Posts Tagged ‘People Under The Stairs’
12/4/09 News briefs: Andrew W.K., Phoenix, Animal Collective, Spacemen 3 and Of Montreal
Friday, December 4th, 2009
Andrew W.K. has contributed to a re-imagining of The Simpsons’ famous theme tune. Andrew played piano and threw in some scatting over top of some production by hip-hop crew People Under The Stairs. Their version will air on January 14th, the final episode of the show’s 20th season.
Phoenix are the stars of three new videos featuring them playing around various spots in Paris. Shot by Vincent Moon (The National, R.E.M., All Tomorrow’s Parties), the clips show the band stripping down their flashy studio sound to a couple of acoustics, a rinky-dink Casio keyboard and Thomas Mars’ unwavering voice.
Animal Collective will premiere their movie with director Daniel Perez at the Sundance Film Festival in January. The official description of ODDSAC is “an earthy, psychedelic experimental narrative infused with the band, Animal Collective’s aural and musical sensibilities.” Basically what we’d want in such an endeavour.
Jason Pierce has said he’s “not interested” in ever reuniting his former band Spacemen 3. About his notorious old bandmate Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember, Mr. Spaceman said, “The split was so acrimonious and my view of him hasn’t changed.”
The other day we mentioned how Beyonce and Of Montreal are interested in working with each other. Well, it appears Kevin Barnes has already jumped at the opportunity and begun working on a song for Ms. Knowles. On Twitter, he posted that the song will be called “He’sMyPartyDrug” and it “sounds like The Time meets Four Tet.” Ooh!
Tags: andrew wk, animal collective, Beyonce, Daniel Perez, He'sMyPartyDrug, Jason Pierce, Kevin Barnes, ODDSAC, Of Montreal, People Under The Stairs, Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember, phoenix, Spacemen 3, Sundance Film Festival, The Simpsons, Twitter, Vincent Moon
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Earworm: People Under The Stairs “Trippin At The Disco”
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009
What: A perenially underrated L.A. hip-hop duo comprised of Thes One and Double K.
Sounds like: A throwback to the simpler days of hip-hop, block parties in the Bronx, original MCs rhyming over disco breaks, etc.
RIYL: The Quannum family, including Blackalicious, Lateef and Chief XL, DJ Honda, Cunninglynguists, Dilated Peoples, Beatnuts, and any other hip-hop group stubbornly keeping the golden-era hip-hop flag flying.
Need to know: These guys have been making reliably high-quality hip-hop for over 10 years - or five times the length of Ja Rule’s career. A couple years ago, the group’s producer Thes One made an incredible album based entirely on radio commercial jingles from the ’50s.
Track: Any time a rap group does this kind of old-school homage, they’re faced with an ultimatum: keep people interested with sharp, modern lyrics over vintage production, or go for pure authenticity by keeping it 1981-simple. “Trippin At The Disco” opts for the latter, with Thes and K emulating the funky cadence of primitive masters of ceremony and no mindblowing turns of phrase. The beat is a simple bassline with bursts of triumphant-sounding horns and strings. While high-concept, the music video is as authentic as the song. As described on YouTube: “In March of 1980 two young rappers from los angeles appeared on the “Chikara Kurahashi Hit Station” variety show in Tokyo. It was the first time rap music had ever been performed in Asia and here is the lost tape of that performance.”
Buy: The group’s seventh album, Carried Away, was released on October 13th.
Tags: Carried Away, Double K, People Under The Stairs, Thes One
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