Temple of DOOM: A tribute to MF DOOM
January 4, 2021
Playlist/Writings: Dominic Valvona
It’s taken a number of months to filter through to the fans and general public, but the Fantastic Four nemesis inspired indomitable Hip-Hop pioneer MF DOOM, nee Daniel Dumile, passed away at the age of 49 on October 31st 2020. Though hardly a disguise, the metal-faced maverick of underground Hip-Hop kept up a cool, mysterious persona throughout a thirty-year career.
Perhaps one of the most influential game-changers in the genre and beyond, DOOM will be sorely missed as an independent producer, rapper and mentor. Difficult to pin down, and keep up with, DOOM’s various masked turns (MF DOOM, DOOM, Viktor Vaughn, Zev Love X) churned out a prolific catalogue of quality inventive and playful meta-reference releases; starting out as Zev Love X in the Long Island (“but we call it strong”) ‘Kausing Much Damage’ trio on the cusps of the 1990s. Abbreviated to KMD, they released one of the best debuts of the entire era, the now classic, Mr. Hood. Tragedy struck with the loss of his brother and fellow KMD founder, Subroc – who died in a freeway-crossing incident in 1993. Further more the trio’s label Elektra shelved an admittedly controversial, baiting follow-up album: Black Bastards. All of which led to five years in the wilderness for DOOM, before reinvention and the donning of the mask that would stay with him for the rest of his music career. Re-energised and determined to plough his own furrow, DOOM began a solo and collaborative pathway, working with a who’s who of underground talent, including Madlib and Danger Mouse. From the Monsta Island Czars all-stars team-up to his work with a new breed of rap stars, such as Bishop Nehru, DOOM leaves behind one of the greatest legacies in Hip-Hop: though his influence, creativeness, wordplay, pop culture, visuals and artwork reaches far beyond rap music.
Having followed DOOM since the very beginning, I’m personally saddened to see him gone. But in the spirit of celebrating that vast cannon of work I’ve selected a curated pathway through the DOOM cosmology. I’ve also included an essay-style deconstruction I wrote many years ago on KMD’s debut album, Mr. Hood – which you can find below the playlist link.
KMD ‘Mr. Hood’: A Deconstruction
From the shores of Long Island, hauling out of New York’s surrounding areas: K.M.D – an abbreviation that is either referred to as ‘Kausing much damage’ or ‘A positive kause in a much damaged society’, take your pick – were part of the second Native Tongues wave; alongside the likes of Brand Nubian and The Black Sheep.
Originally formed whilst still in collage, the Dumile brothers, better known as Zev Love X and Subroc, along with their sparing partner Rodan – also known as Jade 1 – started rapping together during the late 80s.
Rodan soon slipped off the radar, preferring to finish his education, rather then pursue the dream. His replacement was the gemstone moniker Onyx.
The trio soon caught a break with a guest slot on the 3rd Bass LP ‘The Cactus’ in 1989. Dante Ross, the A & R man and member of The Stimulated Dummies Hip Hop production squad, was impressed enough with their innovative skills and delivery to sign them up to the Elektra label the following year, after the Bass’s M.C Search recommended them.
Zev Love X was of course the early birth of that metal-faced maverick and crusader MF Doom, an alter-ego he later adopted, born out of the tragic loss in 1993, of his brother, Subroc – he was killed in a tragic freeway crossing incident – and at the embittered rage he felt after being sucked into the music industry and then un-ceremoniously spat out.
On ‘Mr.Hood’ you can already hear his undercurrent of cynicism and contempt, articulated in a flam-filled throaty delivery; like an apprentice you can hear him finding his feet.
The debut album caused minor ripples, with its adopted use of racist sound bites, miss-directed use of English learning instructional records from a bygone era, appropriation of much loved kids TV puppets and antagonizing Malcolm X speeches.
K.M.D cleverly assembled a collage of inflammatory and discriminate language, which ran alongside satirist and humorous skits – much in the style of De La Soul and The Leaders of the New School – to create a highly ambitious commentary on their own backyard.
There is a central theme running throughout, with the Mr.Hood character of the title popping up in many memorable sketches and miss-quoted exchanges. His contributions are lifted from an old English language course from the 50s, which throws up all kinds of unpleasant, and quite frankly racist, dialogue – well it comes out that way when manipulated as it is.
Our protagonist’s colloquial tones open up the album, as he goes on a wrecky to the local downtown Long Island jewellery shop (misspelt intentionally on the album I assume) where he bumps into Zev Love X, as he attempts to wrangle with the proprietor over an over-priced watch.
He appears on near enough every other track; with his oddly misconstrued and out of kilter with the modern times queries and insults, which draw sharp breaths of disbelief from the trio, or deride ridicule from the local cast of characters, as he meets them on the street corner or at the barbershop. Also making a surprisingly eye-opening appearance is Sesame Street favourites, Bert and Ernie, who amusingly turn up on the tracks, ‘Who Me? (with an answer from Dr.Bert)’, to look for “little sambo”, and on ‘Humrush”, where they nasality hum along with the group.
Musically the beats are of an R’n’B and soulful nature, with samples crafted from the Isley Brothers – their ‘I Turned You On’ track is sampled on ‘Who Me?’ – Shirly Ellis – her ‘The Nitty Gritty’ is used on ‘Nitty Gritty’ – O C Smith – ‘You Can See Forever’ and ‘The Sounds Of Goodbye’ used on ‘Peachfuzz’ – and The Hassles – ‘4’o’Clock In The Mom’hour Of The Wolf’ is used on ‘Subroc’s Mission.
There’s even a re-appropriated use and borrowing of both De La Souls ‘Potholes In My Lawn’, on the tune ‘Hard Wit No Hoe’, and A Tribe Called Quest’s ‘Push It Along’ on ‘Nitty Gritty’.
All these beats are sophisticatedly layered and used quite subtly as a backdrop – you will notice that they are always lower in the mix, and seldom overawe the vocals – and is made-up of 808 drums, Jim Reed-esque organs, tightly packed thumping drum beats, taut wielding guitars, Stax rich bass lines and harmonica.
Any scratching is kept to a bare minimum, with the turntables skills arriving via the acute cutting, mixing and editing of samples and speech; mostly executed by Subroc.
The lyrics are dished out amongst the trio, with each member usually taking it in turns to step to the mic or guest in a solo spot, though Zev does tend to get a larger share then his partners.
A heavily laid-down mix of pro-Muslim rhetoric and protest goes up against the often-whimsical episodes and comical storytelling. Inspired by the teachings of Clarence Smith (known as Clarence 13X), and his splinter group the Five-Percent Nation – an offshoot from the Nation Of Islam – many of the lyrics encapsulate the beliefs and metaphors of this Harlem born sect.
On the opening track ‘Mr.Hood at Piocalles Jewelry Shop/Crackpot’, Zev articulately jams in the syllables, unravelling a kindergarten tale of following the wrong path in life:
“I first met Crackpot in like Head Starts,
And then I knew he wasn’t too head smart cuz as I scribbled in art,
He insisted on standing in the sandbox to collect unknown amounts
of pebbles and stones to throw rocks!’
By the end of the song, Zev bemoans to Mr.Hood about the negative allusions made about his race, and at the depressingly predictable decisions certain black males take: reminding them of their heritage and lack of ambition he almost exasperates:
“We built this place man,
We’re the Gods of the Universe,
Kings and Queens of the planet!”
On the highlight track ‘Who Me?’ Zev rides on the derogatory comments and ethnographical implanted stereotypes of the black race:
“Pigment, is this a defect in birth?
Or more an example of the richness on Earth?
Lips and eyes dominant traits of our race,
Does not take up 95% of one’s face.”
Sibling Subroc, has a more skipping and bouncy terminology to compensate against Zev’s; his own jam ‘Subroc’s Mission’ follows along a loose narrative of street slang and obscure references, whilst the birthstone kid, Onyx, unleashes his torrent of humorous one-liners and staccato stuttering tongue-twisters, over the soul shaking R’n’B horn blasting ‘Boogie Man’:
“Now check it, don’t miss this,
Lick them while I diss this sarcastic bastard,
Of which I’ve been mastered”.
They’re joined by fellow Afrocentric compatriots, Brand Nubians, on the super-rap wordplay riffing chorus-line of ‘Nitty Gritty’. The Nub’s own grandly entitled Grand Puba Maxwell, gives the K.M.D boys a run for their money on the lyrical wordplay:
“God cipher divine as I build on the incline,
Quick to help another, cause I know I’m a get mine.
Build-powers think they’re hard, but they’re killin’ their own kind,
Emphatically no, divine evil got him in his mind”.
Each of the two crews members line-up to show off their dexterity, which revolves around quotes, passages and the teachings of both the Nation of Islam and the offshoot 5-Percenters, name-checking the grand design of their creator, the Pyramids and oppression.
The rest of the album often throws up some unsettling mentions of “white devils” and other uneasy rhetoric, with a heavy use of Malcolm X’s speeches – his famous “he’s a wolf, and you’re a sheep” quote appears on the ‘Boy Who Cried Wolf’ track – from his Nation of Islam days; though it must be pointed out that he eventually publicly left the group, breaking away to form his own splinter group which had a far mellower attitude to the white folk – as long as they were Muslim, of course. But this often cited prose is always counter-acted with the satirical use of cartoon characters and humorous anecdotes.
Mr.Hood’ holds up extremely well, proving to be one the more accomplished albums from the period. Those conceptual themes, so essential to many of the Native Tongues collective, shows exceptional moments of creativity and talent.
Unfortunately their follow-up, no messing, album ‘Black Bastards’, didn’t sit well with the label, held-back and consigned to the vaults for nearly a decade. Both its content and provocative imagery – the cover sports a rubber-lipped characterture of a poor unfortunate black fellow with a noose around its neck, waiting in anticipation for someone to fill the blanks in a fatal game of Hangman. An ultimatum of sorts was made, ditch the cover or else! Of course this never happened and the album was never put out until a later reissue package under another label finally made it to the public – I was lucky to get a rather rough bootleg tape version of 5-tracks, but waited until the noughties to finally get my hands on a proper copy.
‘Black Bastards’ omitted much of the more comical interaction and playfulness, replacing the colourful samples catalogue with a more layered backing, and adding a more heavily laden set of lyrics to counter the whimsical postulations of the debut.
The birthstone kid had of course already jumped ship, leaving the brothers alone to deliver the much-anticipated second LP. Subroc took on all the production duties and assemblage of samples and beats; creating so much material that his brother used some of these sessions on his later MF Doom recordings – including most notably ‘Hoe Cakes’ from the seminal cuisine obsessed ‘Mmm Food’ album.
Tragically as I’ve already mentioned, Subroc was killed whilst crossing a freeway in 1993, putting the albums release into further turmoil, though the controversy over the artwork had already put a kibosh on it ever making the stores.
With the album shelved, resigned to cover dust in the vaults, Zev Love X began his wilderness years. It would be 5 more years until he was re-born as the vengeful MF Doom.
Dominic Valvona
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
Our Ultimate 2020 Revue Playlist
December 18, 2020
PLAYLIST SPECIAL: Dominic Valvona/Matt Oliver/Brian ‘Bordello’ Shea
The Monolith Cocktail bow out of the annus horribilis year of the great Covid-19 plague with a seven hour behemoth of a playlist: the ultimate summary, revue of the year in sonic awakenings, wonders, magic and the challenging. Tracks have been picked from our recent ‘choice albums features of 2020’ (Part One: A-E, Part Two: F-N and Part Three: O-Z), plus a smattering of music from those albums we just didn’t have room for but loved: Leron Thomas, Netta Goldhirsch, Les Freres Smith, Sad Man, Ancient Plastix, Your Old Droog, Dream Parade, Deutsche Ashram, the Chicago Underground Quartet and more. Expect to hear everything and anything.
Thanks for all your support during the last taxing year. We’ll see you all in the New Year with a packed schedule of new music – the early indications are it is going to be another great, bustling year of releases. If you do feel like helping us out, keeping is afloat, or just as a thank you, here’s our begging bowl message: Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
Monolith Cocktail Monthly Playlist: November 2020
December 1, 2020
PLAYLIST REVUE/Dominic Valvona/Matt Oliver/Brain ‘Bordello’ Shea
Join us for the most eclectic of musical journeys as the Monolith Cocktail compiles another monthly playlist of new releases and recent reissues we’ve featured on the site, and tracks we’ve not had time to write about but have been on our radar.
You can expect to hear everything and anything; from the best new Hip-Hop cuts (Swamp Thing, Atmosphere, Oliver Sudden), vintage Zimbabwean shoe shuffling (Hallelujah Chicken Run Band) and Anatolian psych (Moĝollar), needled post-punk lament (The Awkward Silences, Vukovar), synthesized peregrinations (Ancient Plastix) and more dystopian experiments in electronica (Seb Reynolds). Plus new tracks from Peter Cat, The legless Crabs, Tiger Mendoza, Martin L Gore, Kutiman, Geeker-Natsumi, Electric Jalaba and more…
Tracks:
Swamp Thing/Ollie Teeba ‘JumpThe Goblin (Ft. More Or Les/DJiRATE)’
The Du-Rites ‘Can’t Buy Groove’
Hallelujah Chicken Run Band ‘Kare Nanhasi’
Mogollar ‘Iklig D2D session’
Tiger Mendoza ‘KPS (Ft. Half Decent)’
Kutiman ‘Maasai In Dub’
Electric Jalaba ‘Cubaili Ba’
Martin Gore ‘Mandrill’
Geeker-Natsumi ‘Shinigami’s Watchin’ Me’
Tender Tones ‘In Dreamed Lives’
Atmosphere ‘She Loves My Not’
Ya Minko ‘Chambres Vides’
Open Mike Eagle ‘The Black Mirror Episode’
Aesop Rock ‘Marble Cake’
The Stance Brothers ‘On Top (Organ & Vibes)’
Oliver Sudden ‘My Old Wax (Ft. Jazz T)’
Dillion/Day Tripper/Yamin Semali ‘Long Division’
Mr. Lif/Stu Banges ‘Wave The Flag (Ft. Eternia/Insight)’
November Bees ‘All Is Well’
Novelistme ‘In A Dream’
The Awkward Silences ‘Other People Die’
The Left Outsides ‘The Wind No Longer Stirs The Trees’
Sinead O Brien ‘Most Modern Painting’
Le Volume Courbe ‘Fourteen Years’
Julia Meijer ‘Under Water (Ft. Fyfe Dangerfield)’
Luica Cadotsch ‘Azure’
Bloom De Wilde ‘Flying Carpenters’
Hooshyar Khayam/Bamdad Afshar ‘Yə’ k’
Augenwasser ‘Work Wait Work’
Sebastian Reynolds ‘HAL’s Lament’
Ancient Plastix ‘The Dream Within The Dream Within’
Bunny & The Invalid Singers ‘The Certainty Kids’
Corticem ‘Planet Coronavirus: Dying Quasar’
Benedikt/Tuvaband ‘My Killer’
Liz Davinci/Underhatchet ‘While They Prey’
Gillian Stone ‘Bridges’
Vukovar ‘Silent Envoy’
The Legless Crabs ‘Redneck Scott Mccloud’
The Psychotic Monks ‘Confusion’
Peter Cat ‘Love Lurks’
Volcano Victims ‘Canicular Years’
Tina ‘Golden Rope’
Satin Glow ‘Crumbsnatchers’
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
The Monolith Cocktail Social #51: Juan-Juan Zou, Jo Bisso, Disco Zombie, Meatraffle…
November 23, 2020
PLAYLIST: Dominic Valvona
Regular readers and followers will know we celebrated the 50th edition of our imaginary cross-genre and cross-generational spanning radio show, the Monolith Cocktail Social, last month. Carrying on the good work for another fifty (though the last half century did take us 6 years), here’s the latest edition of oddities, smashing hits, novelties, the sublime and more.
We cater to everyone’s tastes, with Taiwanese disco (Juan-Juan Zou), French Ye-Ye (Jacqueline Taieb), petulant snot Krautrock covers (Disco Zombie), the glorious Benin groovers (Orchestre Super Borgou de Parakou), golden age Hip-Hop (Terminator X, Channel Live), Krautrock rock (Krokodil) and a multitude of genres, eras. There’s even a tribute of a sorts to the recently departed inimitable Scotsman Sean Connery.
Tracklist:
Juan-Juan Zou ‘Pond Side’
Bango ‘Mongoose Mix’
Jo Bisso ‘Love Beat’
Zafer Dilek ‘Kol Bastu’
Meitei ‘Oiran I’
Jacqueline Taieb ‘Bravo’
Velvet Crush ‘One Thing Two Believe’
Ninni Forever Band ‘Liekeissa’
Baron Zen ‘Fuckin’ Bored’
Kleenex ‘Hitch-Hike’
Disco Zombies ‘Sad Skinhead’
Prince Douglas ‘Hard Times Dub’
Phantom Band ‘Brain Police’
Meatraffle ‘Oh Corona’
THE NAMES ‘Discovery’
Keep Shelly In Athens ‘I See In Your Mind’
Gary McFarland & Peter Smith ‘Salvation Army Rags’
Man ‘A Night In Dad’s Bag’
Don Nix ‘Olena’
Chicago Underground Duo ‘Moon Debris’
Orchestra Super Borgou de Parkou ‘Abakpe’
Abu Obaida Hassan ‘Nas Fi Nas’
Mike James Kirkland ‘I Need Your Love’
Binary Star ‘Solar Powered’
Channel Live ‘Station Identification’
Da Youngsta’s ‘Rated P.G.’
Terminator X ‘Buck Whylin”
Funkdoobiest ‘Bow Wow Wow’
Biting Tongues ‘Bos Toyota Trouble’
Erlon Chaves ‘Me And My Baby Brother/Day By Day’
Jack van Poll ‘Objizdka’
Lunar Drunes ‘Moon Bathing’
Joe Meek & The Blue Men ‘Valley Of The Saroos’
Sergei Prokofiev ft. Sean Connery ‘Peter And The Wolf Op. 67: “This Is The Story Of Peter And The Wolf”‘
Roberto Musci, Giovanni Venosta & Massimo Mariani ‘Blue’
Krokodil ‘You’re Still A Part Of Me’
Euclid ‘Gimmie Some Lovin”
Mamman Sani ‘Gosi’
JuJu ‘Black Experience’
Lionlimb ‘Temporary’
Tear Gas ‘Lost Awakening’
The Plastic Cloud ‘Face Behind The Sun’
Key & Cleary ‘The Secret’
Furry Lewis ‘See That My Grave Is Kept Clean’
Sandy Harless ‘I Knew Her Well’
Alex Konadu ‘Obi Abawuo’
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
The Monolith Cocktail Social 50th Edition Special: Joni Mitchell, Anthony Moore, The Flock, 79.5, The Reverbs…
October 19, 2020
Playlist/Dominic Valvona
We’ve reached a milestone: the 50th edition of our imaginary cross-genre and cross-generational spanning radio show, the Monolith Cocktail Social.
That’s more than 3000 tracks of brilliance, the weird, the obscure and the cool shit; a series that started way back in 2013 as a way of creating the most eclectic of soundtracks. So as “inside” becomes the new “outside” in these pandemic times, relax and indulge in over three hours of everything you can suffix with the “Afro” tag, post-punk, desert blues, psychedelic, folk, soul, troubadours a plenty, Krautrock, dance, avant-garde and more. Even boomer doyen Joni Mitchell drops in with something new! What’s not to like.
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
Monolith Cocktail Social Playlist: Vol. XLIX: Kamuran Akkor, Zoot, Awate, Dead Moon, Cut Worms…
September 23, 2020
PLAYLIST
Dominic Valvona
For all our friends and followers alike in the shadow of a second coronavirus lockdown, let the Monolith Cocktail ease some of the doldrums and boredoms of a partial restricted winter with another Social Playlist (the 49th edition in fact). The blog’s imaginary radio show (or podcast if you prefer) brings together tracks from across time, genres and the globe to take the listener on a musical odyssey of discovery; with a few recent reissues and even newish tracks thrown in. Expect to anything or everything between Turkish sirens, troubled troubadours that failed to break through, preposterous hard rawk and kitsch beat band cover versions, diaphanous voices from North Africa, the sounds of liberation, concept prog, moseying cowboy blues and good ol’ gospel veneration.
For those of you without access to Spotify, we’ve chosen a random smattering of tracks from Youtube below the track list.
TRACK LIST FOR VOLUME XLIX:
Kamuran Akkor ‘Yorgun Gozler’
Gina X Performance ‘Strip Tease’
Ilous & Decuyper ‘Beruk !!!’
Jon English ‘Laughing At The Guru’
Selda Bagcan ‘Yaz Gazeteci Yaz’
Peter Ives ‘In Pursuit Of Treasure’
Zoot ‘Eleanor Rigby’
Iron Claw ‘Gonna Be Free’
Guadalcanal Diary ‘Michael Rockefeller’
The Toms ‘It’s Needless’
Charanjit Singh ‘Hey Mujhe Dil De’
Orchestre Regional De Mopti ‘Boro’
Sounds Of Liberation ‘Billie One’
Kool Blues ‘Can We Try Love Again’
Los Teddy’s ‘Soy Jack Flash’
Kim Tolliver ‘I Gotta Find A Way’
Derrick Morgan ‘Never Stop Loving You’
Awate (Ft. Turkish Dcypha) ‘Austerity’
Haiku D’ Etat ‘Slower Traffic To The Right’
Nice & Smooth ‘How To Flow’
Maryn E. Coote ‘Emotion’
James Reese & The Progressions ‘You Can Make It If You Try/Love Ain’t Easy’
These Trails ‘Sowed A Seed’
Nahawa Doumbia ‘Blonde Yirini’
Emerald Web ‘Openings’
Good Doom ‘Multi Level Lounge’
Cut Worms ‘Every Once In A While’
Front Page Review ‘FEELS LIKE LOVE’
Julian’s Treatment ‘Fourth From The Sun’
Blackfeather ‘Seasons Of Change Pt. 1’
Deux Filles ‘Shalama’
Rufus Zuphall ‘Knights Of The 3rd Degree’
Speed, Glue & Shinki ‘Mr. Walking Drugstore Man’
Cowboy ‘Use Your Situation’
Washington Phillips ‘Take Your Burden To The Lord And Leave It There’
Dead Moon ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’
And those Youtube versions:
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
Junkboy Special: ‘Belo Horizonte’ Video & Tropicalia Playlist
September 4, 2020
Playlist/Video Premiere
Words: Dominic Valvona
Junkboy ‘Belo Horizonte’
Taken from the reissued/remasterd Sovereign Sky LP, released via Fretsore Records, 25th September 2020
Junkboy ‘Tropicalia Special’ Playlist
Available via Spotify
In the run-up to the release of Junkboy’s acclaimed 2014 cult album Sovereign Sky (released later this month), the Hanscomb brothers in partnership with Ian Sephton of Fretsore Records (who signed the boys back in 2019) have already shared the hazy-soulful Love-esque lapping tidal reflection single-video ‘Salt Water’ with the Monolith Cocktail’s followers, and now, furnish us with a second single of equally lush quality, the sauntering Brazilian psych lilt ‘Belo Horizonte’.
A culmination of Mik and Rich Hanscomb‘s experiments with a number of different styles, Sovereign Sky adopted a relaxed attitude to the pastoral, to cooing frat-folk, surf music, Britpop, the hip sound of Tokyo’s Shibuya Kei district and surprisingly, the languid sweltering rays of late 60s and early 70s Brazilian psych: otherwise known as “Tropicalia”. That album gave fair voice and a wistfully charmed backing of tenderly picked acoustic guitars, stirring strings and hushed, almost whispered, vocals to both the pains and loves of maturity. The brothers mellowed tones and introspection offered a mature observation on the world around them: especially, at the time, their relocated new home of Brighton. It’s a place in which Marc Eric meets Cornelius, and epic45 make friends with Harpers Bizarre; a place where Hawthorne, California and the beach samba saunter of Brasilia is transcribed to the English downs and seaside.
Not just to tie in with that forthcoming reissue release but also, as Mik Hanscomb offers, a reminder that “this is a music of resistance, and well, perhaps that spirit is needed now more than ever”, the brothers have also compiled a homage style playlist to their Tropicalia influences for us on Spotify.
It maybe the end of the summer, but the boys has provided the perfect comedown and ease into autumn. Enjoy.
The remasterd reissue of the previously limited Sovereign Sky is being released on the 25th September 2020 through Fretsore Records. You can read our original review in the link below, and also find previous Junkboy posts and premieres.
Junkboy ‘Salt Water’ Premiere (here)
‘Sovereign Sky’ Review (here)
‘Trains, Trees, Topophila’ Albums Of 2019 (here)
‘Waiting Room’ Premiere (here)
Monolith Cocktail Monthly Playlist: August 2020: Secret Machines, Nosaj Thing, Charles Tolliver, Fliptrix, AUA…
August 28, 2020
PLAYLIST REVUE/Dominic Valvona/Matt Oliver/Brain ‘Bordello’ Shea
Join us once more for the most eclectic of musical journeys as the Monolith Cocktail compiles another monthly playlist of new release and recent reissues we’ve featured on the site, and tracks we’ve not had time to write about but have been on the radar.
The August edition kicks off with a blistering sunny-disposition Ron Gallo,space rock barrage returning Secret Machines and riotous Young Knives. Later on we’ve a host of jazz smarts from Stanley J. Zappa & Simo Laihonen, Charles Tolliver and Donny McCaslin.
As diverse as ever though, there’s a host of genres represented, including ‘Sufi Dub’ (Ashraf Sharif Khan & Viktor Marek) ‘after geography’ ambience (Forest Robots), ‘Eastern European femme fatal punk’ (Shishi) and ‘Euclid inspired polygon techno’ (Kumo).
Matt Oliver furnishes as ever with a host of choice hip-hop tracks from Fliptrix, Helsinki Booze Mercanhts, Loki Dope and Verb T.
There’s also a second despondent melodious grunge-y new wave rocker from the burgeoning talent that is Jacqueline Tucci. Something for everyone, more or less.
TRACKS
Ron Gallo ‘HIDE (MYSELF BEHIND YOU)’
Secret Machines ‘Everything’s Under’
Young Knives ‘Swarm’
Death By Unga Bunga ‘Trouble’
Shishi ‘OK Thx Bye’
Jacqueline Tucci ‘Sweeter Things’
Elian Gray ‘High Art’
Loki Dope ‘Have You Any Wool?’
Stanley J. Zappa & Simo Laihonen ‘E38 E 14th, City Of Piss, USA’
Charles Tolliver ‘Copasetic’
Nosaj Thing ‘For The Light’
Donny McCaslin ‘Reckoning’
VRITRA ‘CLOSER TO GOD’
Remulak & Type.Raw ‘Mad Skillz’
Vex Ruffin ‘Hinde Naman’
Mazi & Otarel ‘Staiy’
Fliptrix ‘Holy Kush’
Sausage Spine & Relentless Exquisite ‘Skin Diamond’
Verb T & Illinformed ‘Rotten Luck’
Pitch 92 & Lord Apex ‘Suttin’ In The Trunk’
Helsinki Booze Merchants ‘Tokyo Drift’
Fliptrix ‘Powerizm’
Diassembler ‘A Wave From A Shore’
Forest Robots ‘Over The Drainage Divide’
Mark Cale, Ines Loubet and Joseph Costi ‘Bodies Of Water’
Lucia Cadotsch, Otis Sandsjo, Petter Eldh ‘Azure’
Paradise Cinema ‘Possible Futures’
Only Now ‘Merciless Destiny’
J. Zunz ‘Four Women And Darkness’
Alan Wakeman, Gordon Beck ‘Chaturanga’
BROTHER SUN SISTER MOON ‘Numb’
Brian Bordello ‘Rock n Roll Is Dead’
The Hannah Barberas ‘W.Y.E.’
AUA ‘I Don’t Want It Darker’
Ashraf Sharif Khan & Viktor Marek ‘Drive Me On The Floor’
Harmonious Thelonious ‘Hohlenmenschemuziek’
Kumo ‘South African Euclid’
Cabaret Voltaire ‘Vasto’
Pons ‘Subliminal Messages’
Freak Heat Waves ‘Busted’
Constant Bop ‘Alone Again (Naturally)’
Josephine Foster ‘Freemason Drag’
John Howard ‘Injuries Sustained In Surviving’
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
Monolith Cocktail Social Playlist #XLVIII: Wanderlea, Cavern of Anti-Matter, Cass McCombs, King Cesar…
August 24, 2020
PLAYLIST/Dominic Valvona
Welcome friends to another one of Dominic Valvona’s eclectic/generational spanning playlists; the Monolith Cocktail’s imaginary radio show. In practice this amounts to Dominic picking whatever he sees fit, including tributes to fallen idols and tracks from recent reissues, even newish releases. Joining him in on this journey, volume XLVIII, are Stained Glass, Jackson Heights, Irish Coffee, Suburban Lawns, William Shatner with Canned Heat, Pekka Pohjola, Mosses, Chiha, Renegade Soundwave, King Cesar, Foetus and 25 other eclectic, cross-border, cross-generational tunes.
Listen how you choose, but each playlist is curated in a special order.
As usual, for those without Spotify (or boycotting it, pissed with it, or whatever) you can find a smattering of videos from the set below the track list.
That full track list:::
Stained Glass ‘Soap And Turkey’
Wanderlea ‘A Terceira Forca’
Jackson Heights ‘Maureen’
The Troll ‘Satin City News’
Irish Coffee ‘Hear Me’
Primevil ‘Hey Lover’
Suburban Lawns ‘Intellectual Rock’
Cold Blood ‘Watch Your Step’
Darrow Fletcher ‘What Is This’
Los Datsuns ‘Ritmo y Movimiento’
William Shatner/Canned Heat ‘Let’s Work Together’
Pekka Pohjola ‘Armoton Idyli – Merciless Idyll’
Franco Battiato ‘Beta’
Cavern Of Anti-Matter ‘High Street Spasm’
Mosses ‘Tall Bearded Iris Speckled’
Ashanti Afrika Jah ‘Ntoboase’
Freedom ‘Cry Baby Cry’
Tucker Zimmerman ‘Left Hand of Moses’
Cass McCombs/Steve Gunn ‘Sweet Lucy’
El Alamo ‘I Cry’
Dana Gavanski ‘Catch’
Doug Firebaugh ‘Only A Dancer’s Dream’
Kikagaku Moyo ‘Ouchi Time’
Chiha ‘Healing’
Renegade Soundwave ‘Probably A Robbery’
Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band ‘My Jamaican Dub’
The Natural Four ‘This Is What’s Happening Now’
Lee Stone ‘What Is Life’
Dan Penn ‘If Love Was Money’
The Goats ‘Do The Digs Dug (Todd Terry Remix)’
Dream Warriors ‘Are We There Yet – Medley’
King Cesar ‘Bloody Knuckles’
Foetus ‘Calamity Crush’
Pigmaliao ‘Banzo de Muri’
The Devil’s Anvil ‘Besaha’
The Ousmane Kouyate Band ‘Miriya’
Video Selections::::
Hi, my name is Dominic Valvona and I’m the Founder of the music/culture blog monolithcocktail.com For the last ten years I’ve featured and supported music, musicians and labels we love across genres from around the world that we think you’ll want to know about. No content on the site is paid for or sponsored and we only feature artists we have genuine respect for /love. If you enjoy our reviews (and we often write long, thoughtful ones), found a new artist you admire or if we have featured you or artists you represent and would like to buy us a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/monolithcocktail to say cheers for spreading the word, then that would be much appreciated.
FEATURE/SELECTION/Dan Shea
The Monolith Cocktail is ecstatic and grateful to have coaxed a guest spot contribution from the impassioned and adroit musician/writer Dan Shea. Roped into his family’s lo fi cult music business, The Bordellos, from a young age, the candid but humble maverick has gone onto instigate the chthonian Vukovar (currently working through a trio of ‘greatest hits’ packages here) and, with one part of that ever-shambling post-punk troupe, musical foil Buddy Preston, the seedy bedsit synth romantics Beauty Stab (who’ve just this week released their second single ‘French Film Embrace’, here)
An exceptional talent (steady…this is becoming increasingly gushing) both in composing and songwriting, the multi-instrumentalist and singer is also a dab hand at writing. For his debut, Dan shared a grand personal ‘fangirl’ purview of major crush, the late Rowland S. Howard (which can be found here), on the eve of Mute Records appraisal style celebration reissue of his highly influential cult albums ‘Teenage Snuff Film’ and ‘Pop Crimes’. This was followed by an often difficult, unsettling, potted with dark comedy, read on Dan’s friend and foil Simon Morris (of the Ceramic Hobs infamy; the piece can be read here), who took his own life last year.
Now, from his lockdown quarantine, Dan furnishes us with the first of his ‘imaginary film screening jukebox’ selections come loose horror fictions.
Surrender – Suicide
A Kenneth Anger motorbike gang, gay greasers checking their hair in the switchblade reflection. Using semen as Brylcreem. The homecoming queen dumped like so many empty bottles and cans.
Vega as Vegas.
The backing vocals drift in from a malt shop that was burned down by some queer bashers pre Stonewall and no one flinched. In a world where high school sweethearts go to a drive in to sneakily and fumblingly attempt autoerotic asphyxiation together as they watch Jayne Mansfield crash in slow motion.
When Vega sings, “I surrender to you”, it could be sex or God or just the voices shrieking through the tinfoil mirror of our synapses but aren’t all those things the same? Lynch would play this behind beehived girls in tight red sweaters first lesbian tryst behind a doughnut shop ran by Anton LaVey and Ricki Lake.
Which Way To Turn – Bryan Ferry
One of weird uncle David’s mystery blondes in trouble smiles from a smashed picture frame, a Stepford femme fatale. All the memory I can dredge up is here. Artfully hung and shot drapes blow in a late summer breeze. A heatwave desire and hungover regret. Blood on your lips, lipstick oozing out of your wounds. The plastic rum cups Mike gave us in the bar are overturned.
“I can’t control my feelings if I tried” sung with all the hauteur this high society Frankenstein can muster. Ferry is often spoken about as some style icon, ignoring how goofy he has frequently looked. See the Manifesto red leather suit, the Top of the Pops Jealous Guy Alan Partridge outfit or his giant shirt in The High Road. For ages I thought something was lost when he became the figure he started out parodying yet yearning to be on the first Roxy albums but that’s a lazy cliché.
This period is one of straw etching your initials in coke on a mixing desk, high-class session musicians playing three notes then disappearing. Some of my favourite stuff he did. The powder lasts an hour but the regret lingers eternal.
Lou Reed – Coney Island Baby
Lana Del Rey – Blue Jeans
The personal connections are all but overwhelming here. I band these two together as Lynch used Lou on a soundtrack and Lana IS Dorothy Vallens and Frank Booth and Sandy and Jeffrey. She’s not just the mystery woman in trouble but the architect of your demise. Lou, he’s the man behind the curtain. Whispering these tracheotomy hymns through a straw, through a hole in your wall into your sleeping mind.
I’d put these back to back to dehydrate myself: Lou’s choked murmur of “I could give the whole thing up for you” will never not crumple me. Send this one out to Lou and Rachel, the romantic ideal of my nightmares.
Lydia Lunch – I Fell In Love With A Ghost
I should’ve learned the lesson from Pet Sematary and Vertigo. I’d done all I could but she came back wrong.
She didn’t reply to anything I said, other than as a series of strangled groans. I heard “yes” where I wanted to hear yes. The first time I caught her crawling spider like along my ceiling, mournfully unaware how she got there should’ve been the tip off. Or the way there was nothing behind her eyes. But even though she’d died and she was now just a beautiful empty vessel, she looked the same. I imagined her side of our conversation the way I did when she was still dead.
Then she was in the bath. This was progress. She was able to wash herself. I supervised, to keep her safe and because I wanted to. She kept turning the hot tap. The bath water was boiling, smoke was rising and she was crying out pathetically. Water spilling over the edge of the bath. The screams got louder. I tried to turn the hot tap off and she lunged forward and head butted me with a force that sent me unconscious SPRAWLED.
I came around in a pool of bloody water in time to watch the love of my life disappear down the plughole.
Cocteau Twins – Musette and Drums
Dylan and Patrick meet in a side street. The snow is still falling lightly, flakes landing on their black leather jackets. They embrace knowing this is truly the last time. The sound of traffic is all but overwhelming but there is not a car to be seen.
They kiss and blood oozes from Dylan’s lips. He turns, walks away and disappears entirely into thin air. He is dragged out of the sea by trawlers, his arms tied behind his back and his eyes pierced by emeralds: “natural causes”.
Smoke enshrouds us as we reach the clearing. I take your hand and we kiss. The world is ending, the tiny grey pinpricks in the sky are opening up. Remember when I first told you I saw them? Be quiet, the ice is melting.
Xiu Xiu – Botanica de Los Angeles
Gersten Hayward is turning tricks now and I want her for her mind as much as her body. That’s okay. I’m turning tricks as well. You get a discount for hiring us as a couple. If you look like a young David Lynch then I don’t charge.
Her love is free to me and as for the whoring it keeps us in whiskey and hash browns. We watch Mulholland Drive together. She freezes, but not at the scene in the diner. Something suddenly clicks in her.
“Dan?”
“Yes darling?”
“I’ve got the incredible feeling that I’m not real”
“Gersten I’ve been dreading this conversation. It is true that you are fictional. I am unsure if I am also fictional.”
“How did my mother birth a fiction?”
I show her the clip from The Return where she is cradling her ODing boyfriend and gently tell her that because he was never born he can never die. This is why I am largely anti natalist. Then a client comes by.
SSQ – Anonymous
The party is over and we watch the nightlife crop itself shorter still through a haze of smoke. A mute TV shows static, like pictures in the fire I just about make out the image of a screaming man watching an emaciated woman disappearing down a plughole. He is entirely naked and smearing his genitals with lipstick.
Thankfully you / she steps in my way. A cigarette dangles from your drunken lips. You don’t even smoke. You in that black velvet dress. You turn around and bid me to unzip it, smiling at me.
Then I wake up in their living room. Where I first heard this record. I thought it was a synth pop revivalist record. Something like the Chromatics where it’s so fetishistically close to that mid 80s sound you think it could only have been made in the last ten years. No. It’s actually from the mid 80s and prefaces her hi NRG records.
The girl is real but she wants nothing to do with me. She probably doesn’t even own a black velvet dress. Gersten hasn’t been returning my calls. Maybe I should try ringing her number.
Scott Walker – Jesse
It’s a shame Lynch and Walker never worked together as this always makes me think of Episode 8. The slow motion Jailhouse Rock chords make me imagine the earth opening itself up to weep. The Penderecki strings that have ran through Scott’s work since as early as Plastic Palace People or It’s Raining Today.
The 50s he dreams of never happened. They are an autistic reflection in a fish bowl. Elvis was weirder than anything you could ever dream up. We don’t deserve rock’n’roll.
I dreamt you were crawling through a tunnel looking for me. My stuck needle entreaties and iconoclast drag. I watch her crawl across the ceiling. I, your supplanter.
Now I’m day drunk on daydreams on a train and an Indian man is shaking me. “We’ve terminated mate. The train is over”. My psychic next of kin I’d know you in my sleep. I, Supplanter.
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