Tag: Girl Talk

Reblogging: NPR’s Decade In Music ’00-’09

Last week we at NPR Music launched a two-week long jaunt looking into the decade in music from 2000-2009. Focused primarily on Carrie Brownstein’s awesome blog Monitor Mix, we delve into all sorts of topics regarding the most important news events, recording industry and business issues, technology changes, the relevancy of labels, big overarching trends and most important recordings of the decade…oh yeah and ‘American Idol.’ Plus so much more, it’s definitely worth checking out.

Here are a few of my own personal contributions:

— Interactive Multimedia Timeline: The Decade In Music

— Song Of The Day: The Decade In Music: OutKast’s ‘So Fresh, So Clean’ (2001)

— All Songs Considered: The Decade’s 50 Most Important Recordings (Here I write about TV On The Radio, The Flaming Lips and Animal Collective.)

— Monitor Mix: The Decade In Music Timeline: What Did We Miss?

— All Songs Considered: Missing The Cut: More Important ’00s Music (Here I nominate Girl Talk’s uber-mashup, Night Ripper)

— A Blog Supreme: The Decade In Review: Jazz And The Mash-Up (In which I considered Norah Jones, Ornette Coleman and Floratone — among others — as helping define the decade in jazz.)

Beck’s ‘Planned Obsolescence’ Rethinks Digital Mixtape

Beck has been keeping busy.
Beck has been keeping busy.

All summer Beck has been slowly trickling out tracks from his Record Club as he Nigel Godrich and cast of other friends and musicians have covered The Velvet Underground & Nico in its entirety. He has also been releasing ‘acoustic’ versions of his 2008 album Modern Guilt, interviewing Tom Waits and Will Ferrell and unearthing found music. And just last night he unveiled his second Record Club effort, Songs Of Leonard Cohen, accompanied by MGMT, Devandra Banhart, Binki Shapiro (of Little Joy) and others.

Needless to say, the dude’s prolific.

One of the other main projects on his revamped website is Planned Obsolescence, in which he releases a new mixtape or DJ set of sorts. Perhaps because I was distracted by the other goodies, I overlooked most of these. But the latest effort, “No. 9: Sapphire Metallic And Silicone For Michael Jackson” really blew me away last night.

No. 9: Sapphire Metallic And Silicone For Michael Jackson by planned_obsolescence

Fusing together a mix of dance music, ambient and industrial electronic, hip hop, funk, a bit of indie rock and 60’s psychedelia, these sets are a great way to hear some new music, stuff you’ve heard before and some curios. It’s a great juxtaposition hearing all of this seamlessly mashed up, and truly mimics the feeling of scanning the car radio dial looking for a decent song.

Unlike other single song remixes or Girl Talk-esque uber-mashups with dozens (hundreds?) of cluttered samples that change just as soon as you figure out what song it’s from, Beck’s sets breathe much easier. It’s all a bit less frantic and the songs play out for just the right amount.

These DJ sets are worth hunting down, as they’d make a great playlist for a party, workout mix or even an early morning commute.

Also be sure to check out “No. 7 Summer Tapes,” all devoted to summer songs, including an inspired highlight where Beck segues a cascades through several versions of “Summertime Blues.”

No. 7: Summer Tapes by planned_obsolescence