Anyone who's ever been to Coachella knows that FILTER throws the hottest party in the desert every single year, and last night's bash was no exception! We teamed up with the good folks at Toyota Antics to throw our 8th annual Coachella kick-off party, and it was certainly one for the books.
Over 1200 party people, music makers, industry elite and DJ talent swarmed our locale in beautiful Indio to take in DJ sets by Jokers of the Scene, Micachu & The Shapes, Afghan Raiders (We're not DJ's), Kid Color, Hesta Prynn, and Kid Lightning vs. Them Jeans. Oh and did we mention that DEVO honored us as special secret guest DJs?
With unbeatable views and party cabanas a-plenty, our guests were kept entertained with multiple dance floors, a K-Swiss ping-pong classic, live screenprinting by H&R, free haircuts from the stylish folks at Rudy's Barbershop, live installation art by the Dethkills crew, Rock Band & photobooths from Toyota Antics, gifting by Jansport, and of course plenty of free-flowing beverages from our friends at Mike's Hard Punch.
Special thanks to all of our friends and fans who joined us, the wonderful talents who DJ'd the night away, all of the sponsors who helped make the night such a resounding success, and of course to Devo for providing the surprise of a lifetime.
Check out a few photos below, courtesy of the amazing Graham John Bell, and find a full gallery at facebook.com/FILTERmagazine. Enjoy the festival this weekend, and we'll see you next year.
Oh, Miami, how you spoil us. Every year it's the same: after a week of solar-powered debauchery, most of us head back home, sunburns peeling, and begin counting down the days until our next chance to dance in the open air.
But what better time to start getting one's crate ready for the balmy days and nights ahead? To that end, we've racked our brains and our hard drives to come up with 100 essential tracks for spring. We've created 10 charts to suit a variety of moods, styles, and themes, from progressive anthems to Balearic bliss-out.
This week's Album of the Week wasn't selected specifically with meteorological conditions in mind. But — apologies to anyone stuck in an airport right now — Chloé's 'One in Other' turns out to be the perfect soundtrack for the gigantic cloud of volcanic ash that's throwing its shadow across Northern Europe.
'One in Other' picks up where the Parisian DJ/producer's 2007 album 'The Waiting Room' left off, with creepy-crawly 4/4 beats suffused in a murk of analog synthesizers and electric guitars. It's a droning, swirling sound at once intimate and alien.
Left behind from Coachella? Drown your sorrows with MEAT. That's what I say. Well, it's not usually my mantra of choice, but for the purposes of today, it'll work.
Sure, partiers in the desert have Thom Yorke, LCD Soundsystem, Pavement, Phoenix, Muse, Grizzly Bear, and Jay-Z (sorry, I have to stop there for fear of crying), but we have the only food known to make This Is Why You're Fat blush: the modern day monstrosity known as the KFC Double Down.
For the small price of your health (just 540 calories, 32gs of fat, and 1380mgs of sodium), you too can enjoy the product that "is so meaty, there's no room for a bun!" Being left behind from Coachella seemed like the perfect opportunity to take the plunge, so that's just what we did in the New York office today.
In two separate Orders today, the FCC issued monetary forfeitures against a cable operator for failure to install Emergency Alert System (EAS) equipment and for various tower violations. These same violations could have been cited against a broadcaster, so these cases are instructive to both broadcasters and cable operators. The FCC issued monetary forfeitures of $20,000 and $18,000 against two Texas cable systems owned by the same company. In both cases, the cable operator failed to install EAS equipment, failed to notify the FAA of a tower lighting outage and failed to exhibit red obstruction tower lighting from sunset to sunrise. The higher fine related to a system's failure to display a tower's Antenna Structure Registration (ASR) number "in a conspicuous place so that it is readily visible near the base of the antenna structure."
These same requirements apply equally to broadcast stations that have their own towers. While most broadcasters are aware of the requirement to maintain working EAS equipment, many may not know that FCC rules require a tower's ASR to be conspicuously displayed at the base of the tower. To be compliant, the ASR must be displayed on a weather-resistant surface and of sufficient size to be easily seen at the base of the tower.
Similarly, if tower lighting is required, FCC rules require that any outage be reported "immediately" to the FAA if it cannot be fixed within 30 minutes. Red obstruction lighting is required to be operational from sunset to sunrise, while high and medium intensity obstruction lighting is required to be operational 24 hours a day.
These are important issues to which both broadcasters and cable operators need to stay alert to avoid big fines like those imposed here. As they potentially involve matters of public safety, the FCC is not likely to be forgiving in the event of violations.
Luciano's high profile Cadenza label has always served the needs of vinyl purists ahead of digital DJs, with releases often coming out on wax months ahead of digital.
But with the launch of Luciano's new digital only imprint, Cadenza Lab, it is digital DJs who will get their hands on the producer's work, and the work of Cadenza artists such as Reboot, Ricardo Villalobs, Thomas Melchior, and Loco Dice, before anyone else.
The Quietus' Angus Finlayson attends the duo's recent gig in an East London warehouse and dips in and out of philosopher Alva Noe's Experience and Experiment in Art paper to try and answer the question.
- After the release of their debut album After Robots, Johannesburg-based BLK JKS are ready to strike again with the release of their upcoming EP, Zol! on June 8, 2010 on Secretly Canadian.
- The album starts off with “Iietys,” a solid progressive rock number that will remind you of The Mars Volta.
- In “Bogobe,” the band becomes more experimental, giving an eerie touch before slowly evolving to space-rock throughout the rest of the track.
- The title-track “Zol!” showcases the band pimping themselves for the World Cup anthem, loaded with Kwaito, Afro-pop beat and choir chants.
Key Tracks
“Bogobe,” “Zol!” and “Paradise”
Predictions
Now that the world is shifting its direction towards South Africa and the FIFA World Cup, it seems like just the right time for the band to release this EP to complement the most celebrated sports event in the world.
Or at least that’s the conclusion you might reach after watching a new Japanese campaign for Nike’s Free Run+ running shoes. Apparently wishing to tout the bendable qualities of its new footwear, Nike enlisted sound artists to transform its product into a musical instrument. The shoes get plugged in, switched on, and mixed up, battle-style, as they sense when the shoe is flexed or moved in space. And yes, everything you see in the video is real: the shoes really are controlling digital sound live. We even have the Max patch to prove it.
Lovers of experimental sound art will immediately recognize one of the Shoe-Js: it’s Daito Manabe, a bleeding-edge sound artist and alternative interface guru with a background in turntablism. I spoke to Daito, and convinced him to share the software that makes the project tick. Daito says he used flex sensors (see examples) and accelerometers to make the shoes interactive. He then processed the control signal and converted it to sound using the modular visual programming environment Max/MSP and Ableton’s Max for Live. (For another example and other resources, you can check out the article I wrote for Make Magazine issue 8, in which I stuffed flex sensors into a sock monkey and connected it via MIDI.)
What’s striking to me about the Max patch is its elegance. For all the power of these interactive environments, sometimes they’re at the best when you do something really simple. In this case, that frees up someone like Daito to focus on the performance aspect.
Screen captures from Ableton Live, Max/MSP courtesy the artist. Click for larger versions.
Here’s what Daito had to say about the project. It doesn’t hurt that the whole team does such nice work:
My patch is not interesting at all.. Ed.: I respectfully disagree; see above comment – sometimes performing a simple task is the strength of a tool like Max. -PK
I used max for serial communication between the shoes(arduino) and a macbookpro,
and max for live sound.
The serial part crashed many times,
so I separated serial part and sound part.
I use OSC and midi for communication between max and maxforlive.
For making and triggering sound,
I used simple msp patches and Ableton’s sampler
and I used some effects in Ableton live.
The effects are also controlled by the shoes.
The sound settings are a bit strange.
We didn’t need to use a loop machine
because we used Ableton live, but
everything was decided at the last minute,
so we used the loop machine for sampling and looping (i think it was roland machine)
I hope people think it is not fake :)
I actually like the impromptu feel. That’s usually the sort of thing the advertisers want. (Oh, look! An abandoned tunnel! Open the vodka! Text your friends! Let’s have a disco! Wow, everyone we know is a model!) Of course, in this case, some of the sense of “let’s set up some shoes and make digital music” is just as improvised as it looks. And this clip is making the rounds, because my Dad sent it to me!
Be sure to check out Daito’s other work; he’s done some really beautiful sound art and interactive pieces, and his site is full of inspiring ideas: http://www.daito.ws/#5
Signal flow for the Nike musical shoes.
An interview with Daito from a few years ago for Max/MSP developer Cycling ‘74 reveals some of his background in turntablism.
Delivered... Johnny | Scene | Fri 16 Apr 2010 1:36 pm
Those of you who have uploaded a mix on Let’s mix recently, might have already noticed, but for everyone else: We’ve launched a great little new feature – mix transfer!
If you want to publish a mix on Let’s mix which you have already uploaded on another platform, simply copy the URL to the mix, log in, go to the upload section and paste the URL into the “File URL” box. The mix will transfer to Let’s mix, and meanwhile you can fill in details and tracklist. Done!
Please note that the mix file needs to be in mp3 format and downloadable/not password protected on the platform you wish to transfer the mix from.
Delivered... Johnny | Scene | Fri 16 Apr 2010 1:18 pm
Since his first DJ gig on a West London pirate radio station in the mid 90’s, Asad Rizvi has played in clubs across five continents, including Fabric and The End (London), Pacha (Buenos Aires), Stereo (Montreal), Folies Pigales (Paris), Roxy & Mecca (Prague) and Crystal (Istanbul). His signature sound – underground house with a quirky twist – is evident in this mix, recorded live at Fabric London recently.
Cheeky French trio dOP have pulled off a major coup and will release the sixth installment of Watergate’s mix series. The group now stands shoulder to shoulder with previous mixers KonradBlack, SeboK, EllenAllien and OnurÖzer.
Constant suppliers of party shenanigans, dOP have cultivated a reputation for bouncing and playful parties. They’re last outing in January achieved cult status with fellow friends Nôze, Kalabrese, M.in, and Zander VT and was the talked about for quite sometime.
In the unlikely event you are unfamiliar with the group, “tThis mix should show how we make music, both alone and with friends or people that inspire us. Watergate gave us the opportunity to create our first mix CD, so we wanted to make it something special. We invited artists that we’re friends with to come work on songs with us, and we then used those songs for the mix.”
Maintaining their French touch, dOP will feature 12 unreleased tracks of their genre defying sound and will wet your appetite before the debut album, which will be released later in 2010.
Tracklist
01. Enliven dOP Acoustic – The Dust (Recorded Live at Watergate)
02. dOP & Nôze – Les Fils du Calvaire
03. Aquarius Heaven & dOP – Before You Go
04. Daniele Papini & dOP – Carte Blanche
05. dOP & Seuil – New York
06. dOP – Stock Option (Tiefschwarz Remix)
07. Mathias Kaden & dOP – The Ceremony
08. Seuil & dOP – Glory Hole
09. Catz & Dogz & dOP – Deaf Wagrant (Selianka Edit)
10. Wareika & dOP – Play Play Play
11. Art of Tones feat. Jaw – Call The Shots (Motor City Drum Ensemble Remix)
12. Khan – Candy Girl (dOP Remix)
13. dOP – Goodbye
Watergate will release dOP’s Watergate 06 on June 7, 2010.
In music videos, there has always been something of a race to the bottom. Sex sells, and directors pay very close attention to the guidelines broadcasters dictate. What's the most amount of nakedness we can squeeze into three minutes before the watershed?
For the most part, the addition of gyrating booties and shapely midriffs to a track that has nothing to do with sex seems mightily contrived, at least to those not watching. The music channels' under-18, mainly male, demographic of course, absolutely loves it. It's why they're watching in the first place.
