Archive for the ‘B-sides’ Category

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This Post Is Straight Edge

Thursday, May 2nd, 2013

Quick self-serving news: new post over at Mostly-Retro, a look at the “soundtrack” LP to Atari’s Asteroids. It’s pretty ridiculous. If you like it, please share it with your friends.

Now for a brief public service announcement for everyone who I turned onto Boom Boom Satellites, you should know that they’re doing a live “360 degree” webcast of their Budokan show this Friday! Check out this link to see the countdown timer. Should be pretty awesome.

Finally, if anyone thought last night’s post was excessively stupid. Don’t worry, so do I. Don’t blog drunk kids. If you’re going to write something stupid, write it sober. Own it.

Chumbawamba
Hear No Bullshit (On Fire Mix)
The Day The Nazi Died (1993 Mix)
There’s a lot to say about Chumbawamba, but for a Cliff Notes version of their crazy history check out this great video by critic Todd In The Shadows. He tackles their crazy career pretty well.

As for these songs specifically, ”Hear No Bullshit” features lead vocals by the UK rap group Credit To The Nation, and it’s a great radical left-wing hip-hop jam that attacks mainstream sell outs, and the fact that too many rappers can’t seem to get past their sexist bullshit when it comes to lyrical inspiration. This song was written over 20 years ago, and judging from disgusting wastes of humanity like Odd Future, it’s sadly just as relevant now as ever.

Same goes for “The Day The Nazi Died.” It’s an attack on Nazi sympathizer politicians, and if you’ve been paying attention to the current clusterfuck that is Greece as of late, you’ll know that this song has once again become topical as well.

Sigh and ugh.

Eurythmics
Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of These) (’91 Remix)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of These (Nightmare Mix)
I Need A Man (Macho Mix)
I Need A Man (Edit)
Beethoven (I Love To Listen To) (Dance Mix)
Beethoven (I Love To Listen To) (7″ Edit)
Most of these are reposts, I put up the “I Need a Man” and “Beethoven” mixes a few years back. But I wasn’t happy with those rips and recently re-recorded them. So if you have those old rips and like those songs at all (and you fucking should) then you ought to download these new rips and replace your old ones.

The “Sweet Dreams’ mixes are new to this site though. I grabbed them off of a very odd DJ bootleg 12″ called “Disco Ballroom.” However, they were both official remixes and were first released on legitimate 12″ and CD singles. If you’re listening to the ’91 remix and thinking “oh wow, this is the most amazing dance beat ever” well that’s because that remix is by Giorgio fucking Moroder. He may have done the “Nightmare” mix too, but I don’t think so, it really doesn’t sound like his kind of work.

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark
Brides Of Frankenstein (Mix)
Brides Of Frankenstein (Dub)
Another pair of reposts. Put these up several years (and turntables) back so grab them again even if you have them already.

I also said this back when I first posted this track (which is really a megamix), but it’s worth repeating; this cut has one of the greatest basslines ever.

Posted in B-sides, Chumbawamba, Eurythmics, remixes | No Comments »

Covers by Toyah and Cyndi

Monday, April 22nd, 2013

Some  new stuff over at Mostly-Retro!

In case you missed it, I did a small post on this crazy poster that came with the first edition of Kraftwerk’s Ralf Und Florian album. I don’t think that thing has ever been scanned and shared on the Internet before, so if you know any Kraftwerk fans make sure to send them that article!

Next up, and on a much more serious note, there’s this post on Game Theory’s Scott Miller, who left us all too suddenly last week. He meant a lot to me and I hope that someday he’ll be recognized as the songwriting genius he was. You can find all of Game Theory’s music at his official site now, and I wrote up a quick thing about him.

Finally, and on another sad note, Storm Thorgerson died last week too (man, last week was SHIT.) While  he was most well-known for his Pink Floyd covers, he did a lot of other great work too. I put together a quick little gallery featuring some of my favorites.

Mostly-Retro is going along better than I thought it would, and I hope you all enjoy it and share it with your friends. I have some cool stuff planned for that site in the coming weeks and I hope it all comes together.

Got cool stuff planned here too! So don’t worry about that. Check it! Cool stuff! Right here!

It’s really cool.

Toyah
Echo Beach (Surf Mix)
Echo Beach (7″ MIx)
Plenty
This is a cover. The original was by a Canadian new wave band called Martha and the Muffins. There were actually two Marthas in that band at one point, so they really should have been called Marthas and the Muffins, but I guess that doesn’t really roll off the tongue. What are the odds of having two Marthas in a band anyways? Is that like some crazy common name in Canada or something?

I’m getting off topic. This version is by perennial UK oddball Toyah, and I prefer it to the original. It has less horns and more synthesizers. If you ask  me, just about any song can be improved using that formula, except maybe “Careless Whisper.” And possibly “Baker Street.” Although, I don’t know, that melody in “Baker Street” is so great that I think it could work on anything. You could play that shit on a marimba and it would sound great.

Cyndi Lauper
What’s Going On (Club Version)
What’s Going On (Instrumental)
What’s Going On (Long Version)
Okay, so maybe you all can help me out here. If you go to Cyndi Lauper’s official VEVO channel on YouTube to watch this video (which is awesome by the way), it says “ft. Chuck D” after the song title. But, yo, where the hell is Chuck? He is not in this video, he is not rapping, and I highly doubt that’s him playing the bongos. Pardon the obvious joke, but what’s going on with that?

That being said, I really think that a Cyndi Lauper/Chuck D collaboration would be dope and they should really get on that already.

These mixes are by Shep Pettibone, because he remixed everyone in the 80s.

Posted in B-sides, covers, Cyndi Lauper, remixes, Toyah | 2 Comments »

Gay Acid

Tuesday, April 16th, 2013

In case you missed my last post, I finally launched that new site of mine. It’s called Mostly-Retro and it’s going to be a clearinghouse of reviews, essays and other stuff I’ve always wanted to write but couldn’t find the venue for. I plan on updating it two to three times a week if all works out. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on shutting down Lost Turntable anytime soon, but until I get things going at a steady pace over at Mostly-Retro, I might slow down to a post a week here for a month or so. Of course, now that I’ve said that I’m probably going to end up being more productive than ever and post shit nonstop. That’s always how that works.

Anyways, check out the new site! Tell me what you think! Keep it mind it’s still a work in progress, so be nice if you think it looks like butt.

Psychic TV
Joy (credited to DJ Doktor Megatrip with Luv Bass)
Thee Politics Ov Ecstasy (credited to Psychic TV & Jack The Tab)
These are from a 12″ single. I bought it because I thought it was some crazy weird bootleg acid house single. I had no idea that both tracks were actually by Psychic TV and that in the late 80s they released two full albums of acid house under the guise of them being compilation albums, complete with fake artist names for each track. That’s weird. But from what little I know of Psychic TV, weird is par for the course so I’m not even going to try and analyze it.

Seriously, I know next to nothing about Psychic TV aside from the fact that they’ve released, like, a billion albums and that they’re really weird. I don’t know how this stuff compares to the rest of their discography or if they’ve released better acid house music. I just like acid house. And as acid house goes, this is pretty damn great. And really fucking trippy.

Patrick Cowley
Menergy (12″ Remix)
I Wanna Take You Home
Tommy Williams’ Megamedley
I’ve posted some Patrick Cowley before. For those who missed those posts and might not know who he is; Cowley was a legend of late-era disco, and one of the first producers who followed in Moroder’s footsteps, taking disco into the realm of electronica. While Moroder was the original innovator of electronic disco, Cowley took it a whole other level during his brief career (he passed away in 1982), and pretty much laid the foundation for HI-NRG dance music and synthpop along the way. If you like the Pet Shop boys and New Order’s dancier stuff, then you should really dig Cowley.

I posted a mix of “Menergy” a few months ago, but this version is longer, clocking in at about eight and a half minutes, making it even gayer than the original. The b-side “I Wanna Take You Home,” while not as fabulous as “Menergy” is still an excellent example of the type of music that Cowley created. I don’t know who is singing on it though, the 12″ gave no credit. If you have any idea let me know.

Finally, there’s the “Tommy Williams’ Megamedley,” which starts with “Menergy” before going into a mostly instrumental mix of Cowley’s greatest tracks. It’s amazing. This shit is better than 99% of the “EDM” you hear on the radio these days, of course that’s really not saying that much is it?

Posted in B-sides, Patrick Cowley, Psychic TV, remixes | 2 Comments »

This post brought to you by a Sudafed Nyquil cocktail

Tuesday, April 2nd, 2013

And now it’s time for an obligatory “what’s going on with the mysterious and oft-delayed new website” update!

Things are actually coming along! I have a template that I am relatively happy with, and the site is fully-functional. Now I just have to get the hang of some small technical quirks, set up the plug-ins working right and get a few articles polished a bit and it should be ready to go! I was originally shooting for an April 2nd launch date, but as you can see, that didn’t happen. Now I’m thinking (for sure this time) that I’ll have the site up by the 16th at the absolute latest.

It’s going to be a weird, with a pretty wide range of topics being covered, but I hope you will all like it.

Now some remixes from bands whose names start with the letter ‘P’. That wasn’t planned, it just kind of worked out that way.

Primal Scream
Know Your Rights
96 Tears
My trip down the Primal Scream rabbit hole continues. I picked up Sreamadelica on the advice of many commenters here, and I freakin’ love it. Damn, what a great record. I’m happy I took a chance and splurged on the massive super deluxe edition. It was worth it to have all the bonus cuts, remixes and live stuff. And the box itself looks great. If you like that album and have the cash to spare, I recommend picking it up.

These cover tunes are both b-sides to the 12″ single for “Kowalski,” a track off of their 1997 record Vanishing Point, which I’m told served as a soundtrack to the 1971 film of the same name. I have to pick up that record next, I love that movie. People who come here are always recommending music to me, well let me recommend a film to you. Want to see a movie about a a speed junkie (in more ways than one) delivery driver who outruns the police on a cross country chase all while being guided by a psychic blind radio DJ? Then you need to see Vanishing Point. That shit is a trip.

Phoenix
If I Ever Feel Better (Todd Edwards’ Dub Better Remix)
If I Ever Feel Better, I’ll Go To The Disco (said The Buffalo Bunch)
Ugh, this song has been my theme song the past month. Two weeks ago I was hit with a brutal stomach flu that left me in a state I best not describe here, and then yesterday I was hammered with a strange head flu/cold thing that, while not totally kicking my ass, has made working a bit unpleasant.

It’s April! It’s to blame I tell you! Longtime readers may know already know this, but I’m cursed during the month of April. Laugh all you want, but when you get dumped, get fired, break a leg, suffer a horrible allergic reaction to antibiotics, break a rib and fall victim to a violent home invasion all in the month of April (not all in the same April though, that would have been fatal), then you start to take this shit a little more seriously.  Considering it took a record seven hours for this April to turn to shitl, I’m not holding out that this one is going to be a winner. If anything else happens to me I’m just going to bunker down in my office with a mountain of records to my left and a mountain of pizza to my right and ride it out (with a mountain of liquor in the middle).

Anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, Phoenix! Yeah, they’re pretty great. I’m stoked for the new record. These are remixes are of a song off their first album, which I do not own but I hear lovely things about.

Posted in B-sides, Phoenix, Primal Scream, remixes | 1 Comment »

One Man and a Blog…Machine

Sunday, March 24th, 2013

Sorry for the lack of updates last week. Life got crazy for a bit, and I lost an entire day because I had to transfer all my music to my new computer. And yo, when you have about half a terabyte of MP3s that shit takes some serious time.

I got good stuff planned for this week though! Check it!

Norman Cook
For Spacious Lies
For Spacious Beats
The Invasion of The Estate Agents
For Spacious Ballad
Norman Cook aka Fatboy Slim has gone by about a billion aliases (The Cheeky Boy, Sunny Side Up, Pizzaman, just to name a few) but this 1989 12″ single is one of the few to bear his actual name. It came out during a rather odd time in Cook’s career. He had left The Housemartins a few years before, but was still a year away from finding his first taste of success in the burgeoning dance scene as part of Beats International. He hasn’t yet found his “voice” as a producer/remixer/DJ, and it shows. The A-side “For Spacious Lies” is very generic by-the-numbers hip house, the kind of track made by someone looking to score with broad appeal. It’s rather boring.

Thankfully, Cook fared far better with the B-side “The Invasion of The Estate Agents.” It’s pretty much just the instrumental for Beats International’s cover of “Just Be Good To Me,”  an incredibly mellow bass groove with a Morricone sample built in. It works great, so great that Cook would later re-use the track as a the basis for his first hit single with Beats International, “Dub Be Good To Me.”

The Wee Papa Girls
Heat It Up (Adonis Chicago House Mix)
Heat It Up (Detroit House Mix)
Heat It Up (Extended Mix)
Heat It Up (Single Edit)
Heat It Up (Adonis House Instrumental)
The Wee Papa Girls are awesome. I already established this when I wrote about them before, first when discussing the Jive Presents Acid House LP, and then again when posting the Jive Presents In House album.

This time, however, they’re made even all the more awesome with the additional production and remix work by Two Men and a Drum Machine. Who are Two Men And a Drum Machine, you ask? Well, they would be a side project by Andy Cox and David Steele. You may not recognize those names, but you’ve surely heard their music before. In the early 80s they were part of the original line-up of The (English) Beat, the excellent ska act who gave up “Mirror in the Bathroom” and “Save It For Later,” among other clasics. Then after that group broke up the duo met singer Roland Gift and formed Fine Young Cannibals, who had major smash hits with “She Drives Me Crazy” and “Good Thing.” (They also did the most shockingly brilliant cover of “Ever Fallen In Love” you’ll ever hear).

Their output as TWo Men and a Drum Machine is sadly sparse. The only track the duo released as Two Men And a Drum Machine was the 1988 single “Tired of Getting Pushed Around,” which is actually credited to “Two Men A Drum Machine and a Trumpet,” and this track by The Wee Papa Girls is their only production credit. It’s a shame, their work as Two Men and a Drum Machine was way more interesting and innovative than anything they put out as members of Fine Young Cannibals.

They definitely missed their calling as acid house/hip-hop producers. “Heat It Up” is a great track, of the stuff by The Wee Papa Girls that I’ve heard it’s clearly the best. The acid house production is tight, and the flow by the girls is great. How great? So great that The Beastie Boys swiped parts of it wholesale some 10 years later for their track “Alive.” Either that or both artists swiped from the same source material. If anyone out there knows of another track that features the same vocal hook, please tell me. Rap is so full of “homages” that sometimes it can be hard to tell who was the real originator and who was borrowing from who.

Posted in B-sides, Fatboy Slim, remixes, The Wee Papa Girls | 8 Comments »

These Daft Punk Remixes are Neither Hot nor New

Monday, March 11th, 2013

I think I’m honestly starting to make some headway on my other, oft-delayed website. I should have some updates soon. Moving everything off of Nearly Free Speech (scam server site) took a lot of time and set everything back. Now that things are back on track I should be able to get that going sooner rather than later. My goal is to launch by April. Let’s see how that works out. Here’s hoping.

Primal Scream
When Thy Kingdom Comes
Okay, I own five Primal Scream singles and no Primal Scream albums. It’s time for me to jump in! Recommend an album I should start with: GO!

Oh, and this is a B-side from the “Accelerator” 12″ single, in case you were wondering.

Renegade Soundwave
Cocaine Sex (Sub-Aqua Overdrive Dub)
Cocaine Sex (Turbo Lust Mix)
People (mainly British) seem to dig it when I post Renegade Soundwave tracks. These are for them, not for me. While I’ve just recently discovered RS, and loved most of what I’ve heard, I fucking hate this song. It’s, quite frankly, kind of gross, and not good enough to earn it in my opinion. But hey, if you love it, go at it and enjoy!

Daft Punk
Prime Time Of Your Life (Para One Remix)
The Brainwasher (Erol Alkan’s Horrohouse Dub)
It seems that everyone is going crazy for new Daft Punk. The hype is reaching such ludicrous levels that the group even put out a 15 second ad that aired during SNL a couple weeks ago. That’s insane! How the hell did Daft Punk’s next album suddenly become the most anticipated record in all of music? Was it just because of a process of elimination? Did the music press have to find a new “OMG where is it?” release after My Bloody Valentine and Godspeed! You Black Emperor finally released new records (and after everything supposedly associated with Dr. Dre’s long-delayed Detox has sucked)?

I just don’t get it. These are the same people who were underwhelmed by the group’s soundtrack to Tron Legacy; the same circle of critics and hipster assholes who dismissed Human After All completely because it had the gall to be an electronic dance album and not another dance/pop hybrid like Homework. Where did this idolization come from?

Maybe its an ‘absence makes the critic get softer’ thing, it’s been years since Human After All, and even the most harsh critic of Tron Legacy could write off that supposed misstep as it being a soundtrack to a mainstream Disney film, and therefore somewhat forgivable for not meeting their lofty standards. Perhaps all these critics, in Daft Punk’s extended hiatus, have made the group out to be something they aren’t, a savior of the bigger-than-ever/shallower-than-ever electronic dance music scene, a group that might bring a resurgence in “Intelligent Dance Music” or “electronica” style dance music of the mid-90s. Now I almost want Daft Punk’s album to be a disappointment (for those looking for another crossover record anyways) just so I can see all those jerks get all bummed out.

But  whatever. I’m just stoked for more Daft Punk. Wet your appetite with these remixes from a 12″ single.

Posted in B-sides, Daft Punk, Primal Scream, remixes, Renegade Soundwave | 11 Comments »

Hot Ash

Thursday, March 7th, 2013

I just bought tickets for seven different shows between March 20th and June 16th. I should really start buying earplugs by the gross.

Ash
Girl From Mars (Live in Tokyo)
Girl From Mars (Live from the Numbskull EP)
Girl From Mars (Live from the Twilight Of The Innocents Bonus Disc)
I really need to update my sources of music news. Not only was I not aware that Ash recently released an amazing 3LP edition of their excellent A-Z Singles series (it comes complete with a digital download that includes a shitton of extra tracks, you should buy it). But I also was not aware that they were touring the states! Even worse, I had no idea that they were coming to my own backyard of Pittsburgh, PA! Shit! Thankfully I found out in time and now I have tickets, but damn, how the hell did this one nearly sneak past me. I must be slipping in my old age.

I fucking love Ash. They’re my favorite band of the britpop era (yes, I know they’re from Northern Ireland, but you know what I mean). 1977 is a great record. Amazing. A must own in my opinion, and everything they’ve done since has been great too. I actually think that their best work has been their most recent, the aforementioned A-Z Series. You should seriously buy that. For real. Go buy it. It’s great.

In the meantime, here are three versions of “Girl From Mars,” taken from different hard-to-find singles, bonus discs and DVDs.

Quick sidenote about Ash. While I do love them, as a person with an s/sh speech impediment, I find their name endlessly frustrating.

Spiritualized
Come Together
Broken Heart
Broken Heart (Instrumental)
HEY EVERYONE LET’S GO DO ACID.

Ahem, these versions are from The Abbey Road EP, and are different than the versions that appeared on Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space.

OH GOD IT’S KICKING IN I CAN SEE NEW COLORS.

Posted in Ash, B-sides, live, Spiritualized | 2 Comments »

On The Verve of Greatness

Wednesday, March 6th, 2013

Drowning my snow sorrows with britpop.

verve

The Verve
Lord I Guess I’ll Never Know
Country Song
Three Steps
The Drugs Don’t Work (Demo)
The Crab
Never Wanna See You Cry
MSG
The Longest Day
Stamped
The Verve were a great band who never got their due here in the states, relegated to a status that could best be described as greater than a one-hit wonder but below a critically-acclaimed cult act (kind of between Elastica and The Stone Roses, if we’re going to stick to 90s britpop bands as a means of comparison). I was never a giant fan of the group, but goddamn Urban Hymns is a great record, one that has fared better with age than many other britpop albums from the time. It’s not surprising then that the b-sides and rarities from that era hold up just as well.

I got all of these tracks from a 4×12″ single box set that I picked up in Japan. As you can see from the image above, the box for the set is sadly bland, just being a cardboard sleeve with black text, but the contents more than make up for the lack of visual flair. All of these b-sides are great amazing tracks that could have easily been album cuts. In fact, I bet that many of these tracks were only cut from the album proper because they were so long. “Country Song,” “MSG” and “The Longest Day are all over seven minutes each, and with Urban Hymns already a long ass record (over 75 minutes) they literally couldn’t have fit on the record without making it a 2CD beast, which I think would have been overkill.

So when I think of it like that, I guess it makes sense that these tracks didn’t make the cut. What doesn’t make sense to me, however, is that nearly all of them have yet to see a proper re-release. The Verve only have one official B-sides compilation, 1994′s No Come Down, which came out before Urban Hymns and only featured outtakes from their first two albums. So Urban Hymns-era rarities have never really seen the light of day. The closest they’ve come in the states is on an odd digital-only release that you can find on Amazon called Deep Cuts. Some of the tracks on Deep Cuts were also on this box set, and I’m not including those here tonight. I do recommend you check that mini-release out though, if for nothing else than the track “So Sister” which is easily one of the group’s best b-sides.

Hope you dig on these, if I have time I’m planning another britpop-centric post later this week.

 

Posted in B-sides | No Comments »

Prince’s Madhouse is full of Bunnymen

Tuesday, February 26th, 2013

I finally got all the records from Japan and China cleaned and I’m intent on plowing through them as fast as possible. If I listen to as many as possible for seven days a week, I think I might be done by 2014.

Did I mention I bought a lot of records in Japan?

Ironically, none of tonight’s music is from those records.

Madhouse
6
6 (End Of The World Mix)
6 and 1/2
I’ve written about Prince “associate” acts before. A while ago I did a quick post about The Family, a band that was pretty much just Prince save for a different vocalist (and even that’s debatable). Then a few months ago I posted a tune by Mazarati, a band that was more independent than other Prince associates, but was still heavily guided and controlled by The Purple One.

Madhouse is another Prince associate act, albeit not as well known as those groups or others like The Time. That’s probably because while those acts were just extensions of Prince’s already successful funk/pop sound, Madhouse was an entirely instrumental jazz act with some funk influences. That’s not the kind of act that sells records.

Madhouse released just two albums, both of which came out in 1987. The first, called 8, was pretty much nothing but Prince, with longtime Prince collaborator Eric Leeds contributing some sax and flute parts. The second album, called 16, was more of a group effort, and featured Shelia E on drums and another longtime Prince associate, Levi Seacer, Jr. on bass.

Apparently there were at least two other Madhouse albums recorded, both called 24, but neither have ever seen the light of day (a common story when discussing Prince). Bootlegs are out there though, for those who are interested.

(By the way, all of this is “alleged” I have found no proof documenting any of this, and all the articles I can find online about Madhouse are completely without credible citation.)

I’m going to be honest, I bought this 12″ single just because I knew it was Prince. I really have no interest in jazz fusion, and while I like these tracks, especially the remix, nothing on here really changed my mind. It’s a catchy tune, with an obvious Prince/funk edge, but I’d be lying if I found it especially memorable. Still, I think this kind of thing, a top-secret song by a super-famous artist, is fascinating, and it’s worth hearing once if for that reason alone.

Echo And The Bunnymen
Lips Like Sugar (12″ Mix)
Lips Like Sugar (Dub Version)
I think that “Lips Like Sugar” is Echo And The Bunnymen’s best song. A lot of people disagree with me, but a lot of people can go to hell. I could dance to this song till my feet fell off, and I’m a sucker for a good new wave love ballad. So you all can take your “The Cutter” and “The Killing Moon” suggestions and cram it. Yes, they’re great songs, but they’ll never hold a candle to this one for me.

The 12″ Mix is nearly seven-minutes long, and since we’ve already established that I could listen to this song all day and all night, I’m a fan of this extended mix. Shit, I wish it was even longer. The dub mix is a dub mix, and I’m including it for the sake of being a completionist.

The 12″ single from which I took these songs had two additional tracks. One was the single mix of the song, and the other was the b-side “Rollercoaster.” Both of these are available on the still in-print Echo box set Crystal Days, and I highly recommend you pick that up. Not only for those tracks (“Rollercoaster” is the secret best Echo And The Bunnymen track!) but for additional great rarities, including a haunting nine-minute version of “The Killing Moon” (woot!) and an awesome live cover of The Velvet Underground’s “Heroin.”

Posted in B-sides, Echo and the Bunnymen, Prince, remixes | 1 Comment »

They Might Be Sakamoto

Tuesday, February 19th, 2013

I finally went through and cleaned the rest of the records I bought when I was in Tokyo, as well as everything that wasn’t cleaned before I went…as well as the stuff I’ve bought since I returned to the states.

It took me four hours.

Seriously. I was able to watch the first two Fast & Furious films in the time it took me to clean all the damn things.

So, yeah, I guess I really did buy a lot of records when I was in Asia. So many records! They’re surrounding me! I feel like a hoarder, except, y’know, not as insane or on TLC.

The prospect of listening to/recording all of them would overwhelm me if I wasn’t looking forward to it so much. Although to be honest, now that I see my pile of Japanese anime soundtracks next to my turntable, I’m starting to question the level of restraint (or lack there of) that I had while in Japan. Oh well! I bought those Gundam soundtracks and dammit I’m going to listen to them! I might even share them with you all.

Also, look forward to Kraftwerk. Holy shit. So much Kraftwerk. And Leftfield, Pet Shop Boys, OMD, Primal Scream, Erasure…you know what? I’m just going to stop now. I want to leave some surprises. I’ll just say that I think I got the next few months, if not year, of The Lost Turntable covered now, and it’s going to be full of some really amazing shit.

Speaking of amazing shit. Yo, check this shit out.

001

Ryuichi Sakamoto (with Thomas Dolby)
Field Work (London Mix)
Field Work (Tokyo Mix)
Exhibition
I’ve begun to slowly dig into the Sakamoto back catalog. Right now I want all of it, but I suppose that’ll stop once after I accidentally buy one of his classical or more jazz-influenced records. I’m sure all that stuff is excellent for what it is, but I’ll pass.

As for these tracks, they are from a 12″ single. The original version of “Field Work” first appeared on the Western version of Sakamoto’s 1986 album Illustrated Musical Encyclopedia (an abridged and re-edited version of a Japanese only release that first came out in 1984). Dolby fans, however, probably didn’t discover the track until the 2009 re-release of his 1984 album The Flat Earth, which also included soundtrack rarities “Don’t Turn Away” and “The Devil Is An Englishman.”

The version of “Field Work” on The Flat Earth re-issue is labeled as the “London Mix” but it is actually an abridged version of that mix. The proper version runs at about six minutes in length, while the version on the album is only four minutes long. The Tokyo Mix, as far as I can tell, has never been released on CD in any form, and that’s a real shame because I think its the better of the two mixes.

Also rare to my knowledge is “Exhibition.” Dolby is nowhere to be found on this track, and its certainly not a radio-friendly pop number. Instead it’s a 15 minute ambient soundscape with no beats, no melody and no motifs outside of a constant, looping set of beeps and bloops. It’s kind of like something you might find on The KLF’s White Room album, or maybe on an Orb b-side. Not for everyone, but I find it relaxing and oddly enough, a great track to write to. I’ve certainly heard worse Sakamoto, I bought his disco album. It’s…something.

They Might Be Giants
Istanbul (Not Constantinople) (Brownsville Mix)
Stormy Pinkness
Chalk up TMBG as another band who seemed to be doing their damnedest to make sure their fans have easy access to all of their b-sides and other rarities. Like I said before, I wish all bands would do that, even if it makes my job of finding out-of-print and hard-to-find stuff all the more difficult.

Still, it looks like at least a couple of b-sides slipped through the band’s re-releasing machine. I found these two oddities on the 12″ single for “Istanbul (Not Constantiople),” which also had “James K. Polk” and “Ant,” two songs that have made their ways onto proper TMBG releases.

The remix of “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)” is one of the strangest TMBG compositions I’ve ever heard, and if you know anything about the group, that’s really saying something.. The TMBG wiki states that it contains a sample of Kraftwerk’s “The Robots” as well as an unidentified Janet Jackson sample. I couldn’t make that out, but I wouldn’t doubt it. The vocal samples at the beginning of the track are even weirder. What the hell is a white tornado?

“Stormy Pinkness” is weird, but it’s also pretty short (about a minute) and there’s not much to it. So I really don’t have anything to say about that one. I’m glad I found it though.

Posted in B-sides, remixes, Ryuichi Sakamoto, They Might Be Giants, Thomas Dolby | 12 Comments »

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