MIND DE-CODER 21

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MIND DE-CODER 21

‘When the ride is over you can go to sleep’

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA     THE AMERICAN METAPHYSICAL CIRCUS

I read somewhere once that, in some lists at least, this is generally regarded as the greatest psychedelic track ever recorded, and I can’t say that I entirely disagree – it would certainly make my top 10. It’s to be found on the only album by the progressive, avant-garde psychedelic band The United States Of America whose eponymous album was released in 1968. The song is notable for including no less than 5 layers of sound: A calliope playing National Emblem, a ragtime piano playing At A Georgia Camp Meeting, two marching bands playing Marching Through Georgia and The Red, White and Blue switching between left and right channels, and two tracks of electronic noise. Towards the end of the track the singer’s voice becomes so distorted it becomes unintelligible. Marvellous.

Welcome to Mind De-Coder 21.

RED KRAYOLA     HURRICANE FIGHTER PLANE/FREE FORM FREAK-OUT 2

Another psychedelic band of the avant-garde variety, Red Krayola were an extremely influential group in certain circles whose sound pre-figured both punk and post-punk with its lo-fi aesthetic; Spacemen 3 were big fans. In a Pitchfork review by Alex Lindhart, that’s worth repeating verbatim, he refers to the band as having “no idea how to play its instruments. In fact, they don't even know what instruments are, or if the guitarist has the ability to remain conscious long enough to play whatever it is a 'note' might be."  

They released their debut album, PARABLE OF ARABLE LAND, in 1967 featuring six songs interwoven with a cacophony generated by approximately 50 anonymous followers known as The Familiar Ugly who appear on a number of noise tracks called Free-Form Freak-Outs. 13th Floor Elevators frontman Roky Erickson also makes a guest appearance on Hurricane Fighter Plane playing organ – this is possibly the most tuneful thing on the album, and owes much to Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, but the band were capable of going much further out than this. I’ve included one of the Free Form Freak-Outs for your further listening pleasure. 

DJ FOOD VS. THE AMORPHOUS ANDROGYNOUS     DON’T PRAY, DON’T 

        BOTHER (WE’RE EVIL)

     

DJ Food exists as an electronic music project originally created to provide a series of records consisting of breaks, loops and samples that could be used by other DJs for mixing, remixing and producing. Over the years the project has moved away from its initial premise and now, under project manager Kevin Foakes (Strictly Kev to his mum) produces albums in its own right. THE SEARCH ENGINE, styled as a kind of psychedelic rock album made with samplers, was released last year, and then given a Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble remix by Amorphous Androgynous, from which the track Don’t Pray, Don’t Bother (We’re Evil) is taken, part 2 of a sprawling 17 minute mix that takes in three tracks from the original album, and then released as THE ILLECTRIC HOAX. 

WOLF PEOPLE     INTERLUDE SCRAPS

Wolf People’s debut album, TIDINGS, released in 2010, combines mead-soaked English folk, classic rock wig-outs and psychedelic flourishes which take in trippy flutes and backwards guitars, mixes them all up and then presents them as strange whirrings and aimless, unfinished, strummings that seem pregnant with ideas and directions to explore. Many of the tracks are simply labeled as interludes and last less than 30 seconds or so, but as a whole, the album comes on like The Faust Tapes played by Creedence Clearwater Revival. Expect to hear more in upcoming shows.

THE GANGLIANS     TO JUNE

The Ganglians are a psych-folk four piece of the bearded variety from Sacramento who do a fine line in light-dappled, hazy outdoor psychedelia enriched by bird-calls and cricket chirps of the summer evening variety. To June is taken from the album MONSTER HEAD ROOM, released in 2010, an album of melodic, yet slightly unhinged tunes, following its own path through the woods of mood and texture. As the band say on their MySpace page: ‘None of this should work but it does’. 

A MOUNTAIN OF ONE     RIDE (TIME AND SPACE MACHINE REMIX)

A Mountain Of One are something of an all-encompassing 21st century rock band whose sound takes in hypnotic rock, pastoral folk, krautrock, gospel and life-affirming soul (as opposed to the other kind). Ride can be found on their album COLLECTED WORKS, released 2008, which seems to be a round up of their EPs to date. The Richard Norris Time and Space Machine remix is from the RIDE EP, available on 12” vinyl, and is essentially a side-long expansion of the version that appears on COLLECTED WORKS that generally gives more bongo for your bucks.

TAPPA ZUKIE     RUSH I SOME DUB

Lest we get too white, here’s the great Tappa Zukie with a track taken from his semi-legendary TAPPA ZUKIE IN DUB album, originally released in 1976 and limited to a pressing of only 300 copies. Rush I Some Dub is taken from a Linval Thompson tune and captures the deep resonant basslines, sizzling drumplay and sonic playfulness of real Jamaican dub in all its former glory. Just say Jah.

THE TIME AND SPACE MACHINE     FLOW RIVER FLOW

Gorgeous, mellow, lysergic vibes from The Time And Space Machine, courtesy of Richard Norris from his second album proper, 2012’s TASTE THE LAZER, an album otherwise characterized by the kind of hypnotic, motorik, psychedelic grooves of which he is so fond.

BRAIN TICKET     PLACES OF LIGHT

Generally acknowledged as one of the more obscure krautrock classics, Brainticket was in fact more of an international band anchored by the magnificently named Swiss organist Joel Vandroogenbroeck. On this debut album, COTTONWOODHILL, released 1971, the group set out to document an LSD trip as the Grateful Dead did on Anthem Of The Sun and Ash Ra Temple would later do on Seven Up. It is, as you can imagine, full of sonic weirdness and at point it becomes completely deranged, but with Places Of Light there’s an altogether spacier groove. Expect to hear more in later shows.

TRINIDAD STEEL DRUMMERS    CISSY STRUT

I first heard this track around about 1997 when David Holmes, with his usual impeccable taste, included it in some set he was doing for The Evening Session on Radio 1. I’ve been hoping to come across it ever since, and finally discovered it on the SUPER ALBUM, by The Trinidad Steel Drummers, released some point during the 1970’s. Of all the versions of The Meter’s funky classic I’ve heard, this heavily narcotized version remains my favourite. If you had tail feathers, I dare say you’d be shaking them.

POP LEVI     BLUE HONEY (A MONSTROUS PSYCHEDELIC BUBBLE REMIX

     BY AMORPHOUS ANDROGYNOUS)

Pop Levi is an English singer, multi-instrumentalist, record producer and film-maker (he’s also the bassist in Ladytron, trivia fans) whose self-produced debut album, THE RETURN TO FORM BLACK MAGICK PARTY, released in 2007, was self-produced solely on a lap-top and contains within its grooves an authentic cracked homage to 70’s glam rock and boogie. Blue Honey was released as a single from the album and refers, apparently, to the colour honey retains after prolonged exposure to to the hallucinogenic chemicals Psilocybin and Psilocilin (although, in my naiveté, I’m not entirely sure why anyone would expose honey to the hallucinogenic chemicals Psilocybin and Psilocilin, but it sounds great). Amorphous Androgynous take the track and do their usual job, turning it into a magnificent, sprawling, kaleidoscopic 16 minute re-imagining of cosmic proportions – but then, I’m a fan of all things monstrous and psychedelic, me.

WAX AUDIO     BALI PRAYER

9 COUNTRIES  is a truly remarkable album, created by Wax Audio (Tom Pagnoni to his mother), an Australian mash-up artist, entirely from field recordings during a two year trip around the far east and beyond on the way to Scotland. Bali Prayer, for example, is the sound of a woman singing prayers at Gunung Kawi in Bali, Indonesia with added rain, insects and thunder recorded at Aow Mai Pai beach on the island of Ko Lanta, Thailand. I often use the album as a get-out-of-gaol-free card as I skip from one genre to another, but in truth the album is one of the finest field recordings I’ve come across, and I’m quite a fan. You can download a copy for free from the Wax Audio website here  

ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE & THE MELTING PARAISO U.F.O.   

         HELLO GOOD CHILD

Given half the chance Japan’s Acid Mothers Temple will launch into an hour long mind-swallowing, uncontainable, relentless, furry cosmic freak-out that will shake the fillings from your teeth, but on this track, Hello Good Child, taken from their 2004 album DOES THE COSMIC SHEPHERD DREAM OF ELECTRIC TAPIRS, we find them in an altogether different place, drifting lazily across a gentle soundscape of acoustic guitar and Battlestar Galactica sound effects – it really is quite lovely.

TANGERINE DREAM     ATEM

 Julian Cope says it so much better than I ever could: ‘ATEM’, released 1973, ‘is as glorious as a Cecil B. DeMille movie and about as cinematic. The pounding tom-tom drums and the fanfare of mellotron on the opening bars of the title track are like background music for building pyramids to. A huge slab of pounding meditational rock that eventually subsides into a massive groovy meditation. This takes up all of side 1…’ It’s not something you hear everyday on the radio, so I thought I’d give you the full 20 minutes.

MILKY     WILLOW’S SONG

This is by far my second favourite recording of Willow’s Song which is, of course, my favourite song ever. Milky are a collaboration between Shazna Nessa, who also records under the name Maria Napoleon, and her ex-husband, Scottish indie pop legend Momus. They only recorded one album together, TRAVELS WITH MY DONKEY, released 2002, but do seem to have contributed a lot of tracks to various Siesta record label compilations; I found this version of Willow’s Song on the album SONGS FOR THE JET SET 2000 VOL. 3, released in 2000. 

JAN AND LORRAINE     NUMBER 33

There’s a childlike delight that wraps itself around this track - a genuinely strange little song from the album GYPSY PEOPLE, released in 1969, by the American artists Jan Hendin and Lorraine Lefevre. The rest of the album is acid-tinged folk pop with a spooky Indian tribal influence going on underneath it all, but this particular track, featuring Jan’s young daughter (credited as Taki – Greek for loved one), manages to be pretty and weird and spooky all at the same time.

RIAA     SATURN SEA ORGAN

Just a short excerpt of some weird, organic sounds by Mr. Fab, from his album THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF SOUND, released 2012, a retrospective of previously released sound collages and mashups from his vast back catalogue. Saturn Sea Organ is possibly the worlds' first sound-effects mashup, combining a ‘sea organ’ (an experimental musical instrument, located in Croatia,  which plays music by way of sea waves and tubes positioned beneath large marble steps), pitch-shifted to give it melody (it says here) vs. radio emissions from the planet Saturn. You can find the whole track here 

PAUL WELLER     SLEEP OF THE SERENE/TWILIGHT

Taken from his 2012 album SONIK KICKS, an album that throws out ideas like an exuberantly cosmic Catherine wheel – Sleep Of The Serene consists of beeps, bloops and pizzicato strings followed by the 20 second verse of clanging musique concrète that makes up Twilight. Marvellous.

SUFJAN STEVENS     NOW THAT I’M OLDER

Hmm.  I’m deeply divided over this track which, now I come to consider it, is no surprise given that the album from which it’s taken, 2010’s THE AGE OF ADZ, was inspired by the work of schizophrenic outsider artist Royal Roberstson. This track seems to ache with pain and hard-earnt self-realization but this is balanced beneath a fairly attractive tune. However, listened to under suitably enhanced conditions (you know what I’m talking about) the electronically distorted voice sounds either hilariously tortured, or simply hilarious, or simply tortured; and depending what mood you’re in, will have you laughing uncontrollably or on your hands and knees scrabbling around for the controls - as such, it kind of works perfectly as the penultimate track on the show. It could only be followed by…

PINK FLOYD     JUGBAND BLUES

Syd Barrett’s farewell to Pink Floyd and the sound of a man unplugging himself from the world – with added Salvation Army band. The final track from 1968’s A SAUCERFUL OF SECRETS, of course, and the only song written by him on the album – after this, Syd disappeared and the legend took over. 

And that was Mind De-Coder 21. I thank you.

MIND DE-CODER 42

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MIND DE-CODER 42

“Psychedelics are illegal not because a loving government is concerned that you may jump out of a third story window. Psychedelics are illegal because they dissolve opinion structures and culturally laid down models of behaviour and information processing. They open you up to the possibility that everything you know is wrong.”

                                                                                                        Terence McKenna

POND     WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE MILLION HEAD COLLIDE

The opening track, or ought that be salvo, from HOBO ROCKET, the second album release from Pond this year who are clearly on a roll, featuring a heavy metal assault of guitar riffs, unrestrained drums, sonic wig-outs and psychedelic trickery. Singer Nick Allbrook howls something about ‘the holy of holies’, Buddha, Krishna, God and then we’re off – welcome to mind De-Coder 42

VIDICATRIX     PRIVATE PLACES (SHACKLETON AND MORDANT MUSIC VESRSION) (excerpt)

A marvellous bit of noise I tagged onto the end of Whatever Happened To…, Private Places is taken from the 2009 album PICKING O’ER THE BONES, a roundup of long deleted tracks released on the Mordant Music record label, which is also the name of the production duo responsible for a hauntologically inspired dubstep/techno aesthetic, as well as home to a cast of outsiders including Shackleton and Vindicatrix, about whom, it must be said, I know next to nothing (I only came across Mordant Music because they were invited to collaborate on a Ghost Box Study Series single release with Mind De-Coder favourites The Belbury Poly which I’ve included later on in the show).  On this piece, of which I only provide an excerpt, Shackleton and MM take Vindicatrix’s Private Places and turn it into a barely conscious soundscape of echo chamber dub FX and vocal apparitions and wrap it up in some voodoo rhythms that send it so far out it never entirely comes back again.

NIRVANA     RAINBOW CHASER

Not that Nirvana, who this pair successfully sued over the name, but a duo consisting of a London-based song writing partnership who never really achieved any public recognition but who were much lauded by music industry types and critics alike. Their debut album THE STORY OF SIMON SIMOPATH, released in 1967, was arguably the first narrative-based concept album ever released, pipping The Pretty Things’ SF SORROW and The Who’s TOMMY to the post by a year or two. Rainbow Chaser, which was a minor chart success in 1968 (it reached the coveted number 1 spot in Denmark despite only the scratching the top 40 in England), is taken from their second album, the rather annoyingly titled THE EXISTENCE OF CHANCE IS EVERYTHING AND NOTHING WHILST THE GREATEST ACHIEVEMENT IS THE LIVING OF LIFE, AND SO SAY ALL OF US, released in 1968 and often abbreviated to ALL OF US for people who can’t be doing with that sort of thing at all.

13^TH FLOOR ELEVATORS     I’VE GOT LEVITATION

I don’t even understand this track. Is it supposed to sound like this? Clearly I mean this in a good way. I’ve Got Levitation is taken from the band’s second album, EASTER EVERYWHERE, released in 1967, and the whole album is a loose, hypnotic trip. The strange patterns of Tommy Hall's electric jug playing are as gloriously bewildering as ever, merging the music of the spheres with an alien attack, and Roky Erickson's vocals make even the most acid-damaged poesy sound passionate, graceful, and wildly alive.

THE LIMIÑANAS     SALVATION

The Limiñanas are something of a revelation – a fuzzy-felt pop folk duo from France who's wonderful, hook laden songs reach out of the stereo and wrap themselves around you. By all accounts, one of the highlights of this years’ Liverpool Psyche Fest, their second album CRYSTAL ANIS, is simple and catchy as hell, humming with effervescent, alluring pop that benefits from superb production that seems to put the emphasis in all the wrong places – like the looping ukulele that opens the album (although, admittedly, that may just be the way I have my amp set up) – which, of course, turns out to be all the right places. Heavenly and triumphant; I’m quite the fan.

THE FOCUS GROUP     THE HEAVY BLESSING

The Focus Group’s ELEKTRIK KAROUSEL has been one of my favourite albums of the year – an awkward collision between unspooled vintage pop and experimental folk moments that finds beauty in the strangest places.

THE OSCILLATION     TELEPATHIC BIRDMAN

A mind-bending track from The Oscillation, whose 2011 release VEILS, combines krautrock rhythms with full-on guitar driven assaults which radiate a trance inducing throb that’s both mesmerising and melodic. Pretty much does what the name suggests.

WHITE MANNA     DON’T GUN US DOWN

Blistering space-rock from California’s White Manna, whose self-named debut album, released 2012, pretty much amounts to 40-odd minutes of relentless, sustained psychedelia of the white-out variety, although on this track there’s just a touch of the jingle for those of you who need to draw breath occasionally.

TIME ATTENDANT     LAPPING UP AT NIGHT

 A little something from the album DOWN TO THE SILVER SEA, a sort of hauntological trip to the seaside, compiled by the Moon Wiring Club’s Ian Hodgson. Time Attendant is the moniker under which experimental musician and painter Paul Snowden releases his aural doodles which, with the best will in the world, are little more than strange, angular melodies and drawn out synth drones – but very conceptual ones. . .

SARAH ANGLISS     VERTICAL GALLOPERS

. . . as, no doubt, are these. Also taken from DOWN TO THE SILVER SEA (released earlier this year), Angliss at least adds a touch of the seaside to the composition. There’s always a touch of the uncanny about her work – she’s a composer, automatist and sound historian who builds robots to play her tunes – but this track reminds me of haunted piers and ghostly Victorian fairground rides.

CLEAR LIGHT     THINK AGAIN

Named after a particularly potent brand of LSD, Clear Light were a folk rock/psyche rock group from LA whose big thing was that they had two drummers. They released just the one album, SAME, in 1967, before returning to, or perhaps becoming, a footnote in musical history. In fairness, they should have done better than they did – SAME has some pretty far out tracks on it with some spot on psychedelic flourishes, but the album failed to sell and the band split up shortly after.

ULTIMATE SPINACH     EGO TRIP

Ultimate Spinach’s Ian Bruce-Douglas (composer, lead singer, multi-instrumentalist) is, to this day, derided as a fourth rate Jim Morrison, Grace Slick or Country Joe McDonald, whose band was never able to scale the giddy heights reached by The Doors, Jefferson Airplane and Country Joe and the Fish – even contemporary re-evaluations of his band find them wanting and worse still, derivative, as if the best they were capable of was sounding like a recombination of all those West Coast psychedelic bands he so desperately wanted to compete with (Ultimate Spinach had the added misfortune of hailing from a very un-rock ‘n’ roll Boston). That being said, their self-titled debut album, released 1967, sold 110,000 in its first week and remained in the charts for 36 consecutive weeks and is not without its merits – I’ve always been very fond of album opener Ego Trip, me.

STEREOLAB     SPACE MOMENT

A track that pretty much does what it says on the label, Space Moment is to be found on the mini-album MUSIC FOR THE AMORPHOUS BODY STUDY CENTER, created in collaboration with New York sculptor Charles Long to accompany an exhibition he held in 1995 (although for people unable to get their hands on a copy of the limited edition pressing the whole EP turned up on one of the group’s many retrospective albums ALUMINIUM TUNES: SWITCHED ON, VOL. 3 which, admittedly, is where I first came across it). It really is quite lovely; one of my favourite Stereolab moments, combining their early trademark drone-sound with their emerging easy listening, 60’s pop inclinations.

CRANIUM PIE     MASTER OF MYSTERY

A short bit of filler taken from the band’s second album GEOMETRY OF THISTLES , a selection of highly psychedelic tracks recorded between 2006 and 2009, released 2012, but none the less magical for all that. The journey into mushroom land starts here.

THE END     LOVING SACRED LOVING

A lovely piece of psychedelic whimsy from The End, a band you really ought to have heard more from but whose chances of success were scuppered when the release of their only album INTROSPECTION was held back for some 18 months until 1969, by which time the world had embraced a slightly more robust take on music and psychedelic whimsy had already become dated. A pity, as the album is not without its charms as demonstrated by Loving Sacred Loving which also saw release as the b-side to the album's only single Shades of Orange, released in 1968. These days if you’ve heard of them at all, it’s because of the Bill Wyman connection, who managed the band and had them touring as support for the Stones during their Satanic Majesties Request days. Legend has it that Shades of Orange and Loving Sacred Loving were later confused by bootleg collectors as being Stones tracks that were unused from that album and that The Beatles appeared on them, what with them being so psychedelic and all. Sadly not true, but this track was written by Wyman and includes Nicky Hopkins on harpsichord, trivia fans.

DAVID MUNROW     LE PETITE GENTILHOMME

Something of a searing lute solo, this track can be found on the soundtrack to HENRY VIII AND HIS SIX WIVES, released back in 1972. I first came across Munrow in Rob Young’s masterful book 'Electric Eden' in which he unearths the story of the folk revival in the British Isles. Munrow emerged as a leading light in the early music and Renaissance movement of the 1960’s and 70’s which, by all accounts, he brought to life in performances of unsurpassed brilliance.  I’ve been meaning to play him on the show for ages, but lute solos aren’t as easy to segue in as you’d think.

I follow that with a reading of Pablo Neruda’s IF YOU FORGET ME, read by La Ciccone of all people, but having listened to several recordings of the poem, it turns out hers was the best.

NICK NICELY     THE MOURNING

I was so excited to hear this - a newly recorded version of nicely’s psychedelic classic Hilly Fields (1892), reinterpreted by nicely (one only uses lower case) himself for the semi-legendary Fruits De Mer record label, some 30 years after the original release. In this version, released on 7” vinyl with the original recording on the b-side, nicely turns in an elaborate and indeed delicate acoustic version that is as every bit as tripped out as the original. For those of you who are new comers to Mind De-Coder, Hilly Fields (1892) is arguably the greatest psychedelic record to have come out of the 80’s.

MORDANT MUSIC     INN OHM THE LAKE

You know, I had to play this on the strength of the title alone, but it’s nevertheless a trippy little piece that can be found on the single GHOST BOX STUDY SERIES 3: WELCOME TO GODALMING, released in 2010 by the Ghost Box record label, of course. They share the release with Ghost Box co-founder Jim Jupp’s Belbury Poly with whom they share an interest in similar long-haunted byways of sound. Looping voices full of post-war pedagogical advice, humming drones, children’s songs and reverb drenched sounds abound.

THE NATURAL YOGURT BAND     VOODOO

The Natural Yogurt Band are the day job for Miles Newbold who under his guise as The Sign Of Four had a track played on Mind De-Coder a little while ago which fairly reverberated with sonic going’s on and polyphonic sound textures. He burst onto the scene (inasmuch as it can be said that he actually burst anywhere) in 2008 with the album AWAY WITH MELANCHOLY, from which the fairly irresistible Voodoo is taken, a stirring mix of jazz and funk although, crucially, not jazz-funk but something that uses elements of each to take the listener on a pretty far out journey to some place completely else – cinematic, funky and at times mellow, other times modal, it was quite possibly a pastiche of all these things, a faux-vintage record with the tunes to carry it through the sum of its parts.

ARIEL KALMA    MESSAGE 18/10/77

Ariel Kalma seems to be a little known synth-pioneer who appears to have been doing something a bit world music-y and Body-Shop-CD-rack since the mid-70’s at least, but don’t let that put you off. Message 18/10/77 is from the album OSMOSE, released in 1977 and, as one reviewer has put it, it’s sort of like Vangelis getting lost in the Amazonian rain forest 35 years ago, but don’t let that put you off either – take away the New Age bird calls and insect noise and you're left with something approaching a perfectly serviceable Spacemen 3 drone.

I have it float off into something really quite wonderful – a recording of crickets with their sound slowed down to equivalent of a human lifespan and sounding like a choir of angels praising creation (is this what they sound like to each other, I wonder?), recorded by Jim Wilson who then pasted the actual sound of crickets over the top of it for pleasing effect – it actually goes on like that for an hour or so and remains spell-binding throughout - you can check out the whole track here; and whilst that was playing I added the sound of a piano tuner replacing a string on the family piano, which she let me record whilst she was doing it because I thought it sounded really cool. This is mind De-Coder.

ROBBIE BASHO     THE GRAIL AND THE LOTUS

Transcendental guitar playing from Robbie Basho, a mystical minstrel heavily influenced by Hindustani classical guitar, who, in 1966 released his second album THE GRAIL AND THE LOTUS, a great lost psychedelic album from an artist who kind of transcended the genre.

VASHTI BUNYAN     HERE BEFORE

Wistful loveliness from Vashti Bunyan with a track from her sublime second album LOOKAFTERING, which came some 36 years after her first; her voice is gorgeous, pristine and precious.

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND     SISTER RAY

And the show comes full circle with a track that’s not so much a song as an assault. Sister Ray, from their 1968 release WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT,  is the definitive Velvet Underground statement in which everything is turned up to 11and the studio bleeds into the production – Reed’s tale of a bunch of drag queens taking some sailors home with them, shooting up on smack and having this orgy when the police appear is by no means a psychedelic piece of music, but the overall effect is so overwhelming, the distortion and frequencies set so high, that the senses are simply broken down and rearranged in a proto- heavy metal haze that disorientates and thrills at the same time, and if that isn’t psychedelic then I don’t know what is.

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MIND DE-CODER 20

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MIND DE-CODER 20

“Jus' lick back de riddim fi I, seen?”

JOHHNY CONQUEST     NOR’ EASTER

Given that I decided the other day that Mind De-Coder is too white, it’s ironic I should start today’s show with a track that’s virtually Country and Western – more or less the whitest music ever made if we ignore, for the sake of argument, the polka, but somehow it just about works, creating a vibe and giving Bob Marley something to say a few words over. Nor’ Easter can be found on the album UPTOWN FOR THE AMERICAS, released in 2001 by Johnny Conquest, a band about whom I know sadly nothing. 

SOUND IRATION     IRATION TIME

This is more like it – Sound Iration are reggae sound system operator and pirate DJ Nick Manesseh and collaborator/bassist Scruff who recorded SOUND IRATION between 1986 and 1988, around about the time that UK club culture was experiencing major sonic and cultural shifts: acid house and rave parties were blossoming and electronic music was revving up into a full-blown phenomenon. Steeped in the tradition of roots and dub acts but inspired by the electro beats coming up from the clubs, Sound Iration offered raw, minimalist dub tracks comprised mostly of looped bass lines, steady computer drum rhythms and echoing shards of piano, synth riffs and sound effects. The sound would later be alternately dubbed UK Steppers and digi-dub owing to the music’s four-four kick drum patterns and digital composition – but the melodica saturated Iration Time with its mournful piano and deep bass notes keep it real.

PRINCE FAR I      NEGUSA NAGAST

Despite his name appearing in the title, MEGABIT 25 1922-DUB is actually more of a tribute album to Prince Far I than a work by the man himself, featuring dubs from a number of bands, including Roots Radics, with whom he worked on his CRY TUFF volumes. MEGABIT 25 1922-DUB was, in fact, produced, arranged and edited by Roy Cousins who then sampled Far I’s remarkable voice to marvelous effect, as can be heard here on the opening track, Negusa Nagast, which, like the other titles on the album, appears to be written in a language with which I’m unfamiliar.

PRINCE JAMMY AND KING TUBBY     THRONE OF JUDGEMENT

This track is from HIS MAJESTY’S DUB, one of those albums whose provenance is difficult to trace. It seems to have been recorded throughout the mid-1970’s  by Jah Woosh at studios all across Jamaica featuring outstanding performances from some of the finest Jamaican instrumentalists of the era, including Sly Dunbar, Robbie Shakespeare, Vin Gordon, Bobby Ellis, and ‘Family Man’ Barrett. It then seems to have been given the dub treatment by Prince Jammy and King Tubby at some later date and released some time between 1976 and 1983, the history at this point becomes contradictory, to say the least. It remains, however, a typically outstanding dub album from two masters of the form.

SCRATCH AND THE UPSETTERS     BLACK VEST

Black Vest is taken from the classic dub album SUPER APE, produced by the legendary Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry in 1976, and which, as the cover promises, pretty much dubs it up ‘blacker than dread’ (although, being whiter than white, I’m not entirely sure what ‘blacker than dread’ actually means – if I’m honest, I don’t know what an iration is either, but I’ll have two please, just to be on the safe side). Unlike most dub albums, which are sparse and play around with space, Perry fills the sound with layers of dense rhythms that practically ooze like molasses from the speakers.

Strictly speaking, it’s not a dub album at all, because that would imply that there’s heavy doses of echo and reverb to be heard, which there isn’t. On the other hand, it’s not simply a reggae album either, because not all the tracks have vocals. Some critics have even compared it to a jazz album, with Perry playing the mixing board like an instrument,
and placed alongside Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew. It is, in fact, what it is.

Black Vest deconstructs Max Romeo’s War Ina Babylon over a dubwise version of the track with vocals from Max Romeo, Jah Lion and James Brown (although, not that James Brown, but the other one) sliding in and out of the mix with Perry artfully constructing the musical mosaic at the mixing desk. Marvellous.

DUB SYNDICATE     STONED IMMACULATE

Dub Syndicate’s STONED IMMACULATE, released 1991, is my favourite dub album of all, despite the bass lines appearing to be played by the keyboardist, which, let’s face it, doesn’t really cut it for roots reggae. (On the other hand, The Doors’ bass lines were played out on keyboards too so it all sort of ties together on the title track which features Jim Morrison vocal snippets from American Prayer). Nevertheless, this is the album I reach for each summer – Adrian Sherwood’s production is typically over-the-top with psychedelic flourishes, Prince Far I is sampled alongside Jim Morrison, Tommy McCook and the Upsetters, and the whole thing has a playful, experimental feel to it that makes it essential listening.

KING TUBBY      KING TUBBY’S IN FINE STYLE

King Tubby (Osbourne Ruddick to his mum) invented dub, of course, and the remix, and adding special effects like extreme delays, echoes reverb and phase effects – which puts it in the same cosmic ballpark as psychedelia as far as I'm concerned. In doing so, he elevated the role of the mixing engineer to a creative fame previously only reserved for composers and musicians and may even be seen as the direct antecedent of dance music as well. He was highly prolific in the 70’s and he’s a bugger to collect, but you could do a lot worse than start with the 2004 compilation IN FINE STYLE, a double disc that compiles 46 dubs mixed at King Tubby’s Studio, which, while barely scratching the surface of his creative output, do represent the best of the best. King tubby’s In Fine Style is on it, for a start.

Nevertheless, I have him fade off into some noise . . .

ALAN BLACK     EARTHBOUND/LEAVING

Two tracks from my current get out of gaol free card, the mighty THE ORTICA, released online by Alan Black here, in which space is entered, explored, made contact with and experienced …so not unlike dub, really.

KING TUBBY AND PRINCE JAMMY     THE POOR BARBER

A classic dub from Fatty and Jammy in which The Poor Barber is disrupted with giant thunderclaps of spring-reverb, outer space blips and bloinks,  and showers of rimshots cutting across the beat, twisting and bulging around cyclical hi-hat patterns. Sampled from John Holt’s 1969 hit Ali Baba, all other versions seem to be based upon an original riddim (I know, I know…) created by Bunny Lee for a track by Jackie Edwards in 1975 that possibly documents the rivalry between dreads and barbers, although it’s conceivable that I might be making that bit up. It’s been covered, remixed and dubbed up literally hundreds of times, but this version, based in Dr Alimantado’s I Killed the Barber, appears on DUB GONE 2 CRAZY, released 1996, an excellent collection of dub singles mixed by King Tubby and Lloyd ‘Prince Jammy’ James. I’ve even provided my own version, I guess, buy over dubbing some vocals I’ve always liked from Borderline Dub (Ali Baba version).

DUBITAL     INSIDE MG

Dubital are an Italian duo who actually do a very fine line in melody-laden electronic dub, but I’ve chosen this messed up ghostly dancehall track that I found on the Epitonic download site here . If there’s anything else to know about them I’m afraid it’s lost to me.

PRIMAL SCREAM    JU-87

Following the release of their 1997 album VANISHING POINT, the boys sent the master tapes off to Adrian Sherwood and asked him to remix them in a dub version stylee. What he, in fact, did was de-assemble the tracks, erase them, cut them up, lose them in the echo chamber, reconstructed them and pushed them out into dub orbit. The result was ECHO DEK – a mightily subverted album of great sonic force. JU-87, a re-working of Stuka is so messed up it’s one of the most imbalanced and disorientating dub tracks produced in the 90’s. Needless to say, Primal Scream were thrilled.

THE ORB feat. LEE ‘SCRATCH’ PERRY     GOLDEN CLOUDS

The legendary Lee 'Scratch’ Perry and The Orb come together on last year’s THE ORBSEVER IN THE STAR HOUSE  - a dubwise album of restrained but dense rhythmic echoes and deep bass over which Perry raps (although this is meant more in the beat sense of the word – stream of consciousness poetry delivered in authentic patois – Lee Perry is no rapper). You may recognize Golden Clouds as re-working of Little Fluffy Clouds (“…and what were the clouds like when you were young, Mr Perry?") but, instead, this track simply samples elements of The Orb’s signature tune in a dubbed out nod to the original, and is all the more enjoyable for the vague familiarity.

THE MOODY BOYS     FREE

A classic dub heavy dance cut over the skanking dub beats by The Moody Boys, a house music production and remix outfit, featuring the KLF’s Jimmy Cauty - Free can be found on their 1990 release JOURNEY INTO DUBLAND. Co-founder Tony Thorpe kept the name after Cauty left but changed it to Moody Boyz and was last heard of remixing Hollie Cook’s Milk and Honey.

AFRICAN HEAD CHARGE     THE BIG COUNTRY

African Head Charge is the brain-child of Ghanaian percussion-meister Bonjo Iyabinghi Noah, who gathers together the field recordings of African and Asian singers from which he gleans the sweetest and/or eeriest passages he can find and then constructs ground-shaking grooves around them; the resulting sound sculptures are whipped into a dubwise frenzy by modern dubmaster Adrian Sherwood, whose imprint appears to be all over the show. The Big Country is taken from the 2010 release VISION OF A PSYCHEDELIC AFRICA, although it may have been recorded in 2005 and was a Japanese only release or something (I wouldn’t want you to think that I’m an authority on the On-U Soundsystem back-catalogue or anything). In many ways this track serves as an exposition on the distilled essence of Noah's musical conception, with eerily beautiful field recordings, an elephantine reggae groove, and Sherwood's patented production craziness. The album pretty much does what it says on the label and is without doubt my favourite release from this psychedelic dub collective.

LINTON KWESI JOHNSON     VICTORIOUS DUB

Victorious Dub can be found on LKJ IN DUB, released 1980, righteous dub re-workings of tracks from the London dub poet’s previous two albums, FORCES OF VICTORY and BASS CULTURE. Produced and arranged by LKJ and the semi-legendary Dennis Bovell, LKJ IN DUB is generally regarded as one of the most influential British dub albums of all time (it says here) despite being essentially the work of Britain’s premier dub poet without the poetry.  The insistent beat and melodic horn parts that mark the eight cuts on the album, however, may be seen as the musical representation of Johnson's impassioned political lyrics with their stolid insinuation and determinism. Clearly, this is not the album with which to introduce oneself to Johnson's work. However, fans who want to pay more attention to the strictly musical side of Johnson's work, or those who just want to hear some good dub from a different source, LKJ IN DUB will do nicely.

LOVE GROCER feat. CHESHIRE CAT     A LITTLE VERSION

New dub (well, newish) from the Love Grocer, sometimes known as the Crispy Horns, a big roots reggae band associated with the new roots/dub scene of the 90’s, with a version of the opening track to their 2001 album ROCKING WITH…THE LOVE GROCER. In truth, I know so little. 

DR. ALIMANTADO     THE BEST DRESSED CHICKEN IN TOWN

Reggae was always popular with the nascent punk scene following Don Lett’s legendary DJ sets at The Roxy – the punk scene was so new that there were no punk singles to play so instead he played a selection of dub and roots reggae to the receptive audience. Dr. Alimantado was especially popular after Johnny Rotten name-checked him in an interview in 1987. THE BEST DRESSED CHICKEN IN TOWN is the title track from his debut album, released in 1978, essentially a collection of tracks recorded in the mid-70s, featuring the good doctor toasting over singers such as John Holt, Gregory Isaacs, Jackie Edwards and Horace Andy. Handling production chores himself, he then enlisted top reggae engineers and producers like Lee 'Scratch' Perry, King Tubby, and Scientist to add their own alchemy to the mix and released one of the finest albums from reggae’s golden age.

FUN-DA-MENTAL     MOTHER INDIA

Fun-Da-Mental were, and possibly still are, a multi-ethnic hip-hop–ethno-techno–world fusion music group with a hard line in strong Islamic affiliation and advocacy, and an outspoken political stance that you’d be correct in thinking of as militant but in what you’d also be correct in calling an Asian Public Enemy kind of way - and an energetic fusion of Eastern and Western musical forms, of course. Mother India is doubly powerful because, on an album that features long elements of Islamic perspective, commentary and assertion, it challenges the patricharchal thought system embedded in that same Islamic belief system - and because it’s dubbed out and classical as hell. I’ve loved this track since I first came upon it on their debut album SEIZE THE TIME in 1994, a musical and politically challenging record that was all the better for daring to include this track on it. There’s a vocal-less version of it called Mother Africa Feeding Sister India which appeared on that album by the Thievery Corporation, which is where you’ve probably heard it before. Imagine how empowering it would be for a young Muslim girl to hear this track nowadays.

THE ORB     TOWERS OF DUB (MAD PROFESSOR REMIX)

Towers of Dub is one of The Orb’s classic tracks, of course. This slightly chaotic ambient dub mix  by the Mad Professor, coming in at a full 15 minutes, is one of the bonus tracks that came with the release of The Blue Room, another classic Orb release in 1994, not least because it comes in at 39 minutes and 57 minutes, thus qualifying it as a single…and who can forget the sight of the two of them playing 3-D chess on Top of the Pops?

UNKNOWN

This kills me – I came across this track on an extended Coldcut mix late one Saturday night in 1995 on Kiss FM while visiting London for the weekend for reasons that I shan’t bother you with. Crucially, I taped 45 minutes of the show and this track is from that very tape. But I’ve no idea who the singer is or what the song is called. Googling ‘Shalom, my people, Shalom’ takes me pretty much where you’d expect, and beyond that – well, just between you and me, I don’t really know what she’s saying – seerightnow, armsno businessguarantings – try Googling that and see what you get. But, you see, I really, like this track and have done since that fateful visit to London. So if you know what it’s called, and can tell me after all these years, you will not find me ungrateful.

LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO     HELLO, MY BABY

From that same Coldcut  session, but this is Ladysmith Black Mambazo, of course, from their album ENZINKULU, the one that featured their first English language songs, from 1979. A slightly different version of the song appeared on their 1987 album SHAKA ZULU, which was an introductory album to the group, on which they sang new versions of older songs for the Western audience they’d just gained following their success on Paul Simon’s Graceland. Sublime, nonetheless.

ERNIE SMITH     PITTA PATTA

I think Ernie Smith was awarded the The Badge of Honour for Meritous Service in the Field of Music by the Jamaican government for this lovely single, Pitta Patta, released in 1973 utilizing Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry’s ‘musical transplant’ rhythm (No? Me neither). He also beat songwriters Neil Sedaka and Michael Legrand, to win the Grand Prize at the World Popular Song Festival in Tokyo. Pitta Patta can also be found on his 1974 album LIFE IS JUST FOR LIVING. It’s just one of those song’s that make you feel good about yourself, and, therefore, a fitting way to round off the show. I mess with it at the end.

BOB MARLEY     STIR IT UP (ACOUSTIC)

Of course, I couldn’t finish the show without playing a little something by Bob Marley, but curiously enough, he wasn’t much one for dubbing up his sound, although the occasional track does exist. Instead, I thought I’d play an acoustic version of Stir It Up which, in its way, is just a rare. This track appears on the semi-legendary acoustic medley, recorded in Sweden during the summer of 1971, when Marley was working on a film soundtrack with Johnny Nash, best known for his 1972 hit, I Can See Clearly Now. In fact, I believe the recording is from a session where Bob was actually teaching Nash some songs, including Stir It Up, which actually became a big hit for Nash. This is Bob Marley at his rawest – just his guitar and the songs he wrote, something special for this week’s Mind De-Coder.

Enjoy, and may the peace of Jah be wid you. This was Mind De-Coder 20. I thank you.