Mutant Bop

Friday saw us launch our Mutant Pop night in style at the Arc. After some hasty equipment fiddling ("Argh! The speaker's not working! The decks are fucked! There's only enough phono leads for one cd deck!") we got down to business, with the Arc already surprisingly busy by the time I started playing. Very strangely, I was set up by myself (the previous DJ being the Mutant Pop mix)...I popped the opening piano chord of Superpitcher's 'Tell Me About It' over the Ame mix of 'Tarzan' and away I went, encompassing 'micro-goth' (see here), futurist disco, and techno of all shapes and sizes. Sensing the dancefloor bubbling away, the jacking yet tasteful house was pulled out to much success, before taking things down a notch with Steve Bug's deeply delicious interpretation of Sian's 'Sei'. Here's the setlist for anyone who's interested.

Richard Carnage's Set
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1) Superpitcher - Tell Me About It // Kompakt
2) Padded Cell - Unknown Zone // DC
3) Gui Boratto - Archipelago // K2
4) Riton vs. Howdi - Closer // Get Physical
5) Rekid - My Bleep // White
6) Spandex - The Bull // Rebelone
7) Shit Robot - Wrong Galaxy // DFA
8) Wighnomy Brothers - Wombat // Kompakt
9) Bodzin & Huntemann // International Deejay Gigolos
10) Solid Groove & Sinden - Din Da Da // White
11) Del Costa & Pedro Goya - #37 // Classic
12) Abe Duque - What Happened? // Abe Duque
13) Freaks - Tweekers // White
14) Sian - Sei (Steve Bug Remix) // Poker Flat

I could quote good old Erol's chart here and say that "you should under no circumstance try to download any of these from any file sharing communities such as soulseek, limewire or whatever..." (see his chart for some top tunes), but it's probably less hypocritical instead to advocate the use of these file-sharing services to evaluate the tracks, and then grab the ones that you like from either your local (ie. Replay!) or not so local (see sidebar for links) record emporia. Anyhow, here's a couple of the aforementioned jackin' tunes to get your ears around; the Solid Groove & Sinden track that samples George Kranz's 'Din Da Da' (also sampled by Patrice Baumel on 'Mutant Pop'), and the boompty-rant anthem that is Abe Duque's 'What Happened?'.

Download:
Solid Groove & Sinden - Din Da Da // White

Download:
Abe Duque - What Happened (Feat. Blake Baxter) // Abe Duque

Puffin's already mentioned in the comments section that his discofied opening 'went down like a sack of shit', but personally I quite enjoyed it, especially Don Armando's 'I'm An Indian Too'.

Download:
Don Armando's Second Avenue Rhumba Band - I'm An Indian Too // Ze

By the time he was rocking the Innocent Sorcerers' latest, the crowd started to get on the same wavelength, and things were really kicking off by the time the Mathew Jonson-esque bassline of Tekel's Metope mix hit. Or maybe it was just all the techno-heads waking up after the oestrogen injection of Palermo Disko Club & Baxendale that preceded it. Either way, Puffin rocked the mixed crowd with a varied yet discerning set, worthy of the Mutant Pop moniker. Here's the penultimate track that he played; Ashley Beedle's hands-in-the-air, piano housing remix of The Streets.

Download:
The Streets - Weak Become Heroes (Ashley Beedle's Love Bug Vocal) // 679

Puffin Jack's Set (in a vague order!)
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Junie Morrison - Techno-Freqs // Ze
Happy Mondays - Wrote For Luck (Vince Clarke Remix) // Factory
Blondie - Rapture (Ripture Edit) // White
Don Armando's Second Avenue Rhumba Band - I'm An Indian Too // Ze
The O'Jays - Put Our Hands Together (Yorkshire Rapper Re-Edit) // Better Days
69 - Sub Seducer // Planet E
12th Floor - Salsa 313 (Trickski remix) // Raw Fusion
Innocent Sorcerers - One Dollar Race // Raw Fusion
Sharon Phillips - Want 2 Need 2 (Switch Remix) // Gut
Makosa & Megablast - Kumuaka // G Stone
Tomboy - Samba // Kitsune
Palermo Disko Club - Pump // Kitsune
Baxendale - I Built This City // Kompakt Pop
Metope - Second Skin (Tekel Remix) // Sender
Billy Nasty & Tresher - Black Sorcer // Electrix
Christopher & Raphael Just - Popper // Combination
Tiga - You Gonna Want Me // PIAS
Paul Woolford - Erotic Discourse // 20:20 Vision
The Streets - Weak Become Heroes (Ashley Beedle Remix) // 679
Kerri Chandler - Bar A Thym // NRK

The night was rounded off by the ketaminimal stylings of honorary Tapers and Mutant Pop cohorts, Mike Bull and Gareth Watkins (pictured right and left, respectively). Personally, I can only remember a couple of their tunes by name; those being Bug & Tanzmann's 'Shick' (recently released on Poker Flat), and one of last year's personal favourites, the incredible Rocket's Revamp mix of Konrad Black's 'Medusa Smile'. As you'd expect, the latter caused total dancefloor demolition, and rounded off what was, by all accounts, a very successful launch party. Thanks to everyone who came down, and I hope that we'll see you there for the next one on May 5th. Our special guest will be Butane who's been releasing stuff over the past year on Alphahouse, Rygular, and International Freakshow amongst others; most notably 'On The Ket', which came out last summer on Jeremy Caulfield's Dumb Unit imprint. Road trippers be warned - you've got no excuse this time as new night Cuisine opens on May 4th at Timbuk2 with a hip-house extravaganga, hosting both Ed Banger's Uffie and Bpitch's Feadz. It's great nights like this being put on on weekdays that make me hate the fact that I've got a day job. Timbuk2's been so popular recently that it's been really hard to get a weekend slot there, so make sure you support Cuisine to make sure that it becomes a long-term fixture. If they keep the line-ups like that then I'll be there every time!