Odds & Ends

See above

Petar Dundov, "Oasis" (Gavin Russom remix)
Delia Gonzalez & Gavin Russom, "#5"

The picture, to answer your first question, was basically my reaction to Gavin Russom's abrupt uncloistering last winter; dude had basically spent the last three years keeping a lower online profile than me. I presume few if any of you give a shit; Days of Mars has been out for almost half a decade and despite my undiminished, unyielding advocacy for its era-defining excellence I've been able to get one of my friends to check it out. One. (aside: this person does approve of it mightily.) Still, this is my site, my eight dollhairs a month, get yr laws off my body etc.

ANYWAY. Russom resurfaced last winter by posting four songs to his MySpace: a track from his acid-house side project Black Meteoric Star, two other I can't remember (and since Flash refuses to play nice with my computer I'm unable to check), and his remix of Petar Dundov's "Oasis". The latter was far and away my favorite of the batch; luckily it's also the only one yet to surface as a non-rip, so now you can all join me in basking in its gleeful, don't-give-a-fuck incrementalism (not that any of you will, but hey it's not my job to update your firmware to include good taste). I also thought I'd go ahead and post Delia & Gavin's "#5", erm...thing from the 2005 DFA Holiday Mix; it's one of my very favorite things they've done, but it's also pretty much the biggest outlier in Russom's entire catalogue to date and that ain't no small potaters. Anyway, have them both and either join me in breathlessly anticipating the long-promised BMS debut release (where have I heard that before?) or take yr shots about me disappearing up my own musical ass and go back to yr Dave Matthews Band record.

(Click here to buy "Sparkling Stars" from Juno.co.uk; it's a limited-edition disc with some grin-triggeringly cool packaging, so I would suggest that you jump. Click here to buy a used copy of the DFA's Holiday Mix from Amazon.co.uk - wait, it's like two-fifty these days? MY NEST EGG NOOOOOOOOOOOOO)

Downtown Party Network, "Days Like These" (vocal mix) - This happened to be playing on the embedded player on Eskimo's site when I stopped by in search of info on Lindstrom & Prins Thomas' forthcoming album (set to release, incidentally, on May 18th on CD and motherfuckin' QUAD LP; also "Tirsdagjam", the song currently streaming on L&PT's MySpace, will be released as a teaser single on April 13th), and it ended up being more or less the best thing I've heard all week. Mostly, it's just the way it builds; even blasting out of my shitty laptop speakers, the progression's just so inviting and assured that I kept getting more excited by the second. Strong reccomendation for fans of stuff like House of House's "Rushing to Paradise" and Aeroplane's Low Motion Disco remix, although of course this is like three month old now so it's not like I'm bringing the news to anyone here. (Click here to buy the "Days Like These" single from a GEMM merchant; click here to visit DPN's MySpace)

Doves, "City of Rust" (Prins Thomas remix) - Seriously, fuck Doves; that shit is weak, and I say that as someone who once bought a Keane album. The original is, admittedly, probably my favorite song of theirs to date, but Prins Thomas just gets motherfucking stupid all over it, smoothing out the original's awkward urgency into a loping eight-minute tour-de-force; let's just say you won't have trouble recognizing the point at which he decides to bring the original mix back in (more or less). In a perfect world, this would be the all over the radio, possibly even bumping up against Superpitcher's take on that Gotye song from a while back. (The Prins Thomas mix is still currently promo-only, but you can buy one from GEMM if you want.)

Frankie Valli, "The Night" (Pilooski re-edit) - I'm sure Pilooski must be hell of over the whole Frankie Valli thing by now, but dammit how the hell else am I supposed to react when literally every single one of his edits for the dude own so fucking hard? I mean, "The Night" isn't all that different from his thrilling dissections of "Beggin'" and "Who Loves You" in either approach or effect - basically it's Yet Another Vocal-Driven Pilooski Rave-Up - leaving me at something of a loss; it's a little hard to avoid repeating yourself when you're describe songs with fundamentally identical virtues. What can I say? I'm just a sucker for the gimmick - and "The Night" is as flawless an example as I've ever found. At least this is the last time I have to do it (by which of course I actually mean FUCK, THIS IS THE LAST TIME I GET TO DO IT /wrists). (Click here to buy Beggin': The Ultimate Collection from a GEMM merchant)