So this is what happens when you give a bunch of douchebags VIP tickets to Primavera with a free bar all weekend. Id tell you about the bands, sunshine, fun etc but i think it would just be rubbing salt in the wounds of those who missed out on the festival event of the summer so far. So here are some pictures that explain themselves. Viva la Barcelona!
This Thursday night Red Bull host the collaborative art stream, ProjectRoom – a unique collaborative live art event featuring the cream of today’s street artists : Remi/Rough, Jaybo and Juice 126. The three artists will create three individual artworks in front of live crowd on the night and then go on to work on each others work to produce nine artworks across the night. Remi/Rough and Jaybo have collaborated in a similar way before and the results from the night can be seen here to give you an idea of what to expect:
As well as creating some fresh, new artwork on the night the artists also produce an exclusive soundtrack for the evening too.
Expect a full review next week!
Let’s get this established from the off: This is bloody great. Any album that kicks-off with a tune that causes its reviewer to emit a camp ‘ooooh’ like a startled hairdresser is definitely off to a winner. ‘Lightwerk’ sets the tone of Lost Idol’s second long-player ‘Brave The Elements’ quite magnificently and serves as a confident statement of intent for what follows. Brimming with ideas and atmosphere, the latest release by James Dean on Cookshop Records is as sharply executed as many of the finer releases on Warp or Ninja and one hopes it’ll gain enough listeners to reflect this. The opener aside, highlights include the single ‘A Sorrowful Thing’ and the beautiful ‘Peace For Joseph’, a fatherly tribute to the most recent addition to the Cookshop family. Reflecting Dean’s love for Electronica, Ambient, Krautrock and Cinematic soundscapes, ‘Brave The Elements’ comfortably melds genres into what is often a rarity nowadays; a very pleasurable album experience from start to finish.
By now you’ve probably heard that the founder of the legendary Gangstarr suffered a heart attack last week. The good news is that after surgery on Monday he’s back on the mend. At this stage little other news is available other than an unnamed source being quoted as saying “Guru is alive and recovering from his surgery. Doctors are expecting a full recovery luckily.” However, the internet being what it is there’s plenty of misinformation doing the rounds, with MTV.com flying the flag of poor research at full mast, attributing quotes to people who may have said bugger all on the issue. Good work guys. Maybe have your work experience bods stick to bagel-fetching in future…
Most recently Guru has been working with producer Solar and Beatmag were fortunate enough to catch up with the duo last year. However for fans of his earlier work with Gangstarr, a tidy ‘Get Well Soon’ mix by DJ Wonder has been doing the rounds and will serve as a reminder as to why the man is held in such high regard by so many of us.
Yordan Orchestra
Psych Introduxeon: Bringing Ingredients Together (Megatier Productions)
So. Beatmag has been away for a half a year and now we return looking very different but let’s not fuss, eh, let’s just review an album of bizarre psychedelica, instead, to get our hand back in. ‘Psych Introduxeon’ arrived at Beatmag Mansions with no info but a snapshot of a sallow pallid dude with sunken stoned eyes. This, we must presume, is Jack Aleister, leader of Yordan Orchestra, a latterday prog-psychedelic outfit from Holland whose concerts are sprawling happenings, heavy with the whiff of a druggier bygone age. Taking their cue from the Polyphonic Spree, who they’ve supported in concert, Yordan Orchestra hurl a mass of instruments into their melodramatic head music. The album has traditional rock leanings, but then the brass and cellos join in for a streak of howling ballads redolent of both Arthur Lee’s Love (for their musical ambition) and early Robyn Hitchcock (for their wilful but tuneful oddness). Like a baroque, burlesque and grungier version of early ’70s Pink Floyd, Yordan Orchestra wear their lysergic attitude loudly – announcing they have “mushrooms to try” on ‘Faced You In A Neon Light’ – but retain a core of approachable, melodic musical experimentalism that certain media-celebrated British bands would do well to emulate.
Thomas H Green
Hellfest is more than just another summer festival; it is an apocalyptic heavy metal experience that makes you feel like you have entered the thunderdome from Mad Max. Wondering around the dust and rock strewn main arena you encounter oiled up Fuel Girls, forests of perfectly groomed mullets, rusty flaming towers, stunt motorbikes in spherical cages, giants, midgets, and whole lotta growling. Hellfest is one of the worlds most revered metal festivals, taking place in the idyllic of Clisson in western France, and 2 weeks ago i had my first taste of hell. And it tasted meaty! (more…)
Beatmag webmaster, boozehound & questionable disc-jockey, Tim Gomersall, takes us through a night playing alongside the big boys (and girls) in London town…
Firstly, a confession. By the end of this gig I was rather plastered. In fact, I was so inebriated that the fact that i actually saw the last band only came back to me a few days later. Anyhow, I will try my best to fill in the blanks, and provide a balanced review of the night. And if there are any glaring holes in my memory, then I will fill them up with sparkles of imagination. (more…)
50 Cent: Blood On The Sand (Xbox 360, PS3)
Nah, I don’t give a FUCK, if this game be old as dirt! I couldn’t just let my nigga Fiddy drop some new game knowledge without spittin’ ‘bout that shit, yo! My nigga done it again, yo! He’s a prophet and an ambassador for the world, and shit…. (more…)
The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.
Neil Gardner Recommends:
Chrome
Red Exposure
(Beggars Banquet) 1980
“I am anti-fade and I can’t go away” Chrome -’Eyes On Mars’ (more…)
Jack Penate
Everything Is New (XL)
Yes, in an event as unlikely as Phil Collins cutting a dubstep album with The Bug, Jack Penate is Beatmag’s Album Of The Issue. (more…)
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