Our good friends over @ Remixin are sponsoring a Johnny Fiasco remix competition. If you're a fan of this Chicago House music legend, then check out the full contest details at: http://www.remixin.com/contests/fiasco

Sadly, tonight is Perla's last gig in San Francisco before he peaces-out back to Sevilla next week. I'm reposting the flyer & email-blurb for Faktion @ Anu tonight.

WHO:: Perla :: STML :: Disconnect
WHAT:: Faktion
WHEN:: 6.26.9 9PM-2AM PST
WHERE:: ANU @ 46 6th ST. SF and Live Online:: http://radio.defsf.com:1200
WHY:: Faktion again brings you some of the best trueschool techno from some
of the best in the bay to SF and beyond. We are coming together to bid a
fond farewell to our friend and one of the best techno producers the bay has
seen in quite some time, Perla. Juan Valverde's, aka Perla's, work has been
recently featured on Bay Area imprints Auralism records (http://www.auralismrecords.com/artists/perla.html) and Ruoho Ruotsi's
de'fchild records (http://www.defchild.com/releases.php?id=dcp011). We are
sad to see him return to his native Spain, but it is not like us here at
Faktion to be sad, instead to celebrate our existence while we may. So
please joins us for one last hurrah for our compatriot Perla and also his
lovely wife Isabel. They will surely be missed.

Also in full support will be Faktion Rezzies and DEF Heads STML and
Disconnect.

Chunky Move's Mortal Engine (Australia) is an amazing multi-media work fusing modern dance, laser & "live" motion tracking video. The results are simply stunning. All I have seen are these videos. I imagine the live perforamance would be be mind-blowing!!

Related Video & Posts:
Networked Performance blog post
Youtube video

Ahh les Français ... These chaps have certainly taken nice images of a Detroit in ruins, but are they tolling the death knell prematurely? While documenting a post-industrial, quasi-post-apocalyptic city in decay, with nary a soul in view, I feel that they give a manifestly one-sided view of Detroit. Disclaimer: I have family in Detroit & visit regularly.

• The Ruins of Detroit by Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre Photography
  
• Detroit's Beautiful, Horrible Decline, Time Magazine Slideshow

After you look at these photos and are feeling rather dejected, don't forget that that is just one perspective. To check out what's happening in the Motor City from another perspective surf over to CurrentTV and check out this video & interview with the Underground Resistance crew, in their swanky record shop, with polished hardwood floors! ... There ain't nothing decrepit about it!

Detroit's Underground Resistance

Our newest artist, Perla has recorded a new Live PA set, featuring material from Casasviejas and new unreleased goodies!

Here's a direct link to the set (181 MB @ 299 kbps, 85 minutes): [MP3]

It is also up on the mixsets page. Enjoy!

New musica by Rift is now out on Thoughtless Music (Toronto), featuring a remix by Ruoho Ruotsi. More information on the official annoucement. Musica is available on Beatport. Enjoy!

Promo Blurb:
... Finally, def'child's Ruoho Ruotsi takes the aquatic elements of the original to their logical conclusion, dub-heavy bass anchoring a tide of sparkling sine waves and analog bubbles. Take a deep breath, and dive - into the thoughtless Rift...

de'fchild productions presents “Afternoon Delighting” (DCP012), a new 4-track EP by Ruoho Ruotsi. The vinyl record is shipping today. The record is available from our US distributors, Crosstalk International in Chicago and internationally via Discomania in the U.K.

Digital versions are available on Beatport, Juno, iTunes, dancetracks, Zero-Inch, Emusic and DanceRecords. More information and sounds are on the release page.

Thanks to Ron for the visual inspiration for the artwork and to Man Pikin for the mad photoshop skills. The high-rez label & jacket artwork is on our flickr page.

Below we've embedded a time-lapse music video that looks at creative process that went into the artwork for this release. It is also linked up our videos page. Enjoy!

The Making of Artwork for "Afternoon Delighting"

The Promotional Blurb:

Ruoho Ruotsi presents his fifth 12" with a four-tracker entitled Afternoon Delighting. Drawing conceptual and lyrical inspiration from the “Chanson d'Après-midi” by Charles Baudelaire (and others from the collection Les Fleurs du Mal), each piece ruminates on the myriad shades of grey between the poles of bitter & sweet, friendship & enmity, sacred & profane love.

Showcasing his affection for dub-influenced production and inter-wreathed textural deployments, Ruoho Ruotsi uses these elements as a compositonal base upon he builds and intertwines an assortment of sonic leitmotifs, invoking on one hand the imagery of wistfulness and bygone intimacy and on the other a capricious and whimsical pneuma.

Presenting an end-of-year mix of faves, that I quickly cobbled together last week in the waning days of 2008. Everything except DJ T.'s Re-Heated mix were fresh in 2008, with a slant to tracks that came out in the last 3 months.

Here's a direct link to the set (143 MB @ 256 kbps, 77 minutes): [MP3]

Enjoy!

Zero" is relative newcomer in the rapidly changing online music marketplace. A couple of months ago, we stumbled on their site by accident. So we sent them an email introducing ourselves and thanks to our distribution via IRIS and their appreciation of our catalogue, a couple months onward, our entire catalogue is now online @ zero-inch.com.

Browsing their site, one immediately notices their attention to detail, this is especially evident in the curated feel one has while browsing for new music. Their fuzzy search makes it sooo much simpler than Beatport/KompaktMP3 to find the artist, song titles or label names without having to click a separate dropdown! I mean we're in the age of Google, fuzzy search like should be the standard, not the exception!!!

However, the feature that takes the cake is the tab on CITIES! Yes, cities! So rather than surf based on a priori knowledge of the music you want to buy, look at DJ charts or otherwise emmerde yourself with so-called features that don't help you manage the data-overload. On the cities tab, you can browse cities around the world, for artists and labels, local to that city! We often talk about music scenes, movements past and present from Detroit, Chicago, NYC, London, Berlin, etc.

So I'm very excited about Zero" and even more excited at the smart way they're slicing up data that is already there, to provide a more accessible and natural way of finding new music! Bravo!

This article in the Times Online (UK) presents an interesting discussion on the Long Tail theory. The article claims that the sheer amount of unsold songs available online, shows that the promise of the Long Tail is not being realized.

Upon a closer look at the data, and a scan of the comments, it is clear that in terms of percentages (which is fairly course grained) that the tail based on the available data is not particularly long in comparison to the total amount available material. True. However, the sheer number (we're talking 10s of 1000s) of additional albums, EPs and singles being sold, that otherwise wouldn't be even stocked in your HMV, Virgin or Sam Goody's points to the Long Tail theory is action!

Additionally as has already been pointed out, its perhaps a bit early to be drawing long term or final conclusions as the marketplace is barely nascent!

Full Article @ the timesonline.co.uk