Les Feuilles Mortes

It’s that time of year again. Everything gets kind of gloomy and cold. Days get shorter and darker. The new yellow pages arrive and signal that old ones can hit the sack or that they can serve a better use drying autumn leaves as in the old schooldays. The first sneeze and cuff get a hold of me as my mind wanders off away from hot summer and disco dancing and into a more melancholic mode and musical setting. The stubru radio program Duyster provides an ideal soundtrack for this mental shift.
Above that came the news that not only Norman Whitfield pasted away but that also Marc Moulin died from cancer. I wrote a couple of times about Marc Moulin on these pages and posted a lot his and related music, time after time, above all his output with Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers as Telex.

If you want more background information and extensive amount of music you can check these great links http://sugarplumfairy-joski.blogspot.com/2007/10/placebo.html + http://saltyka.blogspot.com/2008_04_01_archive.html + http://saltyka.blogspot.com/2008/04/telex-part-2-some-solo.html
Here’s just a short list of my favourite Telex tracks and related stuff. Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers both had their share in creating the Telex sound and they are responsible for more wonderful stuff outside the Telex format. For instance Z-Moor-Z. An incredible Moers vehicle produced by Telex. I’m really glad to be able to offer the Razormaid remix of Héros Dynamique and above all Raised by Snakes, by far one of the best Telex tracks. It’s not on any of the remix albums that they released. Razormaid was a magazine back in the days and a anonymous collective of DJ’s and remixers who produced dozens of outstanding independent remixes in the 80’s. Some of them got released on much sought after compilation albums.

Telex – Brainwash
Telex – I Don't Like Music
Telex – L'Amour Toujours
Telex – Raised by Snakes (1984)
Telex – Raised By Snakes (Razormaid extended DJ remix) 1985
Telex – Rendez-Vous Dans l' Espace 76-86

Z-Moor-Z – Héros Dynamique (Razormaid mix)
Van Twist – Hot Wax

Tait toi et soi Bel…

We still don’t have a government after more than 5 months but life goes on. I have some old and some new Bel classics for ya. The first one is an old disco track from the one-hit-wonders of Two Man Sound. I just recently came across it again and it definitely should be part of the list on my bongo page. It’s still great after al those years.

Two Man Sound – Que Tal America 1978

Some other oldies are Telex related. Dan Lacksman had a project in the seventies called Transvolta – maybe a reference to the young Travolta, who knows – and released under that name the rare but classic Disco Computer and its b-side You Are Disco. I recently bought some other Telex related stuff, Z-Moor-Z’s Héros Dynamique but it’s on vinyl so I still have to transform it into digital content.

Transvolta – Disco Computer 1978
Transvolta – You are Disco 1978

Telex’ Marc Moulin and Dan Lacksman did not only make records of their own but also produced other artists. They worked on the first hit albums of Lio but in 1982 she worked together with Sparks for her album Suite Sixtine. This album features the wonderful Sage Comme Une Image. I read on Asrestlessasweare that the long version of the song was produced by Telex though, instead of Sparks, but I can’t verify that.

Lio – Sage Comme Une Image 1982
Lio – Sage Comme Une Image (version longue) 1982

Next some Electric Body Music from Front 242 and The Neon Judgement. There’s also something more obscure. A track from Parade Ground which is a band from Brussels and strongly related to Front 242.

The Neon Judgement – The Fashion Party 1981/1984
The Neon Judgement – Tomorrow In The Papers 1985
Front 242 – Body To Body (1988 mix)
Parade Ground – Strange World 1987

To finish some very recent tracks that have become classics already. Two tracks from the debut album of Goose.

Goose – British Mode 2006
Goose – Bring It On 2006

The other one is the title track from Jerboa’s debut album. The single Number One can be filed as an instant classic but I don’t know if this one will go the same way. It’s definitely worth listening. It’s a long piece of music that sounds like a multistage rocket. There are soft parts and some hard rocking parts which sound like the phase where the rocket separates from a stage and relaunches into orbit. Something like that.

Jerboa – Rockit Fuel 2007

I don't Like Xmas


I’m a bit late but mediafire was experiencing some difficulties yesterday so I couldn’t upload. What I had in mind was a special Xmas gift.
I’m working on a new blog with an overview of Belgian (pop)music worth listening to, also by others who don’t speak any of the local lingo’s. It’s taking me a lot of time and effort, more than I thought it would take, but in the course of doing so, I’m discovering a lot of interesting music I never heard before.
I prepared a kind of best of compilation by Telex, the 80’s synth-popband with Marc Moulin. If you don’t know them, you can picture them as being something in between the Yellow Magic Orchestra and Sparks but then again something totally original and typically Belgian. It’s hard to describe why. maybe it’s easier the other way round. Listening to Telex can give one an insight in what it’s like to be Belgian.

Enjoy and yes sure, a merry to you too.

01 Moskow Diskow (maxi) –Looking for Saint Tropez 1979
02 Quelque Chose a Dire –Looking for Saint Tropez 1979
03 We Are All Getting Old – Neurovision 1980
04 Face A/B – Neurovision 1980
05 En Route Vers De Nouvelles Aventures – Neurovision 1980
06 Brainwash – Sex/Birds and Bees 1981
07 L'amour Toujours – Wonderful World 1984
08 Raised By Snakes – Wonderful World 1984
09 I Don't Like Music – 1984
10 Rendez-Vous Dans l'Espace – Looney Tunes 1988
11 Z-Moor-Z – Heros Dynamique (razormaid mix) – 1986

http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=cc05797523f3cb92ab1eab3e9fa335ca862c91855b67045c
(usual map with separate tracks)
http://www.mediafire.com/file/fi1zngqecd3/TELEX_bestof_belpoop.zip
(a zip file with the tracks and CD covers)

Essa Una Semana Calor


I’ve just spend a superbly hot ridden sun overloaded week in Sevilla. One word: Heatwave. I left Brussels behind with a meager 2 degrees Celsius to find myself a couple hours later getting struck with 36 degrees, in the shade smack in the face :)

Yours truly feels brand new and fully operational with batteries included this time. So time for an update with another full workout.

I’m working on another system for previews and downloads on this site. It seems that the old system doesn’t work anymore or at least not as I want it to. Whenever I try to paste in a name tagged link, the complete layout changes and everything becomes unmanageable.

Instead of separate links, I now just ad one link every month to a map named after that month where all the goodies are collected and updated. This way is also easier for me. It takes less precious time which I now can devote to exploring more music and to written side dishes.

24 Carat black – Poverty's Paradise 1973
Second track from an heavily sampled rare groove classic called Ghetto: Misfortune's Wealth. Their only one unfortunately. It’s such a versatile and very diverse record. A concept album. Subject: the state of black life in the ghetto in the seventies. A topic and a musical translation which deserves a proper listening instead of mere groove diggin’.

Telex – I don't like music + Alec Mansion – Trop Triste 1982
There’s a Telex link in here. A local band produced by Dan Lacksman who later reappeared as Leopold Nord et Vous with C’est l’amour which sold millions of copies in France and Belgium. One of my favorite oldies. I can’t remember having seen this video clip back then but it’s a nice one.



Au Revoire Simone – Sad Song / Shadows
One of the great concert I’ve seen recently at Le Bota. It was the fourth time that they came to Brussels and they like coming back. A swell show. They sound way better live than on their records. Sometimes the production sounds rather bleak. None of that with the great sound at Le Botanique.

The Fiery Furnaces – Even In The Rain / 'm Going Away / The End Is Near
Another recent concert at Trix. Second time round. This time there weren’t too many people paying a visit. they have a nice new album. More straightforward. A real piety this time was the fact that they left their piano at home. Instead everything got smothered with heavy distorted guitar which killed the dynamics of the songs.

BLK JKS – Lakeside / Molalatladi
Or The Black Jacks. A new band from South Africa that I’m starting to discover. They’re coming to my hometown in December. Reminds me of TV on The Radio set in an African context.

Kano – Can't hold back (your loving) - extended mix 1981 / Semblance 1985
Maxi B-side.

Marva Whitney – It's My Thing (You Can't Tell Me Who To Sock It To) Pts 1 & 2
JB.

Mockba Music – Mötet 1984
Popular band in Sweden I’ve been told. Boy, would I like to sample this.

Norah Jones – Chasing Pirates
New Norah Jones song. I couldn’t hear the lyrics well at first and thought the main line runs like ‘My mind’s racing from chasing heartaches’ which sounded nice to me but it’s actually about real live action pirates. Besides that. Am I the only person who thinks ‘Miss You’ from The Rolling Stones after hearing this song?

Soma Holiday – Shake Your Molecules (the neutron dance) 1984
Wave classic from Wave Klassix Volume 3. Don’t know much about this band. Reminds me a bit of Siouxie.

Ganzheit – Marvelous / Independence 1986
I learned about this band through Saltyka And His Friends. A strange unknown band from the UK who made their hard edged ebnergetic proto acid house meets electronic body music in the late 80's. It sounds familiar, like Front 242, very industrial.
They never made an album only a couple of maxi’s.Marvelous but especially Independence are my favorite tracks. It’s sounds like EBM but then again it’s so much more. A mesmerizing hybrid.

Monsters Of Folk - The Sandman, The Brakeman And Me
It seems that supergroups are back, at least in the States. First The Gutter Twins, after that Them Crooked Vultures or Josh Homme, Dave Grohl and John Paul Jones and now Jim James from My Morning Jacket, Conor Oberst and Mike Mogis from Bright Eyes and M. Ward all together in one band.
What does it sound like? 4 of the most well know and versatile representatives of the folk revival working together makes one think about the Traveling Wilburys and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Well, they’re not that great… but that’s of course asking too much, but boy am I glad that when they met while touring they didn’t stick to playing carts to kill time, but made a couple of songs instead. It took them some years to finally lay them down. You can hear well who made which song but the beauty is in the novel combinations. The interplay of instruments, styles and voices. One of my favorite albums this year.

Simian Mobile Disco feat. Beth Ditto – Cruel Intentions
It seems like Beth Ditto is everywhere these days. Sorry for the cheap joke but given her constitution that shouldn’t be too strange.

Rudy – Just Take My Body / White Room 1979
Rudy was the first name of Rudy Trevesi, a multi talented instrumentalist and vocalist from Italy. This solo-effort, released by Polydor in 1979, was produced by Jacques Fred Petrus and Mauro Malavasi with whom he worked extensively throughout his career on projects like the Peter Jacques Band, Macho and Revanche. The album Just take my body was his only solo effort and that makes it somewhat rare and hard to find. The album was recorded in Italy (in Bologna’s Fonoprint Studio's) and mixed in NY (at Power Station). The background vocals were also recorded in NY.
‘White Room’ was a disco remake of the famous Cream song. Jacques Fred Petrus liked the concept of creating disco remakes, as he also put out Macho's I'm a man by the Spencer Davis Group.

Haruomi Hosono – Kinu Kaido (silk road) (1976)
Yukihiro Takahashi – Radioactivist 1980
Two members of the Yellow Magic Orchestra and their early solo output.

Andrea True Connection – Party Line
Anna Domino – Rhythm
Artefact – Mae
Blue Night – Turn Me Loose - My Design
Chic – Open Up
Easy Going – Do It Again 1978
Emora – The Clonius
Fela Kuti vs. Kano – I'm an I.T.T.
Glory – Let's Get Nice 1981
Golden Girls – Too Cute (1988)
Jacob Miller & Trinity – I'm Just A Dread
Jay Reatard – Always Wanting More
Joakim – Ad Me
Lindstrøm and Christabelle – Baby Can't Stop (Aeroplane remix)
Modern English – I Melt With You
Moderne – Switch On Bach
Recht Herzlich – 1000 Lüste
The Heavy – How You Like Me Now (solo remix)
The Jonzun Crew – WeAre The Jonzun Crew
Toby King – Mr. Tuff Stuff
Tomasz Stanko Quintet – Grand Central 2009
Turzi – Bogota
UDM – To Please You

Still more Blah Blah comin'

>>> http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=cc05797523f3cb92ab1eab3e9fa335cacecd7e1b83acc66b

no need for a name

I’m almost trough with this chain of concerts. The Gossip and Chromeo are still on schedule.
The last gig on Wednesday was really great as I knew it would be. Les Rita Mitsouko gave 3 concerts in a row at a small venue to promote their new album Varieté. Cathérine Ringer is still pretty and wild and custom made for a live on stage. She has a very unique body language, which is totally her own. The way she moves, dances, gesticulates and makes faces at people or to underline the content of the lyrics. She’s a true original.

Because the Orangerie in La Botanique is so small, I got the chance of seeing them from up close. It’s was really… frappant… to see, as they get older, that Cathérine Ringer and Frederic Chichin start to look more and more as characters from Jacques Tardi, auteur of graphic novels [Tardi wouldn’t like this label though, but there just isn’t a other English equivalent for the French and Dutch terms apart from comics]. I'll give proof later on.
it's pretty funny. They still look great and more important sound great.

Another welcome surprise was the preset Sebmartel. I had never heard of Sébastien Martel but apparently he’s still one of France best kept secrets.

Now that things are slowing down a bit I can spend more time relaxing, reading books and checking out what I’ve been missing all those years from not having a TV set. I bought the DVD box of The BBC series The Office, including the Xmas specials. I’m turning into a real couch potatoo for the moment because Green Wing, another fine example of British comedy is scheduled for the next rainy evenings.

88 The Temptations – Don’t Let the Joneses Get you Down

Other worries or more accurate items of interest and concern, are the upcoming holidays. I’m planning to join a bicycle trip from Bangkok to Saigon. I’m really looking forward to this. The trip runs along Cambodia and the ruins of Angkor Vath. Hopefully I’m finally going to make it this time and see the sites.

I’m also still waiting for the first African in outer space. There have been some Afro-American men and women on the various space shuttles but no native African has had a blast off from Lagos or Cape town so far.

In the meantime some more spaced out tracks.

89 Dexter Wansel - Life on Mars 1976
This has nothing to do with the David Bowie track. Dexter Wansel is a Philly keyboard player with some moderate success in the 70’s but his lasting legacy will be his contributions to the Gamble and Huff Philly Sound.

90 Rodney Trotter - Space Nigga' mid 70’s
This track pops up on a number of compilation albums these days. It’s a nice bit of proto-Newcleus electro in which Rodney Trooter [no, not the Only Fools and Horses character] talks of his band landing from the cosmos to wipe out use of that still troublesome ‘N’ word.

You might have noticed some changes on this site over the past few weeks. I’ve run an update on the looks and content. It became a bit more custom made. It’s not that difficult if you take the time and effort to get into all the features Blogspot has to offer.
About the content. I’ve added some extra pages to give some sense of direction to the various styles of music. This main page will stay the central topic but some items will get some sort of regathering on one of the following specific pages.

Black Gold Radio is, as the name already gives away, dedicated to everything Black. No written content here. Its basically just a place where I can leave a widget from Box to publicly stream all the Rare Grooves that I’ve been posting or that I’ve been planning to post because by now there’s already more in the Box map to which the widget links than what I’ve been able to write about and post.

Willie Hutch – Brothers Gonna Work It Out (The Mack 1973)

If you want to download a track, choose the option share (by right clicking the track) and there you can find a link to a shared folder from Box with the same name.

The Latin Section is dedicated to Everything Latin. I’ve had this one for quite a while now but finally got around to do something with it. Again no written content here but a roundup of various posted items on Out to Lunch and home made compilations like the one which I posted recently. Part 2 and 3 are on their way.

Joe Bataan – The Bottle

brasíl is dedicated to the brazilian way. Again this page will feature a roundup of various posted items on Out to Lunch and home made compilations like the ongoing alphabet of MPB / Musica Popular Brasileira. Ongoing because this alphabet is still being written today. Currently I’ve been posting C and D.

Bonde do Rolê – James Bonde

Time Goes By / Con Bolly is inspired by a trip to Barcelona and La Terremoto’s cult hit Time goes by Con Loli but in fact this page is dedicated to everything Bolly [Bollywood or Bombay], Kolly [Kollywood or Kodambakkam Madras] and yes… even Lolly [Lollywood or Lahore]. Not much written content over here but as always a roundup of various posted items on Out to Lunch and home made compilations.

Lover’s Paradise

Um Flash Electricó de alleman is dedicated to electronic music in various forms. No limits, German style, French style, Detroit or Scandinavian style … anything goes if I like it. It’s getting boring I know, but again not much written content over here but a roundup of various posted items on Out to Lunch and home made compilations like the one I posted before: Pop Is Not Dead but Just Smells Funny and String Delay.

Booka Shade – Vertigo (Henrik Schwarz remix)
Faze Action – Keep it Coming (Beats)
Olivier Giacomotto – Gail In The O (John Acquaviva & Damon Jee remix)

The Houston Helpdesk. I had a Myspace account for years but lost track of it until friends of mine got into it too and as result, I revamped the whole thing. I made a fansite out of it in order to keep track of all the bands and artist (dead or alive) that I like. It pretty handy if you want to stay up to date of current and upcoming concerts, clubgigs and record releases and the occasional chat. What the name is concerned, it just popped up somewhere on these pages. Some people though that it was a band name. Maybe I should give up my daytime job and become a fulltime inventor of band names.

And finally, last but not least Last Bongo in Belgium. I didn't make the name of this one up myself. It's an actual song title from the Incredible Bongo Band, yes the one from 'Apache' fame. Why they called it Last Bongo in Belgium? Beats me, how should I know. Maybe they we're thinking about Last Tango in Paris but for all I know, they could just as well have called it Last Bongo in Bulgaria or... in the Balkan or even better Last Bongo in the Congo. Maybe that's how they finally got to Belgium. Isn't that how we all eventually wind up in Belgium?
This page is dedicated to everything marked BEL and worthwhile even for people who are not from around these parts. This small spot on the globe has produced some fine and lasting contributions to mankind which have universal value, relevance and beauty. Being caught here, shouting all of this from the top, seemed the most atypical thing to do, since we are known to be rather unpatriotic about it. That’s why I tend do this.
What better native to start with than Tintin. It was only recently that we celebrated the 100th anniversary of Hergé. I like to draw a bit myself every once in while, that’s why I’m interested in cartoons, comics and graphic novels.
Most of the content on this page though, consists of music, mainly danceable stuff. I know that we‘re getting a kind of reputation in terms of music these days but that doesn’t mean that there wasn’t anything worthwhile going on in the past.

In terms of dance music I guess it all started with Marc Moulin and his alter ego Placebo way back in the 70’s. He kept playing music over the years and stayed an seminal figure in the Belgian music scene up until now as producer, radio DJ and musician. He received worldwide recognition for his early blend of jazz and funk which predated trip hop and his band Telex which inspired early electro and techno. Other classics that will pop up are Front 242, the R&S label output,…