*ALWAYSONTHEBRINK*

Now thats what I call Metallic.

I guess I’ve been in some sort of metallic house mood for the last week and a half.  All the tracks I’ve been into have this cool metallic sound around them with a warm soulful glow in the middle.  

First up is a track I ripped from the Smackos Astro Unicorn radio show on CBS called Time After Time by a Finnish fellow named Kimmo Rapatti AKA Mono Junk.  It’s a very unique track and I’m not quite sure how to describe it so I’ll just let you hear what Smackos has to say about it at the end of the track.  I think he nails it pretty damn well.  

Kimmo Rapatti - Time After Time

Next up is Flight of the Jupiter, an acidic techno house space jam through metallic anolog worm holes by the man himself, Legowelt.  It’s off one of his newer records called Vatos Locos which you can find at junorecords.com or junodownloads.com Highly recomended, this man never dissapoints!

Legowelt - Flight of the Jupiter

I bought a $tinkworx record a few years ago and have only recently realized how kick ass he actualy is.  Once again I’m at a loss for words to describe the sound, Deep house glowing techno disco electric metallic funk just doesn’t quite do it justice.    I’d recommend picking up any or all of his records. Check it!

$tinkworx - Whut

$tinkworx - Raise Up

$tinkworx - Coelacnth

Dreams shouldn't be stoned, only the dreamer.

     Here is my tribute to psychedelic lounge synthesizer king Mort Garson. Mort started out doing arrangements for jazz singers in the early 60’s. These recordings didn’t really feature any of his signature space-synth touches, just nice airy lounge grooves with strings and Brazilian rhythms. The first track that really features an early version of his trademark style is a song that he wrote for the group Ruby & The Romantics in 1963, titled “Our Day Will Come”. I suppose this was somewhat of a hit at the time although I’m really not sure. However the song was later covered by tons of people. There’s no synth work on this track, just organ and some vibes, but it has a great sound:

Ruby & The Romantics - Our Day Will Come

Here are some of my favorites of his. By no means a complete list, just a few select choices.

In 1968 He recorded a psychedelic hippy version of The Wizard Of Oz titled The Wozard Of Iz. The content of the record is super tripped out and a little stereotypical beat/hippy acid style, but the production value is very high and the synth work is very much ahead of it’s time. Check out this track with it’s dark arpeggios and strange percussive hits:

The Wozard Of Iz - Leave The Driving To Us

Here is a later track on the album that features great singing by Suzie Jane Hokum who was a protégé of Lee Hazelwood. This song has a dark moody downer vibe that I really appreciate:

The Wozard Of Iz - I’ve Been Over The Rainbow

In 1971 he released a record under the artist name Lucifer, titled Black Mass. The whole record has a theme of the occult and has an overall dark, scary feeling. Here’s one of my favorites:

Lucifer - The Ride of Aida (Voodoo)

Here’s a track from a much happier record from 1976 called Plantasia. It’s all supposed to be songs that you play for your plants to help them grow, and a lot of the songs are dedicated to a certain variety. This is one of the more mellow songs on there that is very well written, a real feel good song.

Mort Garson - Rhapsody In Green

Here’s an actual disco track that Mort was involved with, the only one I think. It came out on West End in 1979 and he produced and arranged the track. It’s really a great disco song with a huge Spanish influence and of course signature warm analog keys.

Pico - Malaguena

Lastly here is a song from a very obscure movie soundtrack called “Didn’t You Hear?” from 1983. You don’t really hear his style change at all over time, even with the evolution of synthesizers and what not. Which you can’t really complain about, I’m sure he just stuck to his big old patch synths, spring reverb, and space echos. The soundtrack sounds like it could just as well be from 1970 as 1983. This song features some folk style singing and it’s very beautiful and haunting.

Mort Garson - Didn’t You Hear?

The Ghosts of Brokaw

     Here is, at long last, Brokaw’s full length album Nonconflo. Well, kind of.

     Brokaw began around 2002 in Portland and consisted of Cassidy Demarco AKA Casiocity on music and Chip Brokaw AKA Colin Jones on rhymes. They were a staple of Portland’s small Hip-Hop world for about five years, releasing homemade CD’s on their independent label Diss Company and playing out on a regular basis around town. At some point around 2005/2006 it seemed as if they were poised to take shit over around here, and everyone was anticipating their full length release Nonconflo, which was in the works for what seemed like forever. Then all of a sudden they pretty much disappeared. The album was still coming out in theory, but the excitement had died down and both members seemed much more interested in their own solo electro projects (Gouseion and Colin Jones, respectively). Time passed, and eventually it seemed unanimous that Brokaw was done and Nonconflo would never be seen.

     Then I got this message from Chip last week that he had decided to take what he had of the album and put it up for download. It may not be complete to their original vision, but it sounds complete enough to me. No art, rough mixing, no mastering, just raw original Portland Hip-Hop. I played this to a friend in the car the other day, and he said “this is really a true Portland sound”, and I couldn’t agree more. There are really no traces of any West Coast or East Coast influence in the sound, just the melting pot of the musical landscape that is the city I live in. Heavy electro/hip-hop beats, cut up noisy shit, and equal parts politically conscious and dance party minded lyrics. As a born and raised Portland Hip-Hop kid, this is 100% my kind of shit. Download and enjoy!

Brokaw - Nonconflo (The Non Album)

As an addendum, here is the video for “Palace of Pride”

Brokaw - Palace of Pride (Youtube)

Here’s a lo-fi live video from an outdoor show in Summer 2006

Brokaw - Live Medley (Youtube)

And here are a few remixes that I had done, one of “Untitled” and one of “In The Sun” which apparently  didn’t make the final mix here.

Brokaw feat. Lean Rhymes & Shambles - Untitled (Sleepyhead Rmx.)

Brokaw - In The Sun (Sleepyhead Rmx.)