The Monolith Cocktail Social Playlist #63: BDP, Lata Mangeshkar, Bad Brains, Debruit, Sinead O Brien…
February 9, 2022
PLAYLIST/IMAGINARY RADIOSHOW
Compiled By Dominic Valvona
The Monolith Cocktail Social is one of two long-running playlist series on the blog. Running in tandem with the Monthly Revue, which represents all the new music both I and the MC team have been listening to and writing about during the month, the Social is a cross-generational, eclectic imaginary radio show, where anything goes: featuring tracks from the last 50 or more years.
It’s also my chance to show off my own tastes, records from my collection, and to both celebrate those albums reaching anniversary milestones and pay tribute to recent artists and figures we’ve lost during that month. Speaking of which, in the weeks between playlists we’ve lost voice of the beehive Ronnie Spector, the Indian nightingale Lata Mangeshkar, and Rachel Nagy of the mighty motor city garage and Nuggets slaying Detroit Cobras: all three of which are paid homage to in this, volume 63 of the Social.
As always, I also mark certain album anniversaries, including the 30th anniversary of the last album in a bright run from KRS-One‘s most important and fertile creatively vehicle, the boogie down Bronx collective BDP, Sex And Violence. Incredibly, and still rinsed today – though certain so-called new jazz stars think they invented it – the demigod of the spiritual and freeform, Ornette Coleman‘s Science Fiction marker is 50 this month. And what about this, D.C. Afro-Dub-Punk trailblazers Bad Brains‘ self-titled debut is 40 this month. But leading the anniversary pack this month is Amon Düül II‘s 1972 classic acid-folk masterpiece Carnival In Babylon.
Expect the rest of the playlist to mirror my whims, loves and curiosity with tracks from the Bow Street Runners, Vytas Brenner, Adele Sebastian, Ace Spectrum, Crossbones, Bas Jan, Spencer Cullum and loads more.
That Track List In Full::
Amon Düül II ‘All The Years Round’
Bow Street Runners ‘Electric Star’
Lata Mangeshkar ‘Papiha Re Tum Piya Se’
Steaua De Mare ‘Prolog (Original mix)’
JVC Force ‘It’s A Force Thing’
Boogie Down Productions ‘Drug Dealer’
Vytas Brenner ‘Gavilan’
Shay Hazan ‘Pink Collar’
Ornette Coleman ‘Rock The Clock’
Mombasa ‘Soletho Pt. III’
Adele Sebastian ‘Belize’
Afro Soul System ‘Tink Tank’
Bad Brains ‘I’
Chrizzy Zebby Tembo ‘I’ve Been Losing’
Ace Spectrum ‘You Ain’t No Match For Me’
Ronnie Spector ‘Girl From The Ghetto’
Kellee Patterson ‘Look At The Child’
Dream Team ‘There He Is’
Billy Butler ‘Come Over To My Side’
Chayns ‘You’
Crossbones ‘Highway’
The Detroit Cobras ‘I’ll Keep Holding On’
The Halo Benders ‘Virginia Reel Around The Fountain’
The Brilliant Corners ‘Rambling Rose’
Cola ‘Blank Curtain’
Spencer Cullum ‘Imminent Shadow’
Bas Jan ‘Progressive Causes’
Deafheaven ‘Villain’
Debruit ‘Above The Bosphorus’
Trance Farmers & Odd Nosedam ‘Like Dreamers Do’
Sinead O Brien ‘Kid Stuff’
String Machine ‘Eight Legged Dog’
Madelaine ‘Au Clair De La Lune’
Monolith Cocktail Social Playlist: #XXXVIII: BDP, Bob Dylan, Ornette Coleman, Laurence Vanay…
August 2, 2019
PLAYLIST
Dominic Valvona
Cool shit that the Monolith Cocktail founder and instigator Dominic Valvona has pulled together, the Social playlist is a themeless selection of eclectic tracks from across the globe and ages. Representing not only his tastes but the blogs, these regular playlists can be viewed as an imaginary radio show, a taste of Dominic’s DJ sets over 25 plus years. Placed in a way as to ape a listening journey, though feel free to listen to it as you wish, each playlist bridges a myriad of musical treasures to enjoy and also explore – and of course, to dance away the hours to.
Volume XXXVIII includes tracks from two albums enjoying anniversaries this year; The Monkees 1969 cult trip, Head, and Boogie Down Productions marker, Ghetto Music: The Blueprint Of Hip Hop. There’s also a nod to the recent airing (via Netflix) of Bob Dylan‘s Rolling Thunder Revue with the inclusion of a mean version of the ‘Isis’ saga. Elsewhere there’s peregrinations, ruminations, sauntered rhythms, acid rock, garage land bluster and firey revelations from bands as diverse as Agitation Free and The Zipps.
Tracks:
Pazop ‘Swaying Fire’
Agitation Free ‘You Play For Us Today’
Abstract Truth ‘In A Space’
Ornette Coleman ‘Desert Players’
SwamiMillion & Fawda Trio ‘Baccio’
Bob Dylan ‘Isis (Live At Montreal Forum)’
David Blue ‘True To You’
Fresh Maggots ‘Dole Song’
Nancy Priddy ‘Mystic Lady’
Fifty Foot Hose ‘The Things That Concern You’
Beggar’s Opera ‘Memory’
Bonnie Dobson ‘Good Morning Rain’
The Monkees ‘As We Go ALong’
Laurence Vanay ‘Juste Te Revoir’
Ivor Cutler ‘The Man With The Trembly Nose’
The Monkees ‘Superstitious’
The Adult Net ‘Take Me’
Ballroom ‘Silent Singers’
The Long Blondes ‘Big Infatuation’
John Martyn & Beverley Martyn ‘Sorry To Be So Long’
The Zipps ‘Kicks And Chicks’
“Blue” Gene Tyranny ‘Leading A Double Life’
John Phillips ‘Wilderness Of Love’
The Black Neon ‘TX81Z’
Boogie Down Productions ‘You Must Learn (Live From Caucus Mountain Remix)’
Three Times Dope ‘Believe Dat’
Stezo ‘It’s My Turn’
Sol Monk (ft. Shuzin) ‘The Navigator’
Felt ‘Look At The Sun’
Yes ‘Sweet Dreams’
THE ESSENTIAL HIP-HOP REVIEW
WORDS: MATT OLIVER
Prodigy, Mobb Deep, 1974-2017
The clickbait-certified Rapture & Verse has been keeping its cool by ducking into reissues of old skool watersheds from Boogie Down Productions, Special Ed, Run DMC, Del tha Funkee Homosapien and Souls of Mischief, and noting Main Source are on their way to London for a 25th anniversary ‘Breakin Atoms’ tour. Everywhere else, the heat has been melting minds and addling brains, what with 90s legends found sporting socialite attire, the honourable Ugly God cornering a battle rap niche by slagging himself off, Chance the Rapper in a supposed trademark dispute with a pastry chain, and of course Jay-Z releasing a new album, belatedly working out what to do when life gives you lemons.
Singles/EPs
Confucius MC and Mr Brown are all about ‘The Artform’, a straight up seven track EP radiating heat from an undisclosed location. Rhymes retort with polar-level poise to beats turning the screw, and both send the temperature rising until it becomes an interrogation tactic. In ‘The Garden of Eden’, Benaddict stays true, a leisurely stroll allowing his thoughts to roam freely and find their target with finely detailed accuracy. ‘I Arrived Late’ announces Verb T, but you’ll forgive his tardiness when the chipper yet advisory rhymes and bubbly organ-pushed beats of Pitch 92 get you out your seat. Not quite a fascist regime and requiring little instruction, Too Many T’s’ ‘God Save the T’s’ bounces on through, mics attached to wrecking ball elastic.
To an itchy, tripped out beat from BBS, Lost Identity cuts through the haze on ‘Plaque’, spitting hard and unperturbed by the shadows inching up towards him. New York-Yorkshire monopoly Madison Washington show the power of non-conformity on the ‘Code Switchin’ EP, a half dozen shake up where Malik Ameer and thatmanmonkz keep their cool when mixing rolling funk and flows, and creating scenes with arch alchemy. Spectacular Diagnostics gets close to the edge, so don’t push him – ‘Rambo Bars’ a big boom bap deal thrashed out by Conway the Machine, Chris Crack and Nolan the Ninja. With Apollo Brown barely cueing a fusty, unsteady piano loop, Planet Asia and Willie the Kid reveal ‘Dalai Lama Slang’ to put the peace firmly in its place.
Four tracks from DJ Shadow, including his recent collaboration with Nas and a typically steamin’ performance from Danny Brown, bugged out electro boom bap and cinematic cyber engineering, make ‘The Mountain Has Fallen’ an EP with plenty of chameleon behaviour. Simultaneously spacious and claustrophobic, Grieves precedes a new LP by trying to hold back encroaching walls on the eerily gracious ‘RX’. Crowning the ‘Samurai Killa’, Big Bob reading up on how to create a dynasty involving nunchucks and ancient scriptures is enough for five hungry combatants to vie for the belt. John Reilly is a sure shot smoothly cocking back when ‘High Noon’ comes around: simple as.
Albums
Fresh from his fine Frankenstein project fusing Nas and Madlib, David Begun introduces Eminem and Pete Rock to his bootleg laboratory. Suffice to say it’s unsettling to hear the cartoon capers and savage psychosis of Slim Shady smoothed out by The Chocolate Boy Wonder, but that’s the essence of ‘Marshall and The Soul Brother’ for you. Fresh from redressing ‘The Symphony’, the posse cut’s posse cut now found wearing daisy chains, maverick soundsmith Will C sets out to ‘Bless the Beats & Children’ with his hip-hop hot take on The Carpenters. Tastefully calibrated instrumentalism is the pleasing result to get all cynics onside.
For the hardcore head nod faction, Tone Chop and Frost Gamble make a good case for the fact ‘Respect is Earned Not Given’. New York honour is defended through raspy chew ups and spit outs, unequivocal titles such as ‘Get Beat Down’, ‘Walk the Walk’ and Guillotine Chop’, and producer process that cools down and wades in once his vocalist finds his lane. Chop and Gamble land their punches as a safe bet. Though a different beast from his old man, the one and only Big Punisher, the ‘Delorean’-riding Chris Rivers is super lyrical, coming on hardcore while still leaving plenty of room for the clubs and the ladies. Although prey to the age old quandary of attempting to nail every modern hip-hop convention, Rivers’ photo is never found fading, a good quality, next generation endorsement of capital punishment.
A drop of ‘Dopp Hopp’ a day will keep the haters away, The Doppelgangaz keeping you on your toes despite placing their worth on the cusp of a spiralized trip. The lyrical NY jabs and way of thinking from beneath superhero/clergy robes will have this creep up on the button marked ‘repeat’ until it progresses to heavy rotation. By design or otherwise, everything feels summery, completed by the G-funk themes of ‘Roll Flee’ and ‘Beak Wet’.
A free download for a limited time celebrating 30 years of shutting ‘em down, Public Enemy’s ‘Nothing is Quick in the Desert’ keeps fire in its belly, can still shred an axe and dismissively fires off messages that still can’t be argued with (particularly with social media giving them a whole new profile to blast at). Street struck off some back alley black magic are LMNO and Twiz the Beatpro. Either riding the bull into the red rag as ‘Cohorts’ or found twitching under the influence of the illusionary, there’s an unseen pull making it an album that offers more than just tough-tipped, rough lipped beats and rhymes.
More smooth criminal masterminding from that man Giallo Point, this time with the sure and spiky Smoovth leading operations, makes ‘Medellin’ a mob merry-go-round reaching out to a varied cast (Sonny Jim, Vinnie Paz but two on call) of cold hearts applying heat. Actually quite a relaxed listen, transporting you to a world of mythological opulence while secretly measuring you for concrete shoes. Vince Staples’ negotiation of fresh house, garage and twists on trap veers between foot down force and playing suitably vacant for the club’s benefit. With the miscellany of ‘Big Fish Theory’, come for the rebel, stay for the rhythms.
Mixtapes
A daunting reconstruction of peace out of crumpled MPCs and repurposed trap, Clams Casino’s ‘4’ gets industrially scalded hip-hop beats to smash into post-dubstep introspection, stirring a beast raging inside abstract beauty, and making you nod into a complex but satisfying headspace. Though it’s long understood there are six million ways to die, Royce da 5’9” has got the next six million trademarked with the incredible show & prove of ‘The Bar Exam 4’, destroying vernacular establishment for 28 tracks and 90 minutes at a frankly preposterous level of breaking mics down to their very last compound.
Come and watch Datkid turn the world inside out, a face-off between Tyler and A$AP Rocky, and The Mouse Outfit’s latest uprising.
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