My second video for The Videotones project takes a more ambient, slower turn with a widescreen video (I really recommend watching it at Vimeo or YouTube or fullscreen for full effect) for ‘Stay’ off the Downtime album, which includes the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s ‘Maps’ to great effect.

The thinking behind this video (yes I do have a reason for all I do, it’s not all just random, random, random!) is from the intro speech ‘Though I mean the world to you, your world won’t always be this new’ taking that as more of a ecological message (coupled with the ending speech There’s this stuff going down, I don’t think I can deal with it’). A contrast of destruction and beauty, tempus fugit and the futility of man, of how small the earth is in the scheme of things and how important it is to care for it.

Also a thematic one of clouds – from water to explosions to clouds of gases and stars – I was going to include part of this quote from Carl Sagan but decided not to break up the visual narrative with words-

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.

The song worked really well with Koyaaniqatsi, a film I’ve loved since I saw it as an art student in the early 90’s, and another film I love ‘Powers of Ten’ and various more recent updates to it. I wanted to contrast how badly people treat the Earth (Wait they don’t love you) and how beautiful the world is (like I love you), a fragile blue marble speck of light in a massive cosmos (maps). A universe where we are searching and actively exploring for other worlds (Pack up, I’m a stray) whilst not caring for our own (stay…).

You can also download the iPod version here.

Cartelmike brightened up a grey and depressing Friday by posting this rather strange yet wonderful ray of Russian sunshine. I would listen to this on a loop. Continously. With extra loopy bits.

As remixed by Akira the Don and featuring Jay-Z, Dizzee Rascal, Bill Hicks and Haulden Caulfeild from Akira The Don’s mixtape, ATD20.

The embedding wars continue…and it seems to me that the industry as it scrabbles for money is just shooting itself in the horse when the foot has bolted (did I get that right? ) – it is as Damien from OK GO writes:

we’ve got this ridiculous situation where the machinery of the old system is frantically trying to contort and reshape and rewire itself to run without actually selling music. It’s like a car trying to figure out how to run without gas, or a fish trying to learn to breath air.

Damien was describing their bands battle over license/country and embed (as in when you copy the code and put videos into your own webpage/profile/blog) restricted videos, realising that this is counter-productive and annoys fans.

Apparently this is all to do with advertising – the Ad revenue isn’t shared for embedded ads (although annoyingly YouTube STILL shows the ads an embedded videos – what IS with that?) as advertisings don’t like the idea of embedded videos possibly ‘hurting’ their brand by being embedded on any old site (say, a porn site or site of a rival or critical party…yes advertisers get with the 21st century, and the fact of mass comment and lack of control, but as we know like with music marketers they don’t have a clue(train) as yet)…

So when you have bands criticising their paymasters (in this case our old friends EMI) or like with Amanda Palmer criticising Warners for pulling her videos (and then created the wonderful song above ‘Please Drop Me’ to the tune of Moon River – asking fans to upload it to YouTube as a response to Warners), then you know something is very wrong in the state of DigiMark.

And I think this is counterproductive – as Damien and Amanda realise such freedom over their videos help build their career – to clamp down on embedding or sharing or streaming or posting low-quality MP3s is actually to stop the massive free-promotional tool that is the internet. It’s far worse when someone doesn’t actually give a shit and want to listen/post/play/embed your videos and music, believe me. To have their attention is a luxury – don’t waste it, or turn it off by silly restrictions – to lose that possibly a lifetime of attention for the sake of a few cents is really to cut your face off to spite your nose (again? did I do that right?) (thanks to chronicpaint for the link)

Losers (Tom from Cooper Temple Clause, singer friend, Eddy TM)

Last night I went to the Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip warmup show, and mighty fine it was too…not been to the Borderline before, squirrelled secretly down a side street I’d passed through many times without knowing it was there, quite small so I got quite a close view of proceedings.

First on wass Losers…I’m ashamed I didn’t spot who this was, I’d heard the name but friends on Twitter reminded me this was Eddy Temple Morris’s band with a former Cooper Temple Clause and a drummer…what proceeded was a mashup/glitch/dance/indie crossover, kind of a mix of DJ set including samples of the likes of Gossip, Passion Pit (?), Candi Staton and many others I didn’t recognise – and a few live numbers – I thought the live numbers such as debut single ‘No Man is an Island’ (available free at that link) with a cheeky ‘Losers – Just a band’ drop in the middle – see video clip) were best, but liked the controllerism mashupglitchsampletronica DJ set meets heavy bass and real drums approach. After a quiet start really began to rock the crowd they finished on a cool version of You Got The Love with Candi on vocals…I do think a later slot would do them more justice.

Also blowing my mind was their VJ – rocking some cool animations/video live in sync, seemed to be using a MacBook with what looked like Ableton for video, loads of faders on screen with a small central video panel – any ideas what that was? ME WANT.

So after the warm up Dan Le Sac came onstage with a cheery wave and fired up a wonderfully stuttery ‘The Beat that My Heart Skipped’ and Scroobius Pip arrived, bottle of rose in tow. After some shenanigans involving a too-low keyboard and Scroobius admitted he was bloated and a bit slow due to ‘too much Venison pie’! they then launched into the first of the new songs, ‘Sick Tonight’, which with rapid fire rapping and evil dub/drum and bass bassline and skittery snares it’s a definite progression from Angles.

After that was a mix of oldies and newies – stand outs for me of the new tracks were ‘GB’ a ranty political track that should stoke some revolutionary flames and of course a triumphant ‘Get Better’ (which they reminded us is released as a single March 1st) which I have in full here: (most of the time out of respect for Dan & Dave I decided not to record whole bits, and anyone I hate those cunts who hold cameras and mobile phones aloft for hours at a time getting in the way – I was lucky where I was a pillar was behind me so I wasn’t blocking anyone’s view…I was dancing as well at parts hence the rather shakycam…well if you have a problem with that then you should’ve been there, you lazy fuckers

Oh and GB apparently went wrong providing unintentional humour as Dan said to the soundman straight-faced ‘Great Britain is broken!!!’ – also Dan had a new toy in the shape of a controller and was having fun stuttering, looping and swooping everything so apparently a few technical issues but I didn’t hear any! Loads of intentional humour too – Pip’s on-stage manner is less hiphop braggadacio and more music hall and very dry and arch – you can see why he likes Tommy Cooper.

Another good one was ‘Stake A Claim’ which I can’t remember much more of apart from the fact it was indeed, good and like all the new tracks very uptempo and bloopy (that’s the technical term)…less so was The Beat which as they say in ‘Fixed’ (which they also played) ‘I’m not dissing Dizzee Rascal’ but sounded more closer to a cynical ‘Bonkers’ cash-in ploy than it should coming from those two, rhyming the beat with the feet, just seemed a bit lazy dancefloor filler (in the other sense). They also played ‘Last Train Home’ which was a story about – surprisingly – the last train home to Essex and the slightly dodgy people that you meet, which was OK, could be a grower.

Of the old stuff as well as Fixed they played Angles with costume changes, and a great version of Thou Shalt Always Kill which I have in full on video, and
humorously someone kept requesting Tommy C but they weren’t going to play it so the last track ‘Letter From God to Man’ became ‘Letter from Tommy C to man’! That ended with a total Dan Le Sac knob-twiddling wig out, where it turned into a dance stormer – by then everyone was dancing like crazy.

Overall the new songs sound great – social commentary and conscience but with an uptempo danceable backing…the production seems less mid-range and rock/indie and more deeper, with subbass and rave basses coming to the fore (at least one track was totally a dirty MOAR WOBBUL bassline stomper that would make the likes of Jack Beats and AC Slater happy), sort of a more politically conscious ‘Bonkers’, with skittery beats and glitchy chopping. If there is any justice and going by the reaction to ‘Tongue in Cheek’ it should be massive…

It bodes well for the album ‘Logic Of Chance’ which drops on March 14th, and the tour a week or so later….rilly they should pay me for this promo, but I shall declare my interests in this matter – I think they are a fucking brilliant group who deserve far better exposure. That is all.