seriously tingling. Fine playing, great songwriting, a characterful singer, excellent production and bucketloads of atmosphere. The only bad thing about this album is it doesn't seem long enough, but hey, it's their 5th one, so you've got plenty to dig back into if you feel so inclined, and I reckon you will.

Hope you enjoy..."

Okaydoke. Direct download is here (link at top of the page), Mixcloud (may well say nasty things about your mother) stream is here.

See you at 8pm GMT!

The Listening Club - 4th January 2015

Happy new year folks! Hope you all achieved a satisfactory NYE experience, whatever you were up to. Amsterdam went off with a bang as usual (being the only day that folks can set fireworks off, hemhem), and boy am I ever glad of this lil' old extended weekend for restorative purposes. Can't help feeling all "back to skool" tho, but hey, into the breach and all that...

Last week saw the annual cavalcade of audio awesomeness and drunkenness, the #festivevortex, and, as usual was one of finest, widest ranging selections the one could ask for. Big thanks to everyone for chipping in tunes, tracklist is in the comments of last week's post if you missed it!

Back to our regularly scheduled entertainment, and @FaberFedor is back in the chair, grinning from ear to ear no doubt, as he leans over and says...

"Last time in #listeningclub...

The lovely @eastvanhalen helped closed out the old year with a new album not three months old, then we followed it up with a #festivevortex again, of new songs. 

I've decided to do the opposite (surprise!); I'm starting the New Year with an old album.

Some might call it a classic.

You've all heard this album before (and if you haven't, GTFO), but this time, I want you to really listen to the music; approach this album as if you've never heard it before. It will be difficult, believe me, but if you do, you'll realize that there are subtleties you never really heard before.

Don't sing. Don't tap your foot. Just listen to the music."

Rightyho. Direct download is here, Mixcloud (may well piss on your chips) stream is here.

See you at 8pm GMT!