Twitter informs me that it's #johnpeelday so in tribute to the great man here's a Peel session which is pretty hard to find anywhere...

People tend to remember John as a champion of guitar-based bands, which he undoubtedly was, but only in the sense that he was a champion of absolutley everything as long as it was currently under the radar and could be comfortably played for at least two minutes before anyone realised it was at the wrong speed. You were just as likely to hear happy hardcore as twangly twee indie pop or a Vietnamese peasant being sick into a bowl of rice (with thanks to my dad for that one) and everything in between. I'm still trying to get hold of tunes I heard on his show back in the early 90s.

His death really did mark the end of an era on Radio 1. It's impossible to imagine where the late night combo of Peel followed by Kershaw would fit in on BBC radio currently, and completely ridiculous to imagine it fitting where it used to on Radio 1*.

One passion I shared with John Peel was Lab-4. They were pretty formative for me, in fact I was borderline obsessed with them for a while. They soundtracked me and my (now) wife first getting together and I collected as near as I could their entire back catalogue. And got boots just like Adam's. And screamed like a teenage girl at their shows. They just did hard trance better than anyone else, euphoric but with the wrong notes, reflecting the dark side of the euphoria you're feeling... This Peel session was on Radio 1 as part of John Peel's 60th birthday celebrations if I remember correctly, at the height of my Lab-4-mania. I love the gruff anticipation in John's voice when he announces them. "this'll be.... Lab-4..."

DOWNLOAD: Lab4 Peel Session - October 2001 (Radio rip - so head to lab4.com to buy some full quality stuff)

download Girl Robot - Old Amiga Fun

I just uploaded a free album of some of my stuff from waaaay back, well, circa 2002 this is - back when I was Girl Robot (well I still am, sometimes, in theory) and rocked out the lofi-8bit-dub-techno with my Amiga and a couple of bits of supercheap hardware, ah those were the days... Here's a couple to stream:

wer flo wer by Girl Robot

robots dem love by Girl Robot

The whole album is only in 128 unfortunatley, you have to understand that when I started getting involved with music online, we really didn't have that much storage space either online or off - anything more than 128 was just overindulgence... I've only got over this in the past couple of years really, meaning that loads of music of which I literally have the only copy in the world is in relatively low quality... OOPS. If anyone does want any of these to play out, I have a feeling I still have WAVs of one or two - definitely not all - on a hard drive somewhere, hit me up & I'll try to find them!

Anyway check out the album here...

download Girl Robot - Old Amiga Fun

Enjoy!

My boy from Berlin DJ Delay has put together an awesome compilation, released this week: Beyond the Kolo. Check the promo mix:

BEYOND THE KOLO promo mix - free d/l (indiv. tracks out 20.09.10) by Beam Up & DJ Delay

This is a project which invited 9 different artists to interpret the Čačak Kolo (Serbia) in the context of their current musical direction.

Čačak kolo is the name of many Shope type dances found in Eastern Serbia, Northeastern Macedonia, and Western Bulgaria. They are characterized by their fast 2/4 metered music. Čačak dances are often referred to by the town or region from which they come.

Whilst this traditional tune is well known to anyone from the former Yugoslavia, this has not been a part of the handful of tunes, which have been remixed and re-presented in the last 10 years.

FLeCK, Joro Boro and Gypsy Syndicate give burning Dubstep remixes, with killer club tunes from DJ Superstereo, Unsoundboy, Gypsy Syndicate and DJ Delay. Tricky D stands tall with a Cumbia dub version, Curse Ov Dialect show their abstract Hiphop skills and Benjamin Skepper bows in with a tense Contemporary Classical piece.

It's all wicked - I've been banging the FLeCK and DJ Delay tunes for the past couple of weeks particularly, heavy dubstep and d&b vibes respectively, also loving the completely insane Gypsy Syndicate breakcore / balkan gabba mix, but haven't come across a crowd ready for it yet..!

Go buy:
Beyond the Kolo on iTunes
Beyond the Kolo on Juno

Remember that electro swing dj mix I posted last month? Well the mysterious someone who asked me to do it, I can now reveal, was Pod from Ripsnorter... and on Saturday 11th September we're going to be bringing the undeniable sound of this summer (Yolanda Be Cool at no 1!?!? RivaStarr Scott Mill's record of the week?!?!) to Ripsnorter's terrace for a night of future-vintage debauchery. Myself, Pod and others will be bouncing on the Terrace, with the usual Ripsnorter hard/acid/psy/tech/trance shenanigans in the main room from Jim Hedges, Ed Real, Glowbones, DJ Eldy and Pod.

I'm real excited about this gig, some of my first DJing outings were playing hard trance / hard house back around 2000 at Sheffield free parties, and I was a regular at friends-of-Ripsnorter Planet Zogg, so it feels a little like I've come full-circle here, but brought something a bit Untimely to the mix...

Check the event on facebook: Ripsnorter Autumn Antics!

as a reminder of what you're in for... here's that electro-swingin mixtape again:

andykisaragi - Swing Hard mixtape

Amari have a remix contest going on at the moment... Bob Hotskin has turned in this mix, quite a pounding affair, stripped down to a few vocal snippets and the sax loop which is pure Bobness, with some lovely synthy paddy action. Bob says be kind as he's only had headphones to master it on. So be kind.

Here's the track (left click to start download).