Brooklyn Sweet Freakphony

Well, this is officially my first collaboration in more ways than one.

As some of you may remember, about 6 months ago, I made a little promo one shot for Scott over at Ramdom Thoughts, which was basicaly based upon an idea that me sweet sweeeeet Angel gave me. We were chillin' over at my flat one night when she mentioned the Beatnuts' tuned that was sampled on J-Lo's "Jennie from the Block". I wasn't familiar with the original so I googled "Brooklyn Bomb" upon her advice. I eventually came by a little instrumental jobbie, by some unknown artist that sampled several beats from various hip-hop superstars, that included the Beatnuts that I fell in love with immediately. This became the basis for my instrumental, and eventually after trying a few other instrumentals over the top of it, the Verve's legendary "Bittersweet Symphony" fitted it perfectly.

You have to remember, when I first went to Uni, my musical life revolved around house, old skool and d'n'b. I'd grown up hanging out at my mates' houses listening to the likes of the Smiths and the Roses, and even though I was in denial to be controversial, I did like guitar based/indie music, but it was all about the beats for me at the time. I went along to the V98 festival in Leeds more for the drinking than the music, but it all changed once I saw the Verve headline on the Sunday night. It's an old cliche about life changing moemnts but this was literally just that. I have no qualms about admitting, I cried me eyes out to the live version of "Lucky Man" and "History" still sends a shiver down my spine, but "Bittersweet Symphony" remians for me, THE defining song of the 90s, Needless to say, it's still my most favourite gig I've ever been to (and there's been a few now!) and the Verve's "Urban Hymns" is still in my top 5 albums of all time. It inspired me to learn guitar and wear flares. That's powerful music!

Anyway, so the promo was made with my trademark Colatron voices and samples, and it was well received, generating more traffic to the site, plus it earned a fair few downloads for a short piece. I had to try and make a full length track out of it.

So off and on, over the last 6 months, I've revisited the Acid Pro session, completing the instrumental part of things around the same time as I finished the EVP sessions. I just did not have a vocal to fit it.

An avid reader of the Island of Misfit Songs blog by the incomparable Butch Rosser (aka DJ Brother Darkness) in the US, I'd clocked a few months back that he occasionally posts a list of ideas he has that he'd like fellow mashers ot throw together for him. A few ideas have really excited me, but I've just never got around to making them. But on the last challenge, Butch had the genius idea of pairing Adina Howard's "Freak Like Me" (butchered by the Sugababes) with soul classic, "Mr. Big Stuff" by Jean Knight (which holds another special place in my heart ever since my good friend Kirsty was the Soccerette of the week on Sky Sports Soccer AM show a few years back and she had to do that catwalk thingy to it). In theory, a great pairing, but in practice, my laziness prevented me from putting the effort in to match the two.

Another of Butch's ideas involved matchign Biggie Smalls with the Verve - I've never been a Biggie fan as such, but as mentioned, I'm a HUGE Verve fan. The cogs were turning in my head. I have a Verve track, with a strong back beat made, hmmm.....

I dropped the Adina vocal in and well, excuse the French but shit me if it didn't virtually fit immediately.....

3 weeks later, playing around with various track placings/cuts, and looking for that final touch (I went for a home-made Bittersweet Symphony acapella to bring the anthemic lyrics back in) and here it is. I have to give a little it of credit to Angel, you are quite literally the best hon (you need to meet this girl - 6ft 2" of ex-model/dancer perfection, now signed to a NY rap label - she is simply awesome) and I have to give a whole load of credit to Butch for giving me the inspiration to take two of his ideas and mash them. A mash of a mash. Crazy. So yeah, this is essentially, Colatron & DJ Brother Darkness on the ones and twos. I love it, it's going back to the hiphop beats of early Colatron, and it's freaky like a monkey

Colatron & DJ Brother Darkness present....

Brooklyn Sweet Freakphony

featuring
Pharoah Monche - Simon Says (Intro)
Unknown - Brooklyn Bomb (feat. Slick Rick, Crooklyn Clan, Bad Boy, Beatnuts, Time Zone, Biggie, Jay-Z, Mase, Mobb Deep & Nas)
Adina Howard - Freak Like Me
The Verve - Bittersweet Symphony (both instrumental and DIY acapella)

and vocal excerpts from the following movies

Hideous!
Timerunner



MP3 Download Page Here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?gpd18kr2wjv

Don't forget everyone to check out Butch's blog. Its a cracking read with some wicked interviews on there too with some luminaries of the scene. It's over at

http://theisle.wordpress.com/

And show some love for me Angel over at MS&M records. And if you need more info on those movie samples, check out my favourite new site at

http://www.badmovies.org/

If anyone does know who did the Brooklyn Bomb mix, let me know; it's driving me nuts, and I'd love to give it a bit of credit.

Colatron's off to get tipsy and consider heading out to DJ Yoda tomorrow. I'm looking for inspiration for the next one...

Ciao for now

Burn Beachball Burn

Well here's a special one.

About 2 or 3 month's ago, I had an email from Scott Johnson, talking about how show #100 over at the Ramdom Thoughts blog, was going to be a little special (it's pretting special anyway!) and every track played was going to be an exclusive. Having contributed towards the show for the last year (yep, a whole year having a go at this crazy little thing called mash, and I still don't know if I've got any better), the challenge was on to make something to put towards this monumental moment in mash-up. As it happens, I was 3/4s through making the EVP mix, so I started to panic a little - would I have time? Would I have the source material? And so on....

Fortunately, I didn't have to worry. As an avid user of a certain P2P platform (ahem....I'm sure a legal disclaimer should come in about now), I searched for my usual terms, "acapella", "Instrumental", "obscure tibetan prayer chant"....and I stumbled across a VERY usable acapella of the Trammps classic "Disco Inferno". The bane of many a drunken student night out at the Ritzy, Yates, School Disco etc., it's often forgotten that the vocal on this track is actually, ruddy incredible, and is thought of as another boozy cheesy night-out track. Which is a crying shame.

I wanted to give it a modern vibe, but yet, at the same time, I was working on a few house classics such as the Bucketheads for my "Way I Bomb Your Body" track so I was firmly stuck in the mid-90's. One track that I remembered fondly was the trance classic, Nailin & Kane's "Beachball". God I used to love that track. I was sat in the car one day on the way to work just trying to remember the hook, as it was always one of my favourite tracks from the days of Oakenfold live at the Que Club (the Essential Mix live, from one of my local clubs - a must hear event every Friday between '95 - '96). I came by a few different versions of it (I had the CD single but a certain good DJ friend of mine has them in a black binliner down in his posh flat in London...the swine!) and one was just about the right length. The usual drag and drop in Acid Pro, and Bob's Your Uncle....it sounded good! I had to put a bit of work in to the section where the break down comes in as I lost the beat, but I think I managed to find it again.

So, a relatively simple A+B, but the synth just really brings out the Jimmy Ellis vocal, which at one point just soars....check it out during the breakdown when the raw power of "Satisfaction....came with a chain reaction" is sung. Spine-tingling.

As expected, show #100 was a top event, so here's to another 100 shows minimum for you Scott. Thanks for the challenge, and thanks for playing this little Colatron ditty. I hope everyone else out there enjoys this slice of trance disco.

Burn Beachball Burn

Nailin & Kane vs. The Trammps
Beachball vs. Disco Inferno



MP3 Download Page Here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?bw17jsxihzk

PS. Next week's post I am REALLY looking forward to. Another challenge, this time set by me good friend Butch Rosser out in the US of A, which has led to possibly one of my most exciting Colatron tracks yet. Can't stop hammering it on the playlist, and apparently, Butch likes! In the words of Shaw Taylor, "Keep 'em peeled..."