Something Strange...

Something Old...

This track narrowly missed out on last weeks hip hop special blog and as I promised a few of my best mates that it would feature it has pride of place this week.

Massive Attack are a trip hop duo from Bristol and over the years they have collaborated with many artists including Neheh Cherry, David Bowie, Sinead O'Connor and Everything but the Girl's Tracy Thorn. Best known for the brilliant tracks 'Unfinished Sympathy' from their 91 debut album 'Blue Lines', 'Protection' from the 2nd album of the same name and the moving 'Teardrop' taken from their best known album, the 3rd of their 5 albums, 98's 'Mezzanine'. 

For me, its the track when they collaborated with the genius Mos Def for the Blade II soundtrack that will always be up there as one of my favorite hip hop/dance crossovers, the uplifting, effortlessly cool, 'I Against I'...

Something New...

Alt J (aka Triangle, aka △, aka the band who used to be called Films), like to shy away from the light lime refusing to show us their faces were possible and prefer to let the music do the talking.

The Leeds four piece look freakishly young but have this busy, intricate sound to everything they do that makes you think they're either all Mensa members or about 45 years old. Every song seems to have as many layers as possible – mainly revolving around unusual rhythms, weird jabby bits of guitar and lots of loping dub bass with a brilliant vocal – but it all ends up sounding oddly world-weary and wise. Their debut single is called 'Tessellate' contains the line "Triangles are my favourite shape", genius...

Something Borrowed...

Better late than never, as requested by myself this is my electro DJ mate Stephen Davey's mix track sampling various Mercury Prize artists. Davey is better known as Neoclassic Champion Rockers (NCR) and if you like this you can check him out on soundcloud. A regular contributor to my blog he has been doing well for himself this year after being named as one of BBC Radio Shropshire Introducing and following this he has had extensive play on Radio 1 and 6 Music. 

This mix includes samples from tracks by Ghostpoet's 'Survive It', Everything Everything's brilliant 'Photoshop Handsome' and a sample from PJ Harvey's 'England' taken from her winning album all mashed up alongside James Blake, Katy B and Adele, this is, 'Come Back As Something Else'... 

Something Blue...

This weeks Something Blue reflects on the sad news following R E M announcing there split this week on there website after there career spanning over 30 years (1980-2011) which is tinted with good news that they will forever be remembered for the good music they produced and not outstay there welcome, churning out rubbish like *cough* U2.

Formed by singer Michael Stipe and guitarist Peter Buck they spent years as a underground success before finally achieving mainstream success in 87 with the single ‘The One I Love’. The single is taken from the album ‘Document’ that also features the tracks ‘Welcome to the Occupation’ and ‘Exhuming McCarthy’, which were reactions to the conservative political environment of the 80s under US President Regan. The group signed to Warner Bros. Records in 88 and began to espouse political and environmental concerns while playing large arenas worldwide.

By the early 90s, when alternative rock began to experience broad mainstream success, R.E.M. was viewed as a pioneer of the genre, influencing bands from Pavement to Nirvana. They released their two most commercially successful albums whilst working with legendry producer Scott Litt, namely ‘Out of Time’ in 91 that was followed by ‘Automatic for the People’ in 92. Both of which were inspired by the feeling of turning 30, veering from the band's established sound. R.E.M.'s 1994 release, ‘Monster’ was a return to a more rock-oriented sound. By this time the band had already built up an awesome legendry catalogue of tracks including ‘Orange Crush’ from the late 80s to ‘Losing My religion’ and ‘Shiny Happy people’ from ‘Out of Time’ and ‘Drive’, the moving, smash hit ‘Everybody Hurts’ and ‘Man on the Moon’ from ‘Automatic...’, and the legendry riff ‘What’s the frequency, Kenneth’. My pick for the track of choice has got be my all time favorite REM track has to be the fast paced 'It's the End of the World (and I feel fine)' taken from there breakthru album 'Document'...