Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowell, Kim Hunter, glow sticks, disco ball, turntables, DJ...you know you want to watch:
Directed, Edited, Concept by Brad Hasse (www.bradhasse.com)
Visual Effects and Design by EP*Vision (www.epvision.tv)
East Pleasant Pictures (www.eastpleasant.com)
Showing posts with label remix/mix. Show all posts
Showing posts with label remix/mix. Show all posts
Thursday, August 04, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Friday, March 18, 2011
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Viral Video Russian Singer Eduard Khil and Remix
Okay, after resisting the weirdness that is this Eduard Khil video piece making the rounds (Ed-roll, it's the new Rick-roll), I finally give in, but also throw in my favorite (so far) remix.
The New York Daily News has a good background on him and the song HERE.
And, of course, there's a blog for him HERE (I haven't tried the link to download the song).
The New York Daily News has a good background on him and the song HERE.
And, of course, there's a blog for him HERE (I haven't tried the link to download the song).
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Mashup Hall of Fame Part 1
Posting the Avatar/Pocahontas mashup reminded me of a couple of great mashups, so I thought I would throw them out there even though they are old. The first one is not safe for work due to the song lyrics, but it is clever on so many levels. I forwarded this to Andrew Sullivan as he was posting things about the Kirk/Spock "bromance" of the original Star Trek, and he posted it as this mashup takes it to a higher level. It is a play on the Star Trek episode where Spock begins to lose control of his emotions because he is entering a mating cycle. The enterprise tries to return to the planet Vulcan in time for Spock to take part of the ritual before he loses his mind and all control. The fan who created this threw in a couple of seconds of porn and remixed it to Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" with video effects and it is brilliant.
This more professional trailer mashup was also great, combining Ten Things I Hate About You with The Ten Commandments:
This more professional trailer mashup was also great, combining Ten Things I Hate About You with The Ten Commandments:
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Mr. Fingers "Can You Feel It" (Martin Luther King remix)
When Larry Heard (aka Mr. Fingers) put out "Can You Feel It" in 1986 it was very popular and influential in house music circuits. I can only imagine what it would have felt like to be on the floor of the Warehouse when this 1988 remix hit, using Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Rickrolled by way of Nirvana? [an epic mashup]
A subversive Rickroll mashup by Dj Morgoth (if you don't know what Rickrolling is, check this out) and a nice video equivalent. There is one really dissonant note, but it's a pretty damn good mash-up:
[video replaced]
[video replaced]
Sunday, May 03, 2009
What is your sampling epiphany? (Massive Attack samples)
UK Guardian Music Blog
Check out the original post HERE for lots of embedded hyperlinks and media examples of the samples discussed.
What is your sampling epiphany?
An unofficial compilation of tracks sampled by Massive Attack showcases the group's aesthetic through the songs that informed it – and provides fans with the thrill of discovering the originals
Posted by Simon Reynolds Thursday 26 February 2009 16.43 GMT guardian.co.uk
Sampling is weird. We're so used to it, it's been such a commonplace part of pop music for so long (since the late 1980s), that it's easy to lose sight of what a peculiar thing it is. Although sampling is often compared with collage, I think there's a profound difference which relates to the added dimension of time that music inhabits. With recorded music, however much it's doctored and enhanced through studio techniques (multitracking, overdubs etc), there generally remains a kernel of life inside it; what you are hearing is a sequence of human actions happening in real-time. (I'm talking about played music here, as opposed to programmed music. But it is overwhelmingly the case that played music is what gets sampled – music of the 70s particularly, when analogue recording quality was at its peak but drum machines and sequencers had yet to replace tight rhythm sections.) To take a chunk of living time – which is what a sample is – and chain it into a loop isn't just appropriation, it's a form of enslavement. But to pluck several different segments of live playing from separate space-time contexts and force them into unholy congress with each other … that's sorcery.
When sampling first made waves in the mid-80s, most journalistic discussions focused on the legal aspect, typically framing the samplers in punk-like terms as renegade, naughty, larcenous, irreverent. Likewise, academic studies of sampling in pop over the ensuing decades have largely concerned themselves with copyright and corporate power, typically siding with "the streets" versus the entertainment-media complex. These are perennially interesting issues, for sure, especially when given a postcolonial inflection: not just pirating and bootlegging, but the fact that non-western or pre-capitalist folk cultures typically have much looser, more collective notions of authorship and originality. (A friend of mine who's both a DJ and a law student is currently doing dissertation research in Jamaica looking at the "fluid" – a euphemism – notion of copyright in dancehall culture.) None the less, there appears to other crucial dimensions to sampling – its aesthetics and its philosophical implications – that are relatively neglected. (I could be wrong here, of course, and if you know of really penetrating and provocative work in this area, please point me in its direction!)
What got me thinking about all this was the arrival several weeks ago of an advance CD called Protected: Massive Samples. It's the second in a series started by Rapster Records compiling the original tracks that a well-known group has sampled, in this case Massive Attack. The first volume, released a year ago, was Discovered: A Collection of Daft Funk Samples, which showcased raw material for all those hot hits by Daft Punk. These compilations have not been done as a collaboration with, or even with the blessing of, the group in question; the titles and packaging take great care not to use either band's full name at any point, presumably for legal reasons. And I wonder if Daft Punk or Massive Attack are happy about having their sources so clearly signposted.
The sample-source album isn't a brand new idea. When Kanye West was first blowing up circa The College Drop-out, I recall a vinyl bootleg LP in circulation that collated the tunes he'd sampled, such as Chaka Khan's Through the Fire – the basis for his Through the Wire (although "virtual entirety of" would be nearer the mark, give or take the drums and West's rhymes). I expect there have been other such unofficial compilations. I didn't buy the Kanye Samples record because I was reluctant to interfere with my enjoyment of his album. Similarly I was slightly nervous about playing Protected: Massive Samples the first time. Would I ever be able to listen to Blue Lines the same way again? Would knowing the extent of Massive's debts diminish my admiration, sabotage my sense of awe at their achievement?
This dilemma is unique to pop music of the post-sampling era. There's no counterpart in other artforms that I can think of. It's not like looking at the sketches for a painting, or the rushes for a movie, or even like seeing the original movie from which remake is based. It's sort of like a scenario where you venerate a particular painting and then get presented with tubes of the specific colors of oil paint the artist used on that work. Except not really, because the groove of Billy Cobham's Stratus simply is – in a direct and exact and supremely concrete way – the groove of Massive's Safe from Harm. So we're back to that idea of the sample as a living thing, a portion of time and energy wrested away from its original owners and put to service. Idea for a feature: track down the players on that Cobham session and find out what they really think and feel about being used in this manner. I assume Cobham, as composer of the tune, has at least been remunerated (he gets a credit on Safe from Harm) but quite possibly not the other players (Jan Hammer, Lee Sklar, Tommy Bolin). It's not just about the money, though, it's about having one's performance taken out of its context, severed from its original artistic intent. For what is interesting about comparing Stratus with Safe from Harm is how much all the stuff that clearly mattered to Cobham and crew (the noodly, improvised jazziness – there's a long abstract intro, for instance) gets jettisoned as Massive Attack, being typical B-boys, focus on the driving bass-and-drums groove. Indeed, they focus on the most linear, straightforward segment of the rhythm track, which gets looser and wilder at other points in the song.
I'd heard Stratus before and immediately spotted the Massive connection, so its appearance on Protected didn't surprise me. But I was slightly startled by how extensively Daydreaming – another killer tune from Blue Lines – is based on Mambo by Wally Badarou, a session keyboardist associated with Island Records's Compass Point studios in Nassau, who came to moderate renown in the 80s through his work with Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, Grace Jones, Black Uhuru and others. Indeed, it makes me want to hunt down Badarou's solo albums to see what other gems are secreted there.
The overall effect of Protected: Massive Samples is less "gotcha" sample-spotting, though, and more like listening to one of those Back to Mine albums: it's a delectably consistent and mood-unified collection of plushly produced, mostly downtempo soul and reggae. Lowrell's Mellow Mellow – the gorgeous source for Blue Lines's Lately – defines the vibe precisely. Getting stoned to these tunes – as you can be sure the Massive boys did on many a Bristol afternoon in the 80s – must have been like lolling around on a gigantic sofa made of marshmallow. Protected also resembles the Under the Influence series: like a photographic negative of a Best Of compilation, it showcases the group's aesthetic through the listening that informed it.
Some self-consciously arty or iconoclastic exponents of sampling recall the appropriation artists of late 70s New York, figures like Sherrie Levine, Richard Prince and Cindy Sherman, whose work involved gambits like copying famous pictures and appending your own signature, or rephotographing photographs (sometimes famous shots, sometimes iconic adverts) and then cropping or otherwise reframing them. That seems quite close to what the early Justified Ancients of Mu Mu did, or avant-pranksters like Plunderphonics and Negativland, where the whole point is sampling a group or song that is universally known and freighted with associations.
But the approach of Massive Attack, Daft Punk and their peers was not based on exploiting familiarity; only the real cratedigging headz ever knew the sources they were drawing on. If the Rapster series continues there's no shortage of potential candidates for this treatment: DJ Shadow, RZA, Chemical Brothers, J Dilla. Most likely the crate-diggers types have got there first and already pulled together unofficial sample-spotting compilations for these artists, and many others besides, for circulation on the web. Similarly, there's a whole site dedicated to identifying samples used in jungle, but for the moment it contents itself with simply citing the source, as opposed to offering MP3s or embedded YouTube audio streams.
Talking of jungle, I'm reminded of how sampling has created a unique and unprecedented form of pop rapture: the epiphany of suddenly, accidentally encountering the source track for a favourite tune. This happens all the time if you are a fan of jungle and hardcore rave. I vividly remember the thrill that ambushed me during a James Bond movie when suddenly I heard a portentous orchestral theme that I'd loved for years as a key element of Acen's 1992 rave classic Trip to the Moon. (The source in question: John Barry's Space March, from his score for You Only Live Twice, soundtracking the moment when a Soviet capsule in orbit is swallowed up by a mysterious shark-like spacecraft).
But probably my all-time favourite sample epiphany relates to a mystery tune, also from 1992, by an artist who trafficked under the period-evocative moniker E. I taped this track off a pirate radio show and have no idea if it ever saw proper release or what its title is. But it's a real lost classic, propelled by the most boombastic breakbeat loop and featuring a comic little vocal hook that coarsely roars "Oi!!!! I've got a little black disc wiv me tune on it!". But there's also an incongruously plangent guitar part and a slow fade where the groove drops away leaving just an aching guitar solo and a totally blissed raver gasping "I... I... I … luvvit!!!". Several years ago, idly channel surfing, I landed midway through The Wall and realised with a shock of delight that the lead guitar on E's tune was actually David Gilmour. But it was only a few months back, once again chancing upon Alan Parker's overripe farrago, that I realised the whole "little black disc" bit was a parody of Nobody Home, specifically the bit that goes "Oi! I've got a little black book with me poems in!"
The French philosopher Paul Virilio argued that every new technology comes complete with its own unique catastrophe; the invention of the aeroplane, for instance, was also the invention of the plane crash. The corollary of the sample epiphany is what I call the "sample stain". But that's a subject I'll return to in a future blogpost.
Check out the original post HERE for lots of embedded hyperlinks and media examples of the samples discussed.
What is your sampling epiphany?
An unofficial compilation of tracks sampled by Massive Attack showcases the group's aesthetic through the songs that informed it – and provides fans with the thrill of discovering the originals
Posted by Simon Reynolds Thursday 26 February 2009 16.43 GMT guardian.co.uk
Sampling is weird. We're so used to it, it's been such a commonplace part of pop music for so long (since the late 1980s), that it's easy to lose sight of what a peculiar thing it is. Although sampling is often compared with collage, I think there's a profound difference which relates to the added dimension of time that music inhabits. With recorded music, however much it's doctored and enhanced through studio techniques (multitracking, overdubs etc), there generally remains a kernel of life inside it; what you are hearing is a sequence of human actions happening in real-time. (I'm talking about played music here, as opposed to programmed music. But it is overwhelmingly the case that played music is what gets sampled – music of the 70s particularly, when analogue recording quality was at its peak but drum machines and sequencers had yet to replace tight rhythm sections.) To take a chunk of living time – which is what a sample is – and chain it into a loop isn't just appropriation, it's a form of enslavement. But to pluck several different segments of live playing from separate space-time contexts and force them into unholy congress with each other … that's sorcery.
When sampling first made waves in the mid-80s, most journalistic discussions focused on the legal aspect, typically framing the samplers in punk-like terms as renegade, naughty, larcenous, irreverent. Likewise, academic studies of sampling in pop over the ensuing decades have largely concerned themselves with copyright and corporate power, typically siding with "the streets" versus the entertainment-media complex. These are perennially interesting issues, for sure, especially when given a postcolonial inflection: not just pirating and bootlegging, but the fact that non-western or pre-capitalist folk cultures typically have much looser, more collective notions of authorship and originality. (A friend of mine who's both a DJ and a law student is currently doing dissertation research in Jamaica looking at the "fluid" – a euphemism – notion of copyright in dancehall culture.) None the less, there appears to other crucial dimensions to sampling – its aesthetics and its philosophical implications – that are relatively neglected. (I could be wrong here, of course, and if you know of really penetrating and provocative work in this area, please point me in its direction!)
What got me thinking about all this was the arrival several weeks ago of an advance CD called Protected: Massive Samples. It's the second in a series started by Rapster Records compiling the original tracks that a well-known group has sampled, in this case Massive Attack. The first volume, released a year ago, was Discovered: A Collection of Daft Funk Samples, which showcased raw material for all those hot hits by Daft Punk. These compilations have not been done as a collaboration with, or even with the blessing of, the group in question; the titles and packaging take great care not to use either band's full name at any point, presumably for legal reasons. And I wonder if Daft Punk or Massive Attack are happy about having their sources so clearly signposted.
The sample-source album isn't a brand new idea. When Kanye West was first blowing up circa The College Drop-out, I recall a vinyl bootleg LP in circulation that collated the tunes he'd sampled, such as Chaka Khan's Through the Fire – the basis for his Through the Wire (although "virtual entirety of" would be nearer the mark, give or take the drums and West's rhymes). I expect there have been other such unofficial compilations. I didn't buy the Kanye Samples record because I was reluctant to interfere with my enjoyment of his album. Similarly I was slightly nervous about playing Protected: Massive Samples the first time. Would I ever be able to listen to Blue Lines the same way again? Would knowing the extent of Massive's debts diminish my admiration, sabotage my sense of awe at their achievement?
This dilemma is unique to pop music of the post-sampling era. There's no counterpart in other artforms that I can think of. It's not like looking at the sketches for a painting, or the rushes for a movie, or even like seeing the original movie from which remake is based. It's sort of like a scenario where you venerate a particular painting and then get presented with tubes of the specific colors of oil paint the artist used on that work. Except not really, because the groove of Billy Cobham's Stratus simply is – in a direct and exact and supremely concrete way – the groove of Massive's Safe from Harm. So we're back to that idea of the sample as a living thing, a portion of time and energy wrested away from its original owners and put to service. Idea for a feature: track down the players on that Cobham session and find out what they really think and feel about being used in this manner. I assume Cobham, as composer of the tune, has at least been remunerated (he gets a credit on Safe from Harm) but quite possibly not the other players (Jan Hammer, Lee Sklar, Tommy Bolin). It's not just about the money, though, it's about having one's performance taken out of its context, severed from its original artistic intent. For what is interesting about comparing Stratus with Safe from Harm is how much all the stuff that clearly mattered to Cobham and crew (the noodly, improvised jazziness – there's a long abstract intro, for instance) gets jettisoned as Massive Attack, being typical B-boys, focus on the driving bass-and-drums groove. Indeed, they focus on the most linear, straightforward segment of the rhythm track, which gets looser and wilder at other points in the song.
I'd heard Stratus before and immediately spotted the Massive connection, so its appearance on Protected didn't surprise me. But I was slightly startled by how extensively Daydreaming – another killer tune from Blue Lines – is based on Mambo by Wally Badarou, a session keyboardist associated with Island Records's Compass Point studios in Nassau, who came to moderate renown in the 80s through his work with Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, Grace Jones, Black Uhuru and others. Indeed, it makes me want to hunt down Badarou's solo albums to see what other gems are secreted there.
The overall effect of Protected: Massive Samples is less "gotcha" sample-spotting, though, and more like listening to one of those Back to Mine albums: it's a delectably consistent and mood-unified collection of plushly produced, mostly downtempo soul and reggae. Lowrell's Mellow Mellow – the gorgeous source for Blue Lines's Lately – defines the vibe precisely. Getting stoned to these tunes – as you can be sure the Massive boys did on many a Bristol afternoon in the 80s – must have been like lolling around on a gigantic sofa made of marshmallow. Protected also resembles the Under the Influence series: like a photographic negative of a Best Of compilation, it showcases the group's aesthetic through the listening that informed it.
Some self-consciously arty or iconoclastic exponents of sampling recall the appropriation artists of late 70s New York, figures like Sherrie Levine, Richard Prince and Cindy Sherman, whose work involved gambits like copying famous pictures and appending your own signature, or rephotographing photographs (sometimes famous shots, sometimes iconic adverts) and then cropping or otherwise reframing them. That seems quite close to what the early Justified Ancients of Mu Mu did, or avant-pranksters like Plunderphonics and Negativland, where the whole point is sampling a group or song that is universally known and freighted with associations.
But the approach of Massive Attack, Daft Punk and their peers was not based on exploiting familiarity; only the real cratedigging headz ever knew the sources they were drawing on. If the Rapster series continues there's no shortage of potential candidates for this treatment: DJ Shadow, RZA, Chemical Brothers, J Dilla. Most likely the crate-diggers types have got there first and already pulled together unofficial sample-spotting compilations for these artists, and many others besides, for circulation on the web. Similarly, there's a whole site dedicated to identifying samples used in jungle, but for the moment it contents itself with simply citing the source, as opposed to offering MP3s or embedded YouTube audio streams.
Talking of jungle, I'm reminded of how sampling has created a unique and unprecedented form of pop rapture: the epiphany of suddenly, accidentally encountering the source track for a favourite tune. This happens all the time if you are a fan of jungle and hardcore rave. I vividly remember the thrill that ambushed me during a James Bond movie when suddenly I heard a portentous orchestral theme that I'd loved for years as a key element of Acen's 1992 rave classic Trip to the Moon. (The source in question: John Barry's Space March, from his score for You Only Live Twice, soundtracking the moment when a Soviet capsule in orbit is swallowed up by a mysterious shark-like spacecraft).
But probably my all-time favourite sample epiphany relates to a mystery tune, also from 1992, by an artist who trafficked under the period-evocative moniker E. I taped this track off a pirate radio show and have no idea if it ever saw proper release or what its title is. But it's a real lost classic, propelled by the most boombastic breakbeat loop and featuring a comic little vocal hook that coarsely roars "Oi!!!! I've got a little black disc wiv me tune on it!". But there's also an incongruously plangent guitar part and a slow fade where the groove drops away leaving just an aching guitar solo and a totally blissed raver gasping "I... I... I … luvvit!!!". Several years ago, idly channel surfing, I landed midway through The Wall and realised with a shock of delight that the lead guitar on E's tune was actually David Gilmour. But it was only a few months back, once again chancing upon Alan Parker's overripe farrago, that I realised the whole "little black disc" bit was a parody of Nobody Home, specifically the bit that goes "Oi! I've got a little black book with me poems in!"
The French philosopher Paul Virilio argued that every new technology comes complete with its own unique catastrophe; the invention of the aeroplane, for instance, was also the invention of the plane crash. The corollary of the sample epiphany is what I call the "sample stain". But that's a subject I'll return to in a future blogpost.
Kutiman mixes YouTube
Kutiman's virtuosic series of mash-ups of YouTube video clips into "new" music is available HERE.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Radiohead Remix: Nude/Big Ideas (Don't Get Any)
This has been making the rounds quite a bit. James Houston made a creative remix of Radiohead's nude using mostly obsolete equipment: "Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Guitars (rhythm & lead); Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer - Drums; HP Scanjet 3c - Bass Guitar; Hard Drive array - Act as a collection of bad speakers - Vocals & FX."
The scanner as bass line is very cool! Noises up front; the tune itself starts just over one minute in.
Big Ideas (don't get any) from James Houston on Vimeo.
The scanner as bass line is very cool! Noises up front; the tune itself starts just over one minute in.
Big Ideas (don't get any) from James Houston on Vimeo.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
De Phazz: Jazz with a Turntable (NPR)
De Phazz: Jazz with a Turntable
Listen to the story at NPR
Weekend Edition Saturday, April 26, 2008 - The music of German DJ Pit Baumgartner — a.k.a. De Phazz — is a bit hard to categorize. Calling it "jazz with a turntable," De Phazz samples and remixes music he finds just about anywhere, from Ella Fitzgerald hits to 10 cent flea market records. The outcome is both surprising and seamless.
Baumgartner plays a hybrid of electronic dance music and jazz while touring with his band and recording albums, but most of the time he works as a remixer — most notably for the Verve Remix Series — reworking classic songs by Ella Fitzgerald, Kurtis Blow and Boy George.
Baumgartner describes himself as more of a musical collage artist than composer or instrumentalist. "It's a collage thing. I love to bring things together that normally don't fit." he explains. "My music, it joins you while you are doing something. It gives you space to not listen to it immediately or constantly. But if you listen to it constantly and deeper, you should have some little pearls to find."
The artist's latest album is Tales of Trust, a solo effort that gave Baumgartner the freedom to move beyond the live band format. He says experimenting with the song dictates how it will turn out. "At a certain point the song gives you the direction. The song tells you 'listen I need a trumpet' or 'I don't need nothing, I'm an instrumental song' and then it goes by itself."
It's those combinations that Baumgartner finds most interesting. He says, "I don't think that somebody really invents new music. I don't think that's possible. There's so much music — in the train, the supermarket and the airport. I can't really tell you, 'Am I composing this or did I hear this just two days before somewhere?'"
Listen to the story at NPR
Weekend Edition Saturday, April 26, 2008 - The music of German DJ Pit Baumgartner — a.k.a. De Phazz — is a bit hard to categorize. Calling it "jazz with a turntable," De Phazz samples and remixes music he finds just about anywhere, from Ella Fitzgerald hits to 10 cent flea market records. The outcome is both surprising and seamless.
Baumgartner plays a hybrid of electronic dance music and jazz while touring with his band and recording albums, but most of the time he works as a remixer — most notably for the Verve Remix Series — reworking classic songs by Ella Fitzgerald, Kurtis Blow and Boy George.
Baumgartner describes himself as more of a musical collage artist than composer or instrumentalist. "It's a collage thing. I love to bring things together that normally don't fit." he explains. "My music, it joins you while you are doing something. It gives you space to not listen to it immediately or constantly. But if you listen to it constantly and deeper, you should have some little pearls to find."
The artist's latest album is Tales of Trust, a solo effort that gave Baumgartner the freedom to move beyond the live band format. He says experimenting with the song dictates how it will turn out. "At a certain point the song gives you the direction. The song tells you 'listen I need a trumpet' or 'I don't need nothing, I'm an instrumental song' and then it goes by itself."
It's those combinations that Baumgartner finds most interesting. He says, "I don't think that somebody really invents new music. I don't think that's possible. There's so much music — in the train, the supermarket and the airport. I can't really tell you, 'Am I composing this or did I hear this just two days before somewhere?'"
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Radiohead allows fans to remix new single
Along with "All I Need," "Nude" is my favorite composition on In Rainbows. Wish I had the time to do a remix!
Reuters
Radiohead allows fans to remix new single
Wed Apr 2, 8:30 AM ET
Radiohead is using the Internet for another initiative built around its chart-topping album, "In Rainbows."
The UK rock act has teamed with iTunes and GarageBand for an interactive project that allows fans to rework the album's second single, "Nude."
Wannabe remixers can buy five separate tracks from the recording -- bass, voice, guitar, strings/effects and drums -- from iTunes Plus. On purchasing all five elements, the customer will be sent an access code to complete the task via the GarageBand or Logic music production software.
Finished mixes can be uploaded to Radioheadremix.com, where fans have until May 1 to listen and vote for their favorite. Bedroom remixers can also create a widget for their personal Web profile that will tally votes toward the competition.
"In Rainbows" was initially released on the Internet last year, with the band allowing fans to download the album for whatever price they chose. The CD version hit stores earlier this year, debuting at No. 1 on the U.S. and UK charts.
Reuters
Radiohead allows fans to remix new single
Wed Apr 2, 8:30 AM ET
Radiohead is using the Internet for another initiative built around its chart-topping album, "In Rainbows."
The UK rock act has teamed with iTunes and GarageBand for an interactive project that allows fans to rework the album's second single, "Nude."
Wannabe remixers can buy five separate tracks from the recording -- bass, voice, guitar, strings/effects and drums -- from iTunes Plus. On purchasing all five elements, the customer will be sent an access code to complete the task via the GarageBand or Logic music production software.
Finished mixes can be uploaded to Radioheadremix.com, where fans have until May 1 to listen and vote for their favorite. Bedroom remixers can also create a widget for their personal Web profile that will tally votes toward the competition.
"In Rainbows" was initially released on the Internet last year, with the band allowing fans to download the album for whatever price they chose. The CD version hit stores earlier this year, debuting at No. 1 on the U.S. and UK charts.
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Mark Ronson discusses his Bob Dylan remix project
Rollingstone.com
Exclusive Q&A: Mark Ronson
GUS WENNER
Posted Aug 03, 2007 2:53 PM
Rolling Stone recently toured producer Mark Ronson's SoHo studio, which just looks like a neatly organized New York office until you find your way into a back room stocked with recording equipment, old records and a huge recording booth. The purpose of this visit to Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen's producer's abode: To get the "LDN" on his latest remix -- the controversial one that's been both highly praised and sharply criticized (and he's only released thirty seconds of it online so far): Bob Dylan's "Most Likely You'll Go Your Way (And I'll Go Mine)."
How did this Bob Dylan remix project come about?
[Someone from our record company] told me he was gonna put out Dylan's greatest hits [with a] remix of a tune from the Sixties for the bonus. I've just been OD-ing on Dylan for the past two years after I saw Don't Look Back and No Direction Home. There are only two people that if I listen to them for too long at a time I start crying and become an emotional wreck. And that's Dylan and Stevie Wonder. So I started obsessively listening to everything. I definitely didn't want to do "Like a Rolling Stone" or "It's All Right, Ma," because it's just too much to take on a song that's that much in the sort of cultural conscious. And I just thought it would be great to do "You Go Your Way." The song already has an amazing groove to it, like the drums and all that stuff that's going on. It's almost like this New Orleans Second Line-type drumming.
What was your recording process like?
They gave us the original four-track recording of the song. But because it was from the early Sixties, it was that style of recording where everyone's playing in the room at the same time. There wasn't just an a cappella of Dylan. There was bleed from the drums coming in, and guitars. The only thing I could really do was make everyone [in my studio] play much louder over the song so it would drown out all the stuff. And I had to make it quite busy, a lot of percussion to cover up all the other stuff going on in the back of the track. I thought I would keep the vocal and do a really kind of soulful Southern Memphis-style funk arrangement over it and see what happens.
Has Dylan heard it?
Yeah, he heard it. I think they had a couple people trying [to do remixes]. So I was sort of auditioning for it almost. Dylan has never allowed anyone to do a remix of one his songs before, and on top of it, he has the most amazing taste. So you know he's not just gonna approve some bullshit remix where someone slapped a drum beat over one of his songs. He finally heard it about two weeks ago and approved it and then we mixed it. The two approvals I've lost sleep over were Morrissey's for my "Stop Me" cover and definitely the Dylan approval for this remix.
Have you had like a phone conversation with him? Have you been working with Dylan directly?
No, I still never got to talk to him. I'm not sure if I'll ever get to meet him. I saw him in concert in Wembley two months ago. It's too much to meet somebody like that sometimes. I met Stevie Wonder once. It's really hard when you're meeting those people who are just such giant culture personalities and such huge influences and intimidating talents. You just get verbal diarrhea and make a fool out of yourself.
How did you approach the remix? Obviously you have a sound, but did you want to impose your aesthetic on the Dylan track or did you envision something more?
I'm a big fan of the Band and I think the Band are one of the most rhythmic bands ever, like there was so much groove on Levon Helm's drums and Robbie Robertson's guitars and I just kind of imagined what that song would have been like maybe if he had recorded it in the studio with the Band in '71 as opposed to doing it in Nashville in '65, or whenever he did it. I didn¹t want to make it like, "Oh check it out, Bob Dylan goes hip-hop," that would have been really cliche.
Did you feel at all hesitant to take on the project? What do you say to someone who thinks you ruined a Dylan classic?
I'm under no illusions that it's better than the original. It's just another approach to that song. There's always gonna be people who cry sacrilege. There are people who tried to cut the power cable when he played in the Newport Jazz Festival in '65, when he went electric for the first time. There's always gonna be people who attach to the original. I like to think that I did something interesting and cool with the track.
Have you thought about doing this live with Dylan?
Yeah, I mean, it's come up. That's just a pipe dream at this point. That would be cool as fuck.
Exclusive Q&A: Mark Ronson
GUS WENNER
Posted Aug 03, 2007 2:53 PM
Rolling Stone recently toured producer Mark Ronson's SoHo studio, which just looks like a neatly organized New York office until you find your way into a back room stocked with recording equipment, old records and a huge recording booth. The purpose of this visit to Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen's producer's abode: To get the "LDN" on his latest remix -- the controversial one that's been both highly praised and sharply criticized (and he's only released thirty seconds of it online so far): Bob Dylan's "Most Likely You'll Go Your Way (And I'll Go Mine)."
How did this Bob Dylan remix project come about?
[Someone from our record company] told me he was gonna put out Dylan's greatest hits [with a] remix of a tune from the Sixties for the bonus. I've just been OD-ing on Dylan for the past two years after I saw Don't Look Back and No Direction Home. There are only two people that if I listen to them for too long at a time I start crying and become an emotional wreck. And that's Dylan and Stevie Wonder. So I started obsessively listening to everything. I definitely didn't want to do "Like a Rolling Stone" or "It's All Right, Ma," because it's just too much to take on a song that's that much in the sort of cultural conscious. And I just thought it would be great to do "You Go Your Way." The song already has an amazing groove to it, like the drums and all that stuff that's going on. It's almost like this New Orleans Second Line-type drumming.
What was your recording process like?
They gave us the original four-track recording of the song. But because it was from the early Sixties, it was that style of recording where everyone's playing in the room at the same time. There wasn't just an a cappella of Dylan. There was bleed from the drums coming in, and guitars. The only thing I could really do was make everyone [in my studio] play much louder over the song so it would drown out all the stuff. And I had to make it quite busy, a lot of percussion to cover up all the other stuff going on in the back of the track. I thought I would keep the vocal and do a really kind of soulful Southern Memphis-style funk arrangement over it and see what happens.
Has Dylan heard it?
Yeah, he heard it. I think they had a couple people trying [to do remixes]. So I was sort of auditioning for it almost. Dylan has never allowed anyone to do a remix of one his songs before, and on top of it, he has the most amazing taste. So you know he's not just gonna approve some bullshit remix where someone slapped a drum beat over one of his songs. He finally heard it about two weeks ago and approved it and then we mixed it. The two approvals I've lost sleep over were Morrissey's for my "Stop Me" cover and definitely the Dylan approval for this remix.
Have you had like a phone conversation with him? Have you been working with Dylan directly?
No, I still never got to talk to him. I'm not sure if I'll ever get to meet him. I saw him in concert in Wembley two months ago. It's too much to meet somebody like that sometimes. I met Stevie Wonder once. It's really hard when you're meeting those people who are just such giant culture personalities and such huge influences and intimidating talents. You just get verbal diarrhea and make a fool out of yourself.
How did you approach the remix? Obviously you have a sound, but did you want to impose your aesthetic on the Dylan track or did you envision something more?
I'm a big fan of the Band and I think the Band are one of the most rhythmic bands ever, like there was so much groove on Levon Helm's drums and Robbie Robertson's guitars and I just kind of imagined what that song would have been like maybe if he had recorded it in the studio with the Band in '71 as opposed to doing it in Nashville in '65, or whenever he did it. I didn¹t want to make it like, "Oh check it out, Bob Dylan goes hip-hop," that would have been really cliche.
Did you feel at all hesitant to take on the project? What do you say to someone who thinks you ruined a Dylan classic?
I'm under no illusions that it's better than the original. It's just another approach to that song. There's always gonna be people who cry sacrilege. There are people who tried to cut the power cable when he played in the Newport Jazz Festival in '65, when he went electric for the first time. There's always gonna be people who attach to the original. I like to think that I did something interesting and cool with the track.
Have you thought about doing this live with Dylan?
Yeah, I mean, it's come up. That's just a pipe dream at this point. That would be cool as fuck.
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