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A couple of weeks back my workplace did a seminar on agent navigation in conflict zones, and among the presented case stories was Emmerson Amidu Bockarie (links to Wikipedia).

I've always liked grass roots rebel music, and this anti-corruption musician from Sierra Leone immediately caught my interest. The lyric is essentially a cry at the elected and corrupt officials of Sierra Leone, posing the proposition that with you leading us maybe yesterday was better than today? which is a powerful statement, with regards to Sierra Leone's past wars.

Download the song from Awareness Times in wma: Yesterday Betteh Pass Today?

Who knows if na Bogus dem bin dae make nar Focus? [...WHO KNOWS?]
Say the first things first nar we belleh
Business dem dae close; Tax dae go high
Teachers salary nar the same
Infact money nor dae flow

(...)

Sometem we go bellefull tumara
But no one knows tomorrow
Ar nor know for you
Me yesterday betteh pass tiday

His lyrics are in Krio, a language which vocabulary is derived primarily from English, while its sound system, grammar and sentence structure are heavily influenced by at least 12 African languages. If you want to read the text yourself, stop by the Awareness Times' article. Happy listening!

I got an e-mail this morning from the radiohead mailinglist. It was about Philip Selway's independent album Familial. You can download a free mp3 of the first track on his website. I am not convinced yet, but I know he's a great drummer. Good luck!

I was reading up on Radiohead history and news when I noticed a couple of 2009 releases that I had missed entirely, namely Harry Patch (In memory of) and These are my twisted words. The first one is a tribute to "the Last Fighting Tommy", namely the last British soldier surviving WWI. He had strong anti-war views from his dreadful experiences, and a BBC Radio 4 interview inspired Tom Yorke to write a song based on the interview.

i am the only one that got through
the others died where ever they fell
it was an ambush
they came up from all sides
give your leaders each a gun and then let them fight it out themselves
i've seen devils coming up from the ground
i've seen hell upon this earth
the next will be chemical but they will never learn

The song is a download-only that costs £1 BGP, proceeds going to the British Legion. Download/buy here

The second track called These Are my Twisted Words is a single released as direct download and a torrent on mininova (original link dead) at no cost. You can download the mp3 from Radiohead's dead air space website.

I was picking up some nice RL hacking tips on a youtube channel when I came across a user who were introducing freeware games people could run live @ school. Not really interesting, but he also linked to the source music of his presentations, which was rather good. It turned out to be some electronica artist called Le Castle Vania. I found it's great work music for the office. Here 'tis:

Le Castle Vania free music downloads

Today's playlist
Tigertron (Toxic Avenger Remix)
Go Back (Le Castle Vania Remix)
Meet Your Replacement
Rave Is King (Le Castle Vania Remix)
Come Out (Le Castle Vania's Electric Disco Mix Extended)
In For The Kill (Le Castle Vania Remix)

If you're a fan of Daft Punk, Aphex Twin or can dance, you'll like Le Castle Vania.

I'm working late tonight and having spent quite a few hours at work I tend to look at the latest virals. Among the more mindless rubbish I came across today, I stumbled over a little gem of a mixer artist namely Pogo.

Some of his amazing tracks, including the Skynet Symphonic, Alohomora and Upular are made entirely out of sounds from movies (respectively Terminator 2, Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone and Pixar film Up)!



Here's the song Upular as interpreted by Pogo (requries Flash). You can also download quite a few tracks from last.fm (direct link). Ah, this brings me back to when techno was cool. Thanks a lot, mate. This made my evening!

The growling groundhog of the metropolitan under-bowels, Tom Waits, turns 60 today the 7th of December 2009. The jingle:



Yup. It's not the usual jingle, I know, but Tom's not a usual man. The picture's from his 2008 Glitter and Doom tour, this particular one from Prague, provided by Gut. In celebration of Tom Waits' enthralling artistry and prevalent persona we are gathering at Rockefeller in Oslo tonight from eight o'clock. See you there!

Michael Jackson's last recorded album This is it and the DVD made from the preparations of his last big tour are the only reasons why big capitalist bastards still care about him. It's so sad when people who've met such abuse by an industry and the press dies tragically, only to lure all the bottom-dwelling parasites out of the woodwork. Vultures! Anyway, to promote the upcoming album they have released a preview of the This is it single. You can listen to it here!

This Is It! Yep, that's it.

Though it's a ballad I actually think it's great. I am not such a big fan of Jackson's latest tunes when compared to his earlier career and also the History era, but this song could easily be among the classics. Sadly it's not as centered around a computer theme as some of us had hoped. Come on, this is IT...

A colleague sent me this link to Q the podcast, featuring an interview with Tom Waits himself. It's a great interview starting off as a conversation about film, then moves on to his role in The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, and at the end of it he reveals that Tom Waits will release a Glitter and Doom live album on Thanksgiving! News to me!

Download or listen to the Q podcast from 2nd of October here!
The Tom Waits interview starts around 00:21:10.

As you may remember me and Lady C and a whole group of our friends went to his last two concerts (I only saw the next to last) in Dublin, Ireland at the end of July. It was a memorable event, and because there was a lot of recording going on we suspected the shooting of a DVD or a live album. Could be both.. Either way, I'm seriously looking forward to it, because even though the NPR recorded concert in Atlanta was a superb recording (download / stream it here) it didn't feature all the songs he played in the concert that we went to. It would be awesome if they released the Dublin songs that we actually went to. In any case, this is great news for all Tom Waits fans laying the foundations for a great Thanksgiving!

Michael Jackson, one of my childhood heroes and all time King of Pop died today at 11:40 pm Norwegian time. The Los Angeles Times reportedly wrote that Jackson didn't breathe when medical staff arrived his house. He evidently received CPR in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, and later fell into a coma. This news was first reported by TMZ, then quoted by Reuters via The Washington Post. This article writes that the cause of death is still unknown. He died at the age of 50.

Since five minutes ago I began to receive text-messages bearing the earth shattering news. Because, like Lady C said: "I thought he'd live forever." And me too.

Since the first time I heard Smooth Criminal from the Bad album I was sold, and I spent some of my early teenage years defending his great music when the world turned its back on him due to the lawsuits and allegations, and all of his great work was shunned as 'uncool'. Although genius prevails in the world of music and art, the man was lost in the battle. Albeit acquitted from all charges in 2005 I still read hateful comments on the different news sites, just underlining the message Michael tried time and time again to get across. Every person deserves to be loved, even though they are a bit different.

What's funny is that the same cool people slagging him off were the next ones to use his beats in their music. Hip-hop, RnB as well as mainstream pop music all bear significant markings of the King of Pop, a title his legacy justifies. Not to mention that he managed all the stages of musical creation from the beginning to the finished product, the tell-tale sign of a genius, if you ask me.

It is a bit rushed to publish this post as of right now, because all the news agencies seem to quote the same source, creating a vacuum in the press. Fox News just said he was in a coma, but the article didn't say when it was last updated, while Wikipedia's article is marked with the "about a person who has recently died" tag. For the time being I'll assume that these news are true.

Michael Joseph Jackson, I have revered your music and your talent since childhood. I take my hat off to you! You were never alone, and will be sorely missed. Truly the King of Pop above all else. Rest in peace.


Edit 26th of June 2009:
It was confirmed half past midnight Norwegian time that the King of Pop has left us. He got full front pages in Norwegian newspapers today, a lot of airtime across the radio spectre, and millions of tweets around the world. If you live in Oslo, Norway, please consider teaming up with the MJOAI website that announced a commemorative event in Youngstorget at three o'clock (15:00) on Saturday 27th, to honor the musician, genius and human being Michael Jackson. Sadly I'm vacating up north until Monday evening so you won't find me there.

I just found this little news item in the online CD shelves:

1. Summertime/Burma-shave (Live) 
2. Annie Back In Town/I Wish I Was Innew Orleans/Ain't Gonna Rain (Live) 
3. A Sweet Little Bullet From A Prett Blue Gun (Live) 
4. On The Nickel (Live) 
5. Romeo Is Bleeding (Live) 
6. Silent Night/Christmas Card From Ahooker In Minneapolis (Live) 
7. Small Change/Hey, Big Spender/Smal Change (Reprise) (Live) 

The songs are recorded at a live concert in Austin 1978, a great period in Waits' career. We've heard the songs and recordings before, but I prefer a jewel case rather than a battered mp3 player any day. Please note that it is released by the Phantom Sound & Vision label, so who knows whether Waits get a taste of it.. Anyway. I ordered it right away, along with The Spirit of Apollo by N.A.S.A which features 1 track with Waits as Koew reported back in November.

After the concert review I wrote of Mr. I'll be a gecko himself, Bob Dylan, it might surprise you that I actually went ahead and put off time today to get his latest album, the Together Through Life installment of his troublesome biographical trilogy.

But you shouldn't be surprised. I wasn't.

The album is a swinging blues canapé, and if there's anything I like more than dinos fried in baby oil, it's the long pointy finger of a know-it-all blues singer spilling his guts on the wet pavement of black rock music. We have mister Waits, some Young, a little Cohen to mention a few, and when I heard some cuts from Dylan's new album on the radio this morning it felt like a natural addition to me record collection. It's not as hard as could be, but it is definitely a few favourites in there, some good beer party tunes, and hearing through it now I've got no doubt that I'll listen to it again pretty soon.

There are absolutely no geckos on this record, however, so if you really like the geckos and absolutely can't live without them, go to one of his concerts.

Yesterday we went to see Bob Dylan on his Neverending Tour. Me and Kornelius saw him on the same tour back in 2005. I complained about the sound then and I will complain about it now. The sound is crap. Oslo Spektrum was made for hockey games and horse riding, not music. With a better concert hall and a brand new opera readily available within the city limits, I think it's only the amount of people you can cram into there which makes mr. Dylan or his managers choose it. Whoever did it, it's a Bad Choice.

I am not a great fan of Dylan, but I like some of his songs, and I think the recent Dylan concerts are a bit out of my league. When reading the paper today I read a review of the same concert without feeling we'd watched the same thing. I've seen Waits, Reed, Young, Springsteen and several other world stars who make great music, and even a sixty something drug recovering Lou Reed had more of a performance than Bob Dylan did yesterday. I'm not saying you have to be Elvis or something. Elvis is dead. You just need to connect with your audience. The Neverending Tour could just have been a cassette player shipped from one country to another. He came, he played, he left. And this is what he played:

1. Watching the River Flow 
2. When I paint my Masterpiece 
3. You ain't going nowhere 
4. It's all right ma, I'm only bleeding 
5. Just like a woman 
6. Stuck inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again 
7. Ballad of a Thin Man 
8. I don't believe you (she acts like we never have met) 
9. The Levee's Gonna Break 
10. When the deal goes down 
11. Highway 61 Revisited 
12. A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall 
13. Thunder On the Mountain 
14. Like a Rolling Stone 
15. ENCORE: All Along the Watchtower 
16. ENCORE: Spirit on the Water 
17. ENCORE: Blowin' In the Wind 

.. A great set list I'd say, of which I recognized three songs! That's right. "Just Like a Woman", "Like a Rolling Stone" and "All Along the Watchtower". That's the same number of songs I was able to recognize back in 2005. Dylan is an experimental artist and likes to rearrange his songs. I knew what I was going to but Lady C and Koew, however, were not impressed. C felt angry and abused, while Koew was overly drunk from the trauma. The Army Dude just sat in the bar while the mysterious mr. S seemed completely passive. I have great respect for Dylan's talent, and with regards to that respect I can't force anyone to go to a concert with less expectations just because the artist's name's Bob Dylan. A couple of guys seated next to C had a slice of pizza each and fell asleep. And they stayed asleep until the encore. It's hard to get the right atmosphere when you hear Dylan singing:

Something is happening
and I don't know what it is..
I'll be a gecko!

I don't know whether this is Dylan's singing, the shortcomings of Spektrum or both.


Oh my God, he's full of stars!


Like a Rolling Stone.. Bob kept to the organ for all songs minus one!


It was sold out! Here's 8000 people leaving after a neverending concert:)

I didn't take any audio or video because I do have respect for the man. Let's keep it real for a minute, and not be a complete gecko. The reviewer in Dagbladet, Wandrup, writes that Dylan's singing is: "deep and crooner-ish while he [Dylan] on several of the other songs do a staccato-like form of timing and recital." That's a very nice way of putting it. When you take away the over-the-top analysis the rest of us hears an old man blabbering, with a hint of Tourette syndrome, in the beautiful musical voice of Elmer Fudd.

That's the elephant in the room here. Dylan can't sing if his life depended on it.

He's very good at singing his own lyrics though, on the albums and mp3s that I've got. They must have been around take fifty. However, I must agree with Wandrup when he says that Dylan's organ playing reveals a lot of musical humor, because his small almost childish intermittent plays put a smile on my face. All in all it was a good experience, but not a great show. If you want to see the man, go to a concert. If you want to listen to the music, buy the album instead. You won't hear the song unless you already know it by heart. And avoid Spektrum to the extent that you can. That way there's no injustice done to Dylan's excellent poetry and style.

My old pal Kornelius just sent me a PM about Cohen's live performance at the Beacon Theatre in New York City, which was recorded by NPR. The recording is now available for online streaming, just like they did with Tom Wait's Glitter And Doom concert in Atlanta GA which is also available as an mp3 "album" at the pirate bay (just like right over here). I just want to express my thanks to the NPR for doing this, because the kind of audio equipment you need for a good recording is kind of hard to carry into a concert hall:)

Link of the day: Leonard Cohen live @ the Beacon Theatre NYC (stream)

.. I must admit I read the Bacon Theatre but that's just because I'm hungry.

Me, Kornelius, Apoet, Koew, Lady C, Lady C's mother, my own mother, my sister, the mysterious mr. S and around 12,991 others saw Cohen live @ Bislet Stadium 1st of July 2008. It was a great concert, and if you want to see the pictures or videos I took just head over to post #1255. Now I have more audio to grab when I get home:)

Kaada's new album Junkyard Nostalgias is up for sale, and they only have a few copies of the limited edition left. Handfolded by Polish workers.

Head over to kaada.no/shop to grab your copy!

UPCOMING SHOWS (W/KAADA ORKESTER)
Mar 26 Lyngdal Kulturhus
Mar 27 Sandnes Kulturhus
Mar 28 Bergen, Hulen
Apr 02 Drammens Teater
Apr 17 Oslo, Parkteatret
Apr 18 Nøtterøy Kulturhus
Apr 19 Kristiansand, Kickscene
Apr 22 Blå Grotte Fredrikstad
Apr 23 Stryn Kulturhus
Apr 24 Rokken, Volda
Apr 25 Blæst, Trondheim
Apr 26 Oppdal Kulturhus

The mixtape is available from Good Shit Radio or simply by clicking the picture below (bundled into a zip file).



Militant backstreet musicians of Oslo, Alarm Clock Connection, reports:

We will be releasing a new mixtape with good shit each month in 2009, named after the classic Mad Magazine series character sharing name with our DJ.

Good Shit Radio recently celebrated their 10th Anniversary. Happy b-day!

This morning I received a newsletter from Kaada's delivery boy:

We want to give you a little tease of the upcoming NEW ALBUM "Junkyard Nostalgias", so we've uploaded two songs to myspace.com/kaada. Give us some feedback in the comments-board and let us know if you like it or if you think it sucks.

According to KAADA it is 11 compositions to salute to the Polish working man coming to Norway to help us out. The principal objective of the album is to pay homage to these brave and determined men.

The album is due for release February 23rd and allegedly contains "11 Pre-Apocalypse Junkyard Symphonies Nostalgias for the Polish Workingclass Heros Coming to Norway for Work". From the tunes I've just heard the album seem to fit in with the soundscape of the two last Kaada albums I bought, namely O'Horten and Natural Born Star which offers calm electronica tainted by the rust of acoustic industrial instruments that orchestrates a romantic, fantasy-like atmosphere. I could only find two tracks so I can't judge whether the social-realistic title has anything to do with the music. I really hope they have some lively tracks in the spirit of Bregovic which is something I've wanted to hear from them since I saw Underground; but I know from experience that we can expect a lot from the album, be it true to the topic or not. (Not that Underground has anything to do with Polish work migration.) Good listening.

While we are all waiting for George W. Bush to get the hell out of the White House, Alarmclock Connection member Don Martin compiled a retirement mixtape for the Bush Family.

We thought it would be too bad if the Bush Family did not get a proper retirement gift after all the hard work they have done to bring on the apocalypse in our time. So this is our Goodbye and Fuck You Very Much to the Bush Family.

You can download the entire mixtape as MP3 files or stream it.

BushKiller Style Mixtape: Download as mp3 (zipped) or listen to podcast online

1. Goodshit Radio Dot Com Intro feat Poizunus / Chris Morris´ Bushwhacke 
2. Jemini and Danger Mouse - Bush Boys 
3. Paris - Bushkiller (intro) 
4. DJ Green Lantern feat. dead prez, Saigon, Immortal Technique & Just Blaze - Impeach The President 
5. The Legendary KO - George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People 
6. Dark Circle - Smokin Bush 
7. Dead Prez - Know Your Enemy 
8. Akir - Politricks 
9. Louis Logic - The Ugly Truth 
10. Emanon - Politician 
11. Looptroop feat Timbuktu & Chords - Hurricane George 
12. Mr SOS - Arrest the president 
13. Gatas Parlament feat Promoe & Per V - Antiamerikansk Skandinavisk Dans / Postkort 
14. Immortal Technique feat Diabolic & Ras Kass - Payback 
15. Bushkiller - Bushkiller Draw 
16. Paris - Bush Killer (Hellraiser Remix) 

Yep, it's the same guys who started KillHim.nu (shut down by the Norwegian government) which was a "non-religious movement collecting money for a bounty on Bush's head." Gatas Parlament (Parliament of the Streets), the backbone of Alarmclock Connection, will release their new album Apocalypso this weekend.

In 2004 they were prosecuted for Death Threats Against a Foreign Head of State by American Secret Service in Norway and the Norwegian equivalent PST, and now they're back! The mixtape is in English (and some in German?) so please spread the propaganda.

I promised some friends I would inform them with regards to the 9th of October 2008 Tom Waits release, and since I couldn't find the track list online I thought I'd just chuck it up here.

1. Spare Parts 
2. Invitation to the blues 
3. Depot, Depot 
4. The Piano has been drinking 
5. Pasties and a G-String 
6. Step right up 
7. Semi Suite 
8. Fumblin' with the Blues 
9. Midnight Lullaby 
10. Emotional Weather Report 
11. I can't Wait to get off work 
12. New Cort of Paint 
13. Nobody but you 
14. Diamonds on my windshield 
15. Everytime I hear this melody 
16. The one that got away 

Number twelve is written just like that on the cover. The record features the ol' man hisself in the pre-Jesus years, recorded on world tour 1977, Frank Vicari on tenor saxophone, Dr. Fitzgerald on Jenkins bass and Chip White on the drums. It's released by Woodstock tapes. God bless.

Since Pata Pata in 1977, the African singer Miriam Makeba has been known as "Mama Africa" due to her struggle against the Apartheid and for Africans' rights. I had the honor of enjoying her music live when I still lived in the North. She died last night, age 76, after she had had a heart attack on stage. Befitting her life and personality, she died during a performance supporting the fight against the Italian mafia. RIP.

My bruvva just tipped me off about a new rap release from NASA featuring none other than Tom Waits. It definitely adds some serious testosterone to the tune. Click the pic below to stream (note: you won't find Tom Waits in the picture).


Alternatively, click the link to Koew above to download it!
As Pitchforkmedia writes: It's well worth a listen even if just to hear Waits utter the words "ghetto booty."

My brother just posted a "last three CDs I ordered" so why not update my sublet mortgage crisis credit frenzy?

• Michael Brecker - Tales from the Hudson 
• John Coltrane - Live at the Village Vanguard 
• Mercury Rev - All is Dream 
• Mercury Rev - Snowflake Midnight 
• Mercury Rev - Strange Attractor (click for free download) 
• Sun Ra and His Astro Intergalactic Infinity Arkestra - Space is the Place 
• Fat Boy Slim - You've come a long way, baby 
• Fugees - The Score 
• Lou Reed - The Raven 
• Depeche Mode - The Best Of, vol. 1