enuui.org - ambient & dub excursions into the upper plateau

What's been happening lately? I've finally got the final track of my album done, which is great, after not been producing much in the last month, apart from some really sketchy ideas. It's a pure ambient journey that represents what I imagine to be the morning after a Chimbre experience. Chimbre being a spiritual retreat in the Peruvian rainforest. It only has just been established but still has provided some excellent scenery to some heavy psychotheraputic work for many individuals. Check it out at chimbre.com!

So you can have a quick listen (well quick being 15 minutes) to the track on my Soundcloud - http://soundcloud.com/el-cubist/enuui-chimbre-feat-mauxuam-greg-hunter

This track is a collaborative track with Mauxuam and Greg Hunter, who if you've been reading some of my earlier posts are Cloudcycle. I have a bunch of samples I got off them and have tried making a few tracks, but they just haven't cut it. This one though is more fitting towards a halfway point between my sound and their sound.

Also I am in the process of creating a Sufi-esque Persian piece of ambient drum and bass for the experimental noise/jazz/drumfunk d'n'b label Pinecone Moonshine. Nic TVG, the label boss, has been a good friend for many years back when I was running Exegene, and I'm glad to be now working on something for his wicked label, which has some great artists on like Macc, dgoHn, Fanu, Jiva, Ibunshi, Parallel, Eschaton, and of course Nic TVG himself.

Also looking forward to seeing Hallucinogen live, Shpongle DJ set, and Eat Static live in London in a couple of weeks, as well as seeing the African Soul Rebels tour in Manchester with Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou, Oumou Sangaré, and the Kalahari Surfers.

This might just be contender for podcast of the year, even though its still January. Greg Hunter's nailed a sound that he puts it best , a soundtrack for a 'taxi ride to Cairo via Hyderabad'. So clean the Saharan dust out yer ears, and tune in to some exquisite Persian electronica.

Tracklisting:

oum kalsoum
rayo el 7abib
bahauddin dagar
egyptian folk beladi
cheb khaled
nusrat fateh ali khan – mustt mustt
assala
ethiopian vox + tipper
naa jeney bhool bujhona
persian clouds
shereen
divine thread
jannat_Menn
dubsahara – zentropy
wild marmalade – air (featuring avishai)

made in ableton live

for Abd Sattar

Now if I could only get the Soundcloud player to embed I'd have it here. But it doesn't work, so you're going to have to get your trigger finger to click either:

http://soundcloud.com/dubsahara/luxor-8 To Stream

or visit Greg's website - dubsahara.com where you can stream and download if you register.

I'll see if I can get permission to rehost.

Enjoy!

Sorry on the lack of updates, but its been worth it. I'm one track away from completing my album - 'Mindstate Disposition'. It's an hour of ethno-ambient works. There's a few drums here and there, but not many. Lots of meditative drones with Indian instrumentation weaved in and out. It's mainly inspired by Youth's 'Catching Fire From A Distance' album.

I've decided to let you own mp3's of it for free. Donation of your choice for flac/wav. Also looking at getting it pressed on CompactStick. A CD sized case with art, but where the CD should be is a USB stick, which I can have the high quality music, a collection of art, videos, text, and bonus mixes. Not sure when I'll be able to get this out, hopefully by February. This I'll sell for minimum unit price + p&p + £5 donation to amazonwatch.org, so I guess it'll roughly be £10.

Anyway, I have some artwork coming for it. It'll be based around this:

Photo by Chris Evans.

Preview of the album & one free flac download of 'Slow Moving Thoughts' available on my Soundcloud. Check it here, http://soundcloud.com/el-cubist/sets/mindstate_disposition

Thanks for the support over this year!

A little post & heads up for the new Banco album (which arrived this morning, and is getting its full listen right now..... brilliant so far btw.)

I formed Banco de Gaia with Andy Guthrie back in 1989, that's 20 years ago in case you didn't work it out, so it seems appropriate to do something in an anniversary mood. (No, I'm not buying Andy a ring). The new album is in effect that something, a kind of 20 year retrospective with a difference.

The title, as revealed previously, is "Memories Dreams Reflections" and the music can be broken up into three sections. Oh, and it's a double CD for those of you who still buy such things, or a damned big download.

Disc 1 begins with the 'Reflections' bit. This is a selection of cover versions of tunes which hugely inspired and influenced me in my formative years. To be precise it is a full length version of "Echoes" by Pink Floyd (that's 22 minutes), "Starless" by King Crimson and, as some of you may have worked out from recent live shows, "Spirit Of The Age" by Hawkwind.

The rest of Disc 1 is the 'Dreams'. These are reworkings of early Banco tunes which will be familiar to anyone who knows the original cassette albums but mostly unknown apart from that. Ranging from faithful recreation to extreme reworking, the tracks are "Soufie", "Tempra" and "Terra Om".

Disc 2 brings the 'Memories'. It's a 78 minute selection of live recordings taken from over the years and including early solo Banco rave anthems, through the 5-piece live band of the mid/late-90s and continuing on into the 'Toby and Ted' years up to the current live video show (without the video obviously, this is an audio CD).

So, getting on for two and a half hours of music, hope that makes up for the wait.

So head over to banco.co.uk to order! Very reasonably priced and impeccable delivery.

Finally I got these done. Took a lot of tweaking and took a lot more effort to stop tweaking!

If you'd like to download them, then just right click and 'Save target as..' here to download a zip of both tunes and some artwork.

Our good mates at Beatplexity mix archive have a load of Mixmaster Morris mixes uploaded. Some new from this year and last year, when he started playing at the inSpiral Lounge in London, as well as some of the older Solid Steel radio shows he did for Ninja Tune.

Click here to go the mixes

I've still got to grab a few of them myself, theres 24 uploaded on Beatplexity. So when this weather brightens up will have a good old sunsoaked listen to as many as I can, and will re-host some of my favourite ones, and attempt to hunt down the tracklistings.

The Irresistable Force on Myspace

I came across this earlier on Soundcloud. Some familiar names to me in the tracklist but quite a few I don't know of, and it's quite mindblowing stuff. Really laidback vibes, with meaty basslines and ambient skanks. It's got loads of Indian instrumentation, which coupled with rootsy dub, spacial quirks, and blissful pads makes this mix a perfect journey for any time of day. So a big thanks to Indra for mixing this fine selection.. and here's some words & tracklist taken from her myspace.

::TRACKLIST::

INTRO:

I. Ross Daly – Hatif (played by Linsey Pollak) In Arabic, the word hatif refers to the spirits of dead poets who inhabit the desert and entice travellers with their song, causing them to lose their way. This piece was composed by Ross Daly and the haunting wind instrument heard in the beginning of the piece is none other than a small plastic watering pot converted into a musical instrument and played by Linsey Pollak.

II. Leon Danezos (Alcalica) on santoor

A very old instrument, the santoor is possibly the ancient Psalterion or Epigonio. Its name is possibly from the Persian santour or santir. Its shape is trapezoid, with a sound box of 4-5cm in length and measures 50-65cm in width or 100cm in length. On the top of the sound box, the strings are located in 2, 3 or 4th, tuned in tafto phonia. The bass strings are single. There are also two kavalli that divide the instrument into two parts. On the first part, the strings are tuned according to the diatonic scale; while on the other, the strings are tuned according to the chromatic scale.It has 100-140 strings and produces 30-32 notes. The high strings are made of bronze or steel, and the bass strings are made of copper. It has 7 contrabass strings with a range of 3 octaves. It starts from f-contrabass and ends in b. It is played by using two mallets that have thread or cotton at the end so they can produce a soft sound. It is an instrument of accompaniment. It is made of pine or walnut wood. In Greece, Tasos Diakogiorgis is a famous teacher and the best player of the santouri.

1. Manasseh presents Spectre - The Missing Dub
2. Secret Archives of Vatican - Caleb Dub (Uncle Riotous remix)
3. Secret Vibes - Don't Sleep (Dub)
4. Lunagroove - Salvation Dub
5. Vlastur – Cycladic Dub (unreleased)
6. Digital Smoke – Doudouk Dub (unreleased)
7. Guitoud - Get Up Fight (unreleased)
8. Naturelement - Duble Trouble (unreleased)
9. Deadbeat - Rock Of Ages (+ vocals: Butchaa MessenJah)
10. Sardinia Bass Legalize – Leaves
11. Digitalic Park - Ali La Pointe
12. Illumination – Brain Ball Noise (unreleased)
13. Pitch Black - Transient Transmission
14. Adham Shaikh - Micro Dreams
15. Gaudi - Night Watch
16. Pete Namlook & Gaudi - The Sun Won't Set

OUTRO:

I. Kristi Stassinopoulou – Waves

II. Leon Danezos (Alcalica) on santoor

This is a resident mix for Fluid Radio (www.fluid-radio.co.uk) dedicated to the mystic island Samothraki, Greece.

Special thanks for support and taking part to Nitty Dubby, Leon Danezos (alcalica.org), Butchaa MessenJah, Naturelement, Aiora, Vlastur, Sotokkan, Dj Looney...and to my friends Sotiris, Vassilis, Dimitrio, Froso, Kyriakos, Panos, Angeliki, Andrea, Katerina, Oso, Babina, Adonis, Panos, Athena Etana, Ihor, Mani, Nikos, Monia, Andrea... for divine moments on Samothraki.

Download either from here (Right click and save as) or Indra's soundcloud.

Picture from here. Click to go big.

I came across this interview with Don Peyote this week. If you've been checking out my mixes then you'll have heard his stuff. So it's about time we all knew more about the mysterious Aussie...

When did you start to take an interest in making music and who were your biggest influences?

I started making music in the late seventies, played guitar in funk/avant-garde band in Sydney, Australia. I was also involved in the production side of the studio recordings.....in those days big analog desks and great hardware Fx.... my biggest influence at the time :Bill Laswell, Brian Eno, Steve Roach, King Tubby, Pink Floyd & Miles Davis...... "My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts" album by David Byrne & Brian Eno had a profound effect on me, it was the first time i heard ethnic sampling mixed with funky beats. Still a favourite!

Which approach do you prefer when composing a track. Organic? Synthetic? Or a fusion of the two?

It often starts with a simple synthetic kind of back drop, drums & bass lines and then add live elements. I play guitar, bass and live percussion on my recordings and often enlist the help of maestro multi instrumentalist friend of mine Dan Richardson who plays all sorts of flutes (metal & bamboo) and also sax and trumpet. This gives the music a 'live' feel, a good blend of natural and synthetic mix and the unquantized human factor....

Do you find your music more popular in Australia or world-wide?

I would say world wide. I have sold a good amount of cd's overseas because the market for down tempo/ethno beats lovers is bigger abroad than here. Chill space at festivals is a relatively new thing at festivals here. So for a chilled music producer the opportunities to get exposure are a bit limited here....The aussies liked their music quite wild and banging...

You have worked in film and television soundtracks do you find this allows you to explore your tastes fully or is it more restrictive than making your own albums?

In producing your own album ,you are the decision maker ,you call the shots .you can be as indulgent as you like and explore to satisfy your heart content. With films and documentary your are dealing with the "director’, the film industry producers and directors can sometimes be very pedendic,difficult and cryptic individuals. A few years ago this 'nature/documentary' director hired me to do a soundtrack; the 'brief' was nature sounds and acoustic instruments, I plugged away for days and was happy with the result, sent a dat tape away.....A phone call later. The director was not too impressed with the result of my 3 days recording sessions and kept saying i want the music 'big and spacious' but was not able describe his vision further.... this process went on for weeks me sending him stuff and him still not happy and feeling just lukewarm about my musical offerings....An awkward situation.. So i said, can you play me some music, what you have in mind. He then managed to play me an extract from “river dance' the Irish musical over the phone....So i hired a fiddle player and a guitar picker and anything i sent to him from then on was approved with a big yes...So working for films & doco's is trial and error, a bit restrictive at times and can be an exercise in dealing with quite eccentric characters.... but it's all good. I feel blessed spending my time following my musical passion and getting hired & paid for it!

Which venues/festivals would you recommend to others?

In australia I'd recommend the 'Rainbow serpent" in rugged country Victoria and 'Exodus' in the lush sub-tropical settings of northern New South Wales. I did a small tour of Canada this year and 'Diversity' on texada island and 'Lasqueti escape' on lasqueti island were very friendly and much fun!!

Where can people hear and purchase your music?

My latest cd 'Peyote dreaming' is available to purchase on my web sites and my space: donpeyote.com & myspace.com/peyotesoundsystem

Interview from SunIsShining blogspot

I've added a low quality mp3 snippit of Don Peyote's 'In Habana' off the compilation 'Arcana' on Interchill Records. Check out the compilation because along with this Don Peyote track there's stuff from Eat Static, Zen Lemonade, Tripswitch, Kaya Project, & more.

This time is more slower, and more of an Indian vibe to it. Features a few tunes off the Butterfly Dawn compilation. Guaranteed chill.

Right Click and Save Target As It's 49mins long, 67mb big, and is a 192kbps mp3.

01. Nada - Earthgarden
02. Entheogenic - Pagan Dream Machine (Vibrasphere Remix)
03. I:Cube - Le Dub
04. Jam'n - Ghayange, Nachenge
05. Nada - Raja Mati
06. Kuba - Mura
07. Don Peyote - Song For Andre
08. Subkha - Equinox
09. The Kumba Mela Experiment - Interstellar Hiss - Sky Is On Fire Dub
10. Shpongle - Exhalation
11. Shpongle - Around The World In A Tea Daze (Ott Remix)

Picture by Biggins

Drop some words, let me know what you think.

Peace & Love.