Full Bag on Skylab

 Back on the radio today with my own show on Skylab Radio!

Full Bag with Empty DJ will be on at from 12pm - I’m bringing a bunch of bits that are always in my bag for the first ep.

Tune in online or come down and say whats up at High Note in Northcote :)

Space’d Ensemble on Sunday

 Back at Doctor Morse this Sunday arvo for the Space’d Ensemble crew!

So keen to get the call up - come down for H.O.U.S.E.

Jimi Tenor - Can't Stay With You Baby (Boo Williams Remix)

There's a bittersweet story to how I ended up with this new upload.

About two years ago, I was listening to a Trushmix by the amazing DJ Sotofett and came across this tune with wonky baseline, sharp stabs and an enchanting hook, and became obsessed with trying to track it down.

After months of looking, in February I heard Can't Stay With You Baby from Finnish composer Jimi Tenor on Warp in 1996 and realised I had found the vocal. Reinvigorated, I searched for anything that had any record of using that song.

This CD came with a copy of Swedish music magazine Merge in 2000, and it featured a remix of Can't Stay With You Baby by Chicago legend Boo Williams. I thought that this must be it. A rare nordic CD that didn't get any recognition, something that Sotofett may have dug up while being in the great white North. Plus, the production did sound a little bit like Boo Williams' early techno productions, like his releases on Relief. 

I convinced myself that this was it, and copped the last available copy online from the US with eye-watering shipping costs that were double the CD itself. After about a month of waiting in the mail, I nervously put the CD in and pressed play.

Turned out it wasn't that tune. It's more of a Track Mode Boo Williams sound with less wonky-ness, but it's still a beautiful rework of the original. Disappointed, I took comfort in the fact that I still really enjoyed this version. A fitting consolation prize.

Any suggestions on that original Sotofett track are welcomed. My working theory at the moment is that it may have involved the production of Maurice Fulton, regular collaborator with Jimi Tenor, or maybe even a production by Sotofett himself.

The search continues...

Check out the record on Discogs here.

Rivtek at Doctor Morse

Bit late on this one but wanted to upload this epic poster!

So stoked to be asked by Luke to play at his party - always been a big fan and felt starstruck to be on this bill!

Hopefully more gig news soon 

A.J. & Kenny - Different Stages

Filled with odes to life in the rural USA of the 1970s, I stumbled across this album in a third level record shop in Tokyo of all places.

Delighted to find a record store with a dedicated AOR section, I dived in, and found Different Stages with only one tune online and at a far more affordable price than recent Discogs sales. 

Different Stages is a mysterious private press release from Modern Music Workshop, a studio in Gainesville, Florida in the 80s, mostly notable for enigmatic funk mystery Jeff Floyd's early releases, some of which have recently been repressed.

This album is a joint work by (maybe related) A.J. and Kenny Minotti, with the two of them sharing writing credits across different tunes. There's also the inclusion of a third (and also possibly related) Minotti, Steve, on a few of the tunes with choir backing vocals.

There's elements of jazz and country woven throughout the album, a love letter the Different Stages of life in middle smalltown America.

There's songs like Hit and Run Woman, about a heartbreaking woman who "knows the game" meeting a "smooth talker [who] drives a Mercedes" or Daddy's Little Girl who "always got away with everything she did" and is now "putting out for the neighbourhood kids." 

Also particularly notable are Baby Don't Get Cosmic With Me, about the perils of dating those enamored with astrology, and Holding Out For You, recounting a night of stealing your old man's whisky for the high school dance and almost bungling your chance with your high school sweetheart. 

I've uploaded three tunes to the channel. The first, Lie Away, wears energetic jazz influences high on it's sleeve for a short ode to holding unfaithful lovers accountable.

(Feels So Good) To Love You is a twilight Yacht Rock gem, even though I wonder if there have been that many yachts in Gainesville. 

Finally Little Marie, another starry-eyed adult-oriented fusion piece, particularly notable for the mandolin solo from Captain Ray Valla. What he's Captain of I'm not sure. 

I'm so grateful to be able to upload a few of these tunes, and have in my collection unique snapshot of some rare and under-appreciated music from a time I can only imagine. 

Check out the record on Discogs here.

Here are some more photos:

B.P.M. on P.B.S.

Dusted a few of my favourite techno records off on the weekend for BPM on PBS 1067FM here in Naarm. 

Recording highlights include: winding the clock back an hour for daylight savings, Joey Lightbulb hounding me for my Instagram handle and me trying a stool out in the studio.

Check the link for uptempo stuff from Chicago, Detroit and Aarhus!

Trendline... Together...

At a Vinnies on the outskirts of Craigieburn I stumbled upon this Swiss rock CD which, amongst some remarkably cheesy pop rock, has some epic hidden AOR featured on the channel this week.

Trendline, a Swiss group from Grenchen in the Alps, combined to only release this album in 1995. Together was recorded over ten days at a countryside home in Lüterkofen-Ichertswil, which was apparently the home of legendary Swiss jazz pianist Six Trutt.

I can't really find any record that any jazz painist called Six Trutt even existed, yet the group say the stories and atmosphere that he and his wife created allowed for them to come together and create an album that represented this harmony. 

I can tell you that there's not really much jazz sensibility about most of this album. On the whole it's cringe-worthy euro pop rock, but there is something about the optimism and naivety that makes this CD so endearing.

The art direction too is inspired, the cover looks like it could be a late 90s trance mix, and the photos are all re-touched to look like an 80s yearbook. 

The first track I've uploaded, Sandy & John, is an acoustic flute and guitar duet arranged in three acts, which actually does seem to take in the mysterious Six Trutt's jazz knowledge. 

I've also uploaded the albums final song, SvePaHe (Invitation), which features echoed guitar stabs, disjointed percussion and maybe even the cries of a young child. The back of the CD insert is probably the best way to understand this tune: 

"The CD "Together" is an incentive to produce it in such a way that even the listener feels that the help of others is needed to achieve the set goals. Unfortunately, today's world brings with it many other manifestations such as hatred, war, oppression, and manipulation, etc., which lead to the opposite. However, since all of these tendencies have their beginning or origin in people, and the soul is also involved, the themes in our songs illuminate the various corners of the soul and its desires, dreams, fears, worries, losses, etc., which we try to convey in our music. With this in mind, it is worth immersing yourself in the last song on this CD, as an unconventional style of music and sound was used here."

Pretty weird. But it's also pretty interesting and I'm really happy to have found it in that one Craigieburn Vinnies. 

There are some photos of the CD here: