Monday's Long Song

A Stretford (Manchester)- Stravanger (Norway) remix crossover to start the week with Chris Massey reworking Lindstrom's Blinded By The LEDs. Massey gets straight to business with a kick drum and hi- hats, wobbly synth topline and then some increasingly intense buzzing and fizzing sounds. Seven minutes of rising and falling synths, drop outs and re- entries and enough energy to send you flying into Monday. At the very least you might turn up at work pretending you want to be there. 

Blinded By The LEDs (Chris Massey's Club Mix)

If you go to Bandcamp there's a second shorter remix (the Balearic Trance Rework) available too, both free. Blinded BY The LEDs was released in 2019, Massey's reworks were a product of lockdown- the pair DJed together only a few weeks before the world shut down in March 2020- and came out last year. 

Monday's Long Songs

It would have been Andrew Weatherall's 57th birthday today. Around the internet there are artists offering tracks they recorded with Andrew or that were remixed by him as freebies and, natch, there are plenty of long songs to get your teeth into while raising a glass to the man's birthday tonight.

Being is/was the name adopted by Edinburgh based Dave Paton. He has an extensive back catalogue. In the 90s Being found himself in Weatherall's orbit, releasing music on the Emissions Audio Output label. Emissions replaced Sabres Of Paradise as Weatherall's own label and was split into several sub- labels- Emissions Echoic, Emissions Lo- Fi, Emissions Static, Special Emissions and New Emissions- all to put out slightly different takes on the sound from 'dark, stripped down, derelict house music' to 'experimental and ambient dance music'. A full breakdown of the different sub- labels and their releases can be found at Discogs. The logos were nicely minimal and looked good on the generic Emissions sleeves and t- shirts.

Being's records came out on Special Emissions in 1995 and 1996, minimal scratchy, ambient electronic dub records with weird noises, echoes, hiss and lots of s p a c e. In 1996 the Two Lone Swordsmen and A Being record came out, three tracks long- Craterplay, Pallor and Thruxton Circuits. The release was only on white label, limited edition and came in a resealable plastic bag with a photocopied A4 insert. Rare and now very collectable. The 12" single plus the remix he did of Two Lone Swordsmen's 1996 tracks Azzolini and The Branch Brothers (both originally part of the first two Lone Swordsmen record, The Third Mission, out on Emissions Echoic in April 1996) are available from Being's Bandcamp as a free download. Probably not everyone's cup of tea but sharing these emissions from the margins is part of what blogging is all about. Let's leave no stone unturned.



More recently, 2018, Andrew remixed Marius Circus' I Feel Space track.  I Feel Space is Marius' take on the track that kicked off the whole Scandi disco scene back in 2005- Lindstrom's tribute to I Feel Love, an warm, uplifting, dreamy Italo- house synth record. Marius' cover and the two Weatherall remixes are both available for free, if you haven't got them already. Both remixes are spaced out, cosmic disco chuggers with plenty of those long, keening sounds that are littered throughout his work from the last decade. The unreleased dub is, er, dubbier and probably the pick of the pair to these ears.

Blinded

Some lifestyle advice from the inside of a toilet door in one of Manchester's pubs, the promotion of mood altering substances along with some criticism of one of the city's best known sons.

Not related but here's some more Scandi-disco from Lindstrom. Blinded By The LEDs, a single from last year, starts out dark and spaced out. The disco drums power it forwards before it all goes a bit prog. The ending comes dramatically, the lights going out, leaving you wanting it all to start up again. Lindstrom is a master of this kind of thing, makes it all seem so easy and has a back catalogue littered with jewels. His new album, a four track, recorded live in one take, synth and drum machine banger, is out now too- On A Clear Day I Can See You Forever can be bought here.

Blinded By The LEDs

Monday's Long Song

Scandinavian disco house is one of the high points of early 21st century popular culture I reckon. DJs and producers like Lindstrom, Prins Thomas and Todd Terje make and play expansive, forward looking and open minded electronic dance music that doesn't take itself too seriously. Really Deep Snow came out back in August, a nine minute cosmic disco journey from Lindstrom, and part of a four track album called On A Clear Day I Can See You Forever (out in October). Built around a drum machine and a bubbling synth line Really Deep Snow ploughs its way onward, gathering momentum, a drive on a dirt track through the trees, deeper into the forest. A fairly fast paced slow burner, if that makes sense.

Spire

Somehow I managed to schedule two posts for yesterday. At this point Ren would yell at Stimpy 'Stimpy, you eediot!!'.

Pulling something out from my hard drive for Friday, the end of a long week at work, leads me to Scandi-disco, one of my sounds of now. This was from Lindstrom back in 2017, a drum machine led piece that brings the synths in gradually and ends up with something that keeps on rising and ends dramatically. Brought up in Stavanger, Norway and raised on country and western Lindstrom moved to Oslo and practically started the whole Scandi-house scene off back in the early 2000s.

Spire

Ren and Stimpy were a TV cartoon in the early 90s, a short tempered, emotionally unstable Chihuahua (Ren) and a good natured but dim cat (Stimpy). A cartoon for adults with innuendo, violence, darkness and trippy absurdity. It was rather good.

Space

Do you want a free download of a previously unreleased Andrew Weatherall remix (a dub) of Marius Circus' cover of Lindstrom's I Feel Space (the song that kicked off the whole Scandi-disco scene and a Norwegian version of Donna Summer's I Feel Love)? Of course you do. Why wouldn't you?



I'm quite partial to this kind of thing. This throbbing, glacial Ewan Pearson remix of Polaris, beautiful sequenced bassline and electronic handclaps to the fore, is quite the thing for January 2019 too (it came out in the middle of last December and I missed it).

I Feel Space

More space-disco from Norway today with Lindstrom and I Feel Space, a track inspired by I Feel Love. Norway by way of Giorgio Moroder and Donna Summer. I Feel Space was released back in 2005 but in no way sounds thirteen years old, its Italo synths and rhythms sounding completely current in 2018 (but then I think I Feel Love still sounds modern, which goes to show how ahead of the game Moroder was).

I Feel Space was covered by fellow Norwegian Marius Circus earlier this year, a 12" single which came with a very tasty, slightly acid-tinged Andrew Weatherall remix. I posted it here.

I Feel Space

I Feel Space

Saturday nights are made for dancing. Tonight I am attending Peter Hook And The Light's gig at Manchester's Albert Hall where he's playing not just Technique in its entirety but Republic too. Technique I am massively looking forward too, an album that has stuck with me through thick and thin since January 1989, a record I know every note of. Republic remains to be seen (not the strongest set of songs, and front loaded too- the best song off it, Regret, will be up first). If we get there early enough he's playing an opening set of Joy Division songs.

Today's song a new one from Mr Weatherall, a remix of Norwegian Marius Circus' cover of fellow countryman Lindstrom's I Feel Space. Weatherall finds the acid in it, pumps it up and makes the most of some lovely long siren/horn noises. One to start your Saturday off with a bit of a shimmy to.

Disco Monday

Work seems to be, well, hard work at the moment. Mustn't complain I suppose, there's plenty of people out of work but still...

Here's something uplifting for the start of the week- DJ Harvey's Locus Solus album was one of my favourites from last year, a grower that included a great Andrew Weatherall dub remix. It also came with this remix by Lindstrom and Prins Thomas, where they turn the knob marked Balearic down and push the Disco button all the way to the top for nine minutes plus.

I Want It (Lindstrom and Prins Thomas Remix)