Archive for June, 2007

No. This is not about Keith Sweat’s classic baby making jam. This is about the mind blowing deep disco track by Inner Life featuring the indomitable Jocelyn Brown of the same name. I don’t know the date of the original release but it seems to have been put down in the very early eighties. I heard it on a college radio show last night and immediately called my home boy. “You gotta turn on the radio,” I told him. I can’t remember the last time I heard a club track of any type for the first time that struck me as so significant. This track must have influenced so many producers, singers, and coke attic disco fiends. Its sexy, slow, driving pulse says “We’re gonna be up all night tonight.”

Having acknowledged the importance of the track, my homie shook me back into reality and suggested I call the radio station for the track listing. I did. Its a “Salsoul classic (you foolish amateur),” the dj divulged. So now I am faced with the task of finding this sucker. Of course, I found it on a number Salsoul comps released on cd. But, come on gods of music. Ya’ll know I gotta have that plate, that human scaled incarnation of soul, that vinyl. So, its me vs. ebay. I wouldn’t be surprised if every real disco dealer from Tokyo to London is hiding a few copies of this ish. I’m gonna find you. And when I do…I’m gonna fork over way to much money for this precious gem.

-Brandon Brown

Come out and support a positive movement and have yourself a damn good time.

July 21st 8pm - 2am
13575th st. Suite B
Delicious organic foods, desserts, beer and sangria!
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Live hip-hop performances by:
New Dekades Music: ( http://www.myspace.com/tenurenudekades
featuring
K.E.V
( http://www.myspace.com/kevkickineveryverse ) .,
Ryan Nicole (http://www.myspace.com/itsrye),
and Midnight Suhn
also live performances by
Mamaz (http://www.myspace.com/mamazhouse )
Speacial dance mix by Dj Brandon Brown ( http://www.wrgradio.com)

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Donation scale: $7 - $10,000. (No one turned away for lack of funds!)
RSVP: http://www.foodcommunityculture.org/parties.html
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“Will dance for Food…Justice!” is a summer project fundraising event
for Oakland Food Connection.
This summer we are employing 4 youth in building East Oakland’s FIRST
educational rooftop garden
at E.C. Reems academy of Arts and Technology and launching our mobile
cafe “The Purple Lawn Cafe”.

For more info: http://www.foodcommunityculture.org/parties.html

1. It’s Simple - Visioneers - BBE
2. Butterfly Theory - Project Move - Sunmoon
3. Rock On - Beatless feat. Quasimoto and Madlib - Ubiquity
4. 5th Gear - Kidkanevil feat. Lateef and Little Miss B - First Word
5. Pieces of You - 1Luv - Especial
6. Me & You - Cassie - Bad Boy
7. URUB - Spacek - Jazzy Sport
8. This Way - Kid Sublime feat. U-Gene - Kindred Spirits
9. Spread Your Love - Paolo Fedreghini and Marco Bianchi feat. Claudia Bernath - Schema
10. Pray 4 Soul - Solid Gold Playaz feat. Black Music - Losofono
11. Break the Chain (Elegia Remix) - Sonoluce and Leena Conquest - Ecco Chamber
12. Don’t You Know - Atnarko - Nightshift
13. Cloud One - Spaced Out - P&P

This mix is full of stuff that we should have been listening to, but we fronted on it.

While I was recently in Atlanta, I had to stop at Moods Music, Atlanta’s premiere soul boutique. Whenever you are in ATL, stop by Moods, but bring a few dollars with you. Darryl, the owner/artistic director, if you will, is, simply put, a taste maker. If you don’t know ‘what’s really good,’ he will definitely put you on…and take your money in exchange. He happened to have some cd imports that I had been hoping would pop up on vinyl in my local store. I knew this was my best chance to avoid paying for overseas shipping.

I grabbed a dope compilation from a new UK label called Phuture Lounge. The comp is called Rainbow Soul and stars some really sweet melody makers including Fyza (who is just burning up my headphones this year), Michelle Amador (bay area!), and Vaceo among others. I’ve been hunting for Fyza’s “Summer Groove” on vinyl to no avail, but the cd is keeping me from flying to brighton and organizing a sit in in front of Phuture Lounge headquarters. “Summer Groove” is simply a Summer dancefloor fire starter. Holy sh_t ya’ll. Wassup with a 12″? Then Amador raises things up on “Higher.” This is really soulful broken house kind of a groove that has some of the skyward feel of a 4Hero 2 Pages track with some really jazzy vocal love and hand percussion garnish that keeps it from floating away. Amador’s lyrical approach is unique, playful, complex, and sincere all at once.

If you like Phuture Lounge, you will also dig Uniqueuncut’s Basement Soul compilation. Uniqueuncut is a new label started by the dons of the Basement Soul parties that go down in Brighton (I think). You will find some of the same artists on this comp like Vaceo for example. I recognized other names as well: Kid Sublime, Maddslinky, Yellowtail, and Kidkanevil, definately the future if not the present of nusoul and broken biz. For me, the stand out tracks are Kidkanevil’s “Good Morning, What’s New” featuring Andreya Triana. This beat is like broken soul bubble bath. You can just lie down in it and relax. Triana plays it so coy and yet she is so fierce moving sweetly over a really jazzy melody. Vaceo laces a sweet little bopper of a deep broken house track on “Cos You’re Here.” Vaceo reminds of Colonel Red and Siji at the same time, the preacher and the teacher. This will be a nice one for the dance floor around 1 o’clock when the tourists legs begin to fail them and the ladies take their heels into their hands. Electric Conversation gives an life to an afrobeat inspired broken house joint on “Dancing.” The track ends with some super dope percussion work. Aroop Roy comes with some raw, broken jazz funk on “I’d Die 4 U” and Masoul teams up with Ursala Rucker for a really contemplative but base heavy poem called “Knowledge.” Honestly, the more I write the more I realize that this comp is crazy packed with fresh sound. As they say in New York: “Cop this!”

-Brandon Brown