Tag Archives: breaks

Catnap – A Fire In My Bones

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This mix bounces a number of different musical styles off each other, building up steam into high energy dance party.  I was inspired by some fascinating interpretations of the blues by Kenny Larkin (in his Dark Comedy alter ego) and an Akufen track from the Blu Tibunl remix project.  Then after a short detour into the “heroin house” style, I got down to business with some jackin’ house and then electro from Riton, Beck, and a medley of classic Prince tunes.

Where do you go from there?  Ghetto house, Bmore breaks, and some straight up dance rock from folks like Blues Explosion, LCD Soundsystem, Blur, The Libertines, DJ Mujhava, and much more.  I did lots of edits throughout this mix and even threw in a remix of Juney Boomdata’s “Cookies” I did myself.

Listen here:

Download here

137mb /// 60 min.  /// 320kbps

Track list after the jump… Continue reading →

Onra – Chinoiseries

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Thanks to Boomkat for this great description:

Brilliantly odd instrumental hip hop album here from Onra, compiled and constructed around vintage Vietnamese pop records picked up in flea markets on a trip to the far east. 32 short tracks make up “Chinoiseries”, each of them clocking in at the 1 or 2 minute mark and delivering a tight selection of beats that somehow bring to mind J Dilla, Rza, Madlib, Moondog, MF Doom and the Sublime Frequencies label rolled into one beautifully incoherent package.

Onra – “What Up Duyet?”

Having a ravenous appetite for the “Radio Transmission” style beloved of the aforementioned Sublime Frequencies crew, we might be perfectly primed for this sort of thing, but while the dusty exotica, folk and plastic pop of the source material here could so easily have ended up sounding like the sterile plunderphonic coffee table beats that typified so much instrumental hip hop in the late 90’s, Onra manages to harness the mystifying magic of the original material and juxtapose it with a production style that’s still adequately rough around the edges.

Onra – “The Anthem”

And the source material itself is still bathed in the sublime hiss and crackle of hoary vinyl, retaining the unknown wonders of each of the nameless gems that play a central part through each and every track on this excellent album. Like small, perfectly flawed vignettes, each of the tracks here offers a quirky and mesmerising window into the far east of another era.   A real treat for crate diggers and found sound hounds out there, wherever you may be.

Onra – “Relax in Mui Ne”

Download a .rar with all the tracks here (right click and “save as”)

The Roots – Dilla Joints!

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In an act of great musicianship, the legendary Roots-crew pay respect to the late and great J Dilla offering their renditions of the producer’s greatest hits. The featured mixtape belongs easily to the most sublime tributes to J Dilla I have seen to date. Enjoy in this highest form of appreciation.

Download a .rar file with all the tracks here

Coldcut – 2006 Essential Mix

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The following is excerpted from a larger article, found here:

Matt Black and Jonathon Moore have been creating tracks since the mid-80’s. It wasn’t until they came together as Coldcut and formed the highly innovative label Ninja Tune that they really started to have any success. With tracks such as “Mo Beats”, “Beats and Pieces”, and “Greedy Beat” they helped lay the foundation for hip-hop instrumentalists like DJ Shadow and RJD2. The Ninja Tune label has released albums and singles from DJs and producers such as the deep hip-hop of DJ Food, turntablist extraordinare Kid Koala and Russia’s DJ Vadim.

The mix starts off with some classic hip-hop, including Sweet Tee and A Tribe Called Quest’s “Can I Kick It?” with the original Lou Reed vocal over it. The mix then moves in to expiremental electro-house territory, before starting the second hour with some drum-n-bass like DJ Zinc’s “Super Sharp Shooter” and Krust’s infamous roller “Warhead”. Laced in between is Wayne Smith’s heavy “Under Me Sleng Teng”. Finally rounding out the mix is Franz Ferdinand’s “This Fire” over a floating dub reggae track, they then put Bjork’s “Hidden Place” with a backing track that consists of reggae guitar, 808 drums and opera-like vocals.

This is an entertaining mix that keeps you nodding your head the whole time and leaves you in awe at some of the things Coldcut come up with — they prove that even in an era when a kid with a computer can create “Jay-Zeezer” it still takes talent and a knowledge of music and DJing to create truly beautiful music using . It is rare that you get a DJ mix that contains creativity. It is even rarer to find an Essential Mix with longevity that doesn’t just contain the newest and hottest tunes.

Listen now:

Download here (right click and “save as”)

124 minutes /// 170.21 mb /// 192 kbps .mp3

Track list after the jump… Continue reading →

DJ Dopeshoes – Sole Food: Cold Bolgona Mayonnaise And Bread

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DJ Dopeshoes is a member of the Hometown Blends crew and a selector with an excellent taste in hiphop, funk, breaks, and soul.  Sole Food: Cold Bologna, Mayonnaise, & Bread features a lot of her personal favorites in both old school, and recent hip hop as well as funk and soul.  In her own words “This is a largely retrospective mixtape for afternoons, bbqs, and whenever the hell else you feel like it.”  I will definitely be rocking it at my next BBQ, and so should you.

Listen now:

Download here (right click and ‘save as’)

66 minutes 31 sec. /// 153mb /// 320kbps .mp3

Tracklist after the jump… Continue reading →

Kenny Dope – Break Beats

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kennydopebreakbeats

More old-school goodness from Mr. Dope.  In the words of DJ Ayres:

This Breakbeats CD is a reissued classic in the Bronx tradition of doubling hard funk, disco & early rap breaks with precision. The production is impeccable, and manages a lot of multitracking to keep it interesting, without sacrificing a live feel. But that’s just one level of appreciation; it’s a digging tape too. Everything is on here, from obvious “my first breakbeat” records (James Brown, Headhunters, Meters) to that james flames rare shit that djs like Language and Roctakon cream their panties over. And apparently he’s only rocking original copies, scratching the shit out of $200+ 12″ singles. 37 tracks total, with a couple of extended live remixes at the end and a lot of composition throughout (39 records are listed on the back, but I would guess he used more like 70-80 joints total). I know we hype a lot of music up in our reviews, but honestly, this is a desert island pick.

Listen now: [audio:http://www.djcatnap.com/myoozick/KennyDope-BreakBeats2004.mp3]

Download here (right click and “save as”)

Time: 72:20 /// 99.3mb /// 192kbps .mp3

Track list after the jump… Continue reading →

DJ Icey – Essential Mix

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DJ Icey has been a purveyor of ravey ravery since the early 1990’s.  Coming from the fertile “Florida breaks” scene, Icey’s DJ style and record labels (Zone and Tree Records) has always been about big BIG basslines and electro-acid synth noises.  I’ve always found his music a mixed bag but he shines as a DJ, with impeccable track selection and on-point mixing.

The Essential Mix compilation was released in 2000 at an interesting time for the breaks scene; Florida’s electro-inspired, sample-heavy “acid breaks” sound was being edged out by the UK “nu-school” breaks scene that favored more lush, orchestratal arrangements paired with dark, devastating bass lines drawn from drum ‘n bass scene.  Icey’s track selection reflects this, blending tracks from UK stars Orbital, Plump DJ’s, Freestylers, and Sabres of Paradise with plenty of American tunes (many of them being his own, and thankfully some of his best.)  This mix also includes a DJ Godfather tune, a nod from Icey to the sparse “ghettotech” style that exploded out of Detroit and into the dance music mainstream a year or two later.

This is one of those mixes that stands as a classic of the genre, an excellent snapshot of a sonic aesthetic in transition, and just a helluva lot of fun to listen to.  Track list after the jump.

Listen now:

Download here (right click and “save as”)

time: 72:38 /// 132mb /// 256kbps .mp3

Continue reading →