Content Catnip

Six of the best electronic and experimental channels on YouTube

Six of my favourite electronic and experimental music channels on YouTube

There is so much great content and junk out there on Youtube. I have a really eclectic and diverse taste in music and so I like to seek out weird shit on Youtube and try and find things that float my boat. Here are some Youtube channels I always go back to…

When Dubs Cry

This channel features rare and little heard vinyl rips from 60s-90’s electronica, synth, ambient and new age music. It features many female electronic music artists such as Suzanne Ciani, who I have profiled before. Many of these albums are too full on to really even comprehend and are challenging to listen to, whereas others are growers and stay with you for a long time. Such as this one by Al Gromer Khan

And this one by Suzanne Ciani which I did a very gushing review of here.

All in all, quite a satisfying channel to rummage through, for lovers of vintage obscure electronic music. It never fails to deliver and evoke emotion – even if sometimes that emotion is confusion, its always a confusion tinged with curiosity.

Electronic Love Collective

This electronic music channel is more about brand new releases, literally hot off the vinyl and digital press, by underground electronic music artists and producers who are gathering a ground-swell of following. This channel is multi-genre and features everything from thumping, heaving ‘basement at Berghain’ techno to ethereal, light and new-agey ambient music, to 90’s acid house inspired trance to everything in between.

Of note for me is Chaos in the CBD, producers from Auckland who have made a range of really impressive, atmospheric acid house tracks and 90’s throw-backs – I can’t stop listneing to them

Another discovery for me on this channel is Marquis Hawkes with their thumping warehouse style garage – bangin!

And also one of my all time favourite albums ever…I found on this channel – The Fifty Eleven Project by Kasper Bjørke Quartet

Slav

This is another underground electronic music channel that delivers a lot of juicy joints. Slav has amassed quite an enormous following on YouTube now with 170K followers. Although I was there right from the start several years ago. I have discovered a lot of cool stuff here that ranges from Garage, House, funky psychadelic house, along with layered floaty and summery yacht on the Mediterranean kind of vibes, with a funky edge. Take this Niles Cooper track for example…

Slav’s channel has music that is cruisy, chirpy and inobstrusive enough to perform well as background fodder while working, writing or perhaps even while working out.

And this one by Hush Hush

The Needle Drop

Anthony Fantano who runs The Needle Drop, reviews rock, metal, electronic and experimental music without taking himself too seriously. He’s incredibly amusing, musically erudite and sometimes absolutely bonkers in a good way. He is also incredibly expressive in terms of his colourful descriptions of music. I am not aware of his background or expertise, but he certainly seems to know his stuff. I like that while he selects a lot of new releases, he also circles back in time to profile classic albums of all genres. Its also my guilty pleasure to see him eviscerate shitty albums, as well as pick apart the best to worst albums by iconic artists like Bjork, Prince, Bowie and more.

Bjork – worst to best

The worst songs of Anthony’s adolescence

KEXP

Apparently KEXP is a public radio station in the US. They feature a lot of up and coming indie bands but lately they have become more all-encompassing and include a lot of world music and stuff you would never have heard before, like this mongolian folk music, which is just incredible.

Funked Up East

Funky, snazzy, sparkly jazzy, rock and experimental numbers from the former Soviet Bloc countries from back when the wall was still up. Despite the oppression they faced there, they still managed to make some funky as hell jazz-fusion albums and I have no idea who any of these people are, but the sounds were pretty amazing.

Kamil Hala Orchestra- Jubileum

Yuri Morozov ‎– Strange Angels

Do you have any favourite music channels on Youtube that continue to deliver for you….what are they?

Ancient words of the day: Glamour and grammar

Glamour is an 18th Century corruption of the word grammar. Or the occult processes that were traditionally associated with learning during the middle ages. The words grammar and glamour are also associated with the word grimoire – a spell-book.

Ancient words of the day: Glamour and grammar

Glamourie: witchcraft, magic, fascination or a spell

Glaumerify: to cast a spell over or bewich

Glamour-bead: an amber bead, used for enchantment and also used as a gift, might the gift or power of fascination or enchantment, the power of casting spells.

“London Grimoire, a ludic group of independent musicians, first met in Nottingham to bring musical cheer (because it’s Grimoire up North)” Minstrels’ Almanac 1597

Owl Warsaw Zoo Copyright Content Catnip 2019

“When devils, wizards or jugglers deceive the sight, they are said to cast glamour o’er the eyes of the spectator.” Poems of Allan Ramsay (Edinburgh 1720).

Glamour -Draíocht
(Charm, enchantment fascination, magic, spell)
Spell-bound -Faoi dhraíocht

“He was a grammarian, and could doubtless see further into the future than others.” J. R. R. Tolkien, Farmer Giles of Ham.

References The English Dialectical Dictionary

The Ruthless Unspoken

At night I lie awake In the ruthless Unspoken, knowing that planets come to life, bloom, and die away, like day-lilies opening one after another in every nook and cranny of the Universe… Diane Ackerman

Ancient Word of the Day: Vellichor library book

Artists & Writers in Their Own Words: Jarod K Anderson AKA The Cryptonaturalist

Ancient words of the day: Arcadian Idyll

Pagan date: Litha

Litha, also known as midsummer, is the longest day of the year in the southern hemisphere.And it’s also a great date for planning and transition, a good day to ponder the year ahead.

Litha

Ancient word of the day: Tsundoku

Got enough books? What a stupid question!

The Japanese word, “Tsundoku”, which literally means “reading pile”, dates back all the way to the Meiji era (1868-1912). It’s a unique word for which there is no English equivalent. If you’re an avid reader though, you will well understand that feeling…it’s pure happiness, the feeling of knowing that you have many more books ready to read!

The word is a combination of the words tsundeoku 積つんでおく (to pile things up and leave them) and dokusho 読書どくしょ
(reading).

A great private collection is a material concentrate that continually stimulates, that overexcites. Not only because it can always be added to, but because it is already too much. The collector’s need is precisely for excess, for surfeit, for profusion. It’s too much—and it’s just enough for me. … A collection is always more than is necessary.”
― Susan Sontag, The Volcano Lover: A Romance

Geological Marvel, Art or Book? You Be The Judge! — Ancient word of the day: Tsundoku

Ancient word of the day: Tsundoku — Books I have actually read in this stack, but many more are still lingering in a state of tsundoku

A book is a dream that you hold in your hand. – Neil Gaiman

Every picture tells a story: The library made of gigantic books

All of those books you own but haven’t read are a sign that you’re not wise enough yet and that life still has so much to teach you. And while it’s difficult to be minimalistic when surrounded by books, there is a cosy pleasure in being surrounded by so many new worlds to explore.

There is another similar feeling to tsudoku I think…the feeling of looking at a stack of books you have already read and returning to those worlds inside of your head, even if only for moments. Do you know this feeling?

A flower

A flower’s fragrance declares to all the world that it is fertile, available, and desirable, its sex organs oozing with nectar. Its smell reminds us in vestigial ways of fertility, vigor, life-force, all the optimism, expectancy, and passionate bloom of youth. We inhale its ardent aroma and, no matter what our ages, we feel young and nubile in a world aflame with desire. Diane Ackerman

Ancient word of the day: Dægeseage — Some wildflowers on Carningli Copyright Content Catnip 2010

Travel: Meandering around the Mynydd Carningli neolithic hillfort — Some wildflowers on Carningli Copyright Content Catnip 2010

Travel: Wellington from city to wild coasts

Watch my video of the journey

Wellington is unusual and amazing in that you can walk along the beach for 10 km and go from being in the middle of the city to being in a really remote and wind-swept marine sanctuary. There aren’t many other places in the world you can do that. Here’s a vlog of that walk.

Wallace Stevens – Somnambulisma

On an old shore, the vulgar ocean rolls

Noiselessly, noiselessly, resembling a thin bird,

That thinks of settling, yet never settles, on a nest.

The wings keep spreading and yet are never wings.

The claws keep scratching on the shale, the shallow shale,

The sounding shallow, until by water washed away.

Every picture tells a story: Into the unknowable

The generations of the bird are all

By water washed away. They follow after.

The follow, follow, follow, in water washed away.

Without this bird that never settles, without

Every Picture Tells A Story: The somnambulent sea, Napier

Its generations that follow in their universe,

The ocean, falling and falling on the hollow shore,

Would be a geography of the dead: not of that land

Tracey Emin. About Neon Art and Loneliness http://wp.me/p41CQf-aU

To which they may have gone, but of the place in which

They lived, in which they lacked a pervasive being,

In which no scholar, separately dwelling,

Poured forth the fine fins, the gawky beaks, the personalia,

Which, as a man feeling everything, were his.

Wallace Stevens, 1943

Film Review: High Life

I saw this one at this year’s NZIFF in Wellington. Directed by Claire Denis, High Life is about a group of prisoners who are used as guinea pigs in sexual experiments by an evil nurse played by Juliette Binoche on board a space mission.

I don’t normally speak in such plain terms about the plot of a movie – but there you have it. That about sums it up.

Juliette Binoche – who is normally one of the most highly watchable and incredible actresses on the planet, is severely squandered here.

Juliette Binoche delivers lethal doses of sexual toxicity to people who you can’t help but not give two shits about.

This is about as one dimensional a movie as you can possibly imagine. Robert Pattinson of Twilight fame, is the main protagonist in this film and does it no favours with his wooden, emotionless acting. All the while, the plot remains completely non-existent.

Why is there a need for sexual experimentation in space? Why is there a garden on the space ship? What did all of the prisoners do to get onto the ship in the first place and what are their individual stories? How does the IVF inspired seeding of the prisoners actually work?

We never find out. Nothing that adds legitimacy to the story is ever explained and no detail is provided about any of the characters in the story. And therefore, I couldn’t force myself to give a shit about anything that happened in this movie, no matter how hard I tried. Perhaps if I was on something, it would have been more amusing.

Roger Ebert rated this film really highly. He must have been on some pretty mean space cookies to get to that point.

0/5

An effervescent, mellow and energised summer playlist for 2020

Here’s a few cool albums I have been listening to lately. They have a nice beachy vibe, which is the kind of weather we are getting in Australia and New Zealand right now. Great background music for BBQS, on the headphones while sinking a few cold ones on the beach, while reading, and some of these songs are great if you plan on staying out all night to party. With so much disturbing shit going on in the world lately, here’s some nice uplifting tunes to escape into. Like jumping into a vat full of bubbly Sprite…and vodka.

Altin Gun – Gece

Altin Gun are a Turkish experimental psychadelic rock band with a female vocalist with a soaring and passionate voice. Who knows what she’s saying, I can’t speak Turkish but I still love it, love it, love it.

Skinshape – Oracolo

Khruangbin – Con Todo El Mundo

Khruangbin literally means airplane in Thai, and this Texan band get their influences from the funky-ass psychadelic funk of Thailand in the 70’s, among other things. There is something warm and timeless about this album, it makes you smile and swing your hips seductively. And watching their goddess bass player Laura Lee swinging her hips on stage at live gigs is enough to make any girl bat for the other side. She is cool personified.

The Cool Out Corner (Summer Mixtape) [Mixed by Amerigo Gazaway

Fancy a totally dope mash-up of 80’s and 90’s East Coast hip hop of a certain swing and vibe. This is it, the pinnacle of tracks featuring all of the usual suspects Kool & the Gang, Prince, Public Enemy, Snoop, Tupac, etc. in one irresistible mix by mix-master Amerigo Gazaway. How the hell he is not really famous I have no idea, because he’s one talented muthafucker.

Chaos in the CBD – Green Dove

A track reminiscent of underground 90’s acid house from Kiwi brothers Ben and Louis Helliker-Hales. There’s a floaty, hypnotic and trancy vibe to it, as though the music is actually undulating waves on a beach. All of their music is like this, like 90’s rave nostalgia but layered in a new, spacey and modern way. Anyway they have exploded and got a lot of festival gigs in recent months in the US, which is very understandable.

E&D – Runaway (Ali Berger Remix)

I have no idea who E&D are but this track is so amazing. Reminds me a little of Disclosure before they went commercial and turned shit. That sort of fun, bouncy, garage vibe of a summer night out in London at Fabric.

E&D – Not Enough

Ditto for this track. That opening vocal with the echoey reverb gives this song a lot of depth. And the warm garage-y London vibe to the whole thing. I just really dig this!

Furious Frank ft. Ivy Barkakati – Ahora Sí (Frank’s Sunrise Mix)

Are you looking for a track to basically end a long late set at a rave? A magical sunrise track that will reinvigorate the crowd to shred that last bit of energy? Well this is it actually. A bit messy, a bit sleazy, but totally euphoric and the whispery Spanish vocals sound confessional, kind of like a conversation that you would have after a very long and very great party.

And here’s another version with a lot of 303 – equally good.

Another Kiwi band full of lush and floaty summery BBQ vibes.

Marquis Hawkes – Don’t U (Feat. Ursula Rucker) [HTH100]

Some more mellow sunrise vibes for after a long and great night.

Marquis Hawkes – Sunset

And for a great light show in Hala Stulecia in Wrocław have a look and listen to this set by deep house producer Cocolino

I hope you enjoy it. Here’s the complete playlist if you are interested. What do you think of my picks, any summery songs on your own playlist this year? And conversely if you are in the freezing cold right now, what are you listening to? We welcome you to visit warm and friendly Wellington.