blog to the oldskool

This track is more well known than what I normally post, but I’m sure a number of people who check this site who don’t know it. I actually had a super obscure track queued up to post, but was listening to it and decided I don’t even like it that much… Even though I do want to try to focus on lots of lesser known tracks here, a good tune is a good tune and obscurities-for-the-sake-of-obscurities get old after a while.

“Ruff Beats” is one of the bigger Phantasy & Gemini tracks, behind their classic “Never try the Hippodrome”. The chopped female vocal part 53 seconds in is undoubtbly one of my favorite hardcore melodies. This whole track, and more generally a lot of Liquid Wax stuff, reminds me what I like about oldskool hardcore to begin with: tunes which are catchy but also strange and mucked up in some way. No hands in the air piano style, just crazy jungle beats, tweaked melodies and catchy hiphop vocal cuts.

DJ Phantasy & DJ Gemini – Ruff Beats Producing Bass

Here’s a perfect example of a track which has grown on me purely from listening to a favorite mix over and over. In this case, the mix reponsible is the DJ Milf mix I posted here a while back. “Need a release” is pretty standard Noise Factory / Ibiza stuff – weird squelchy synths and dance vocals pitched to the sky (in this tune it’s the the S.O.S. Band “Finest” acapella, as used in Foul Play – Finest Illusion and Rufige Cru – Krisp Biscuit). Still, something about those shrieky vocals and weird synth parts gets it stuck in my head every time….

Noise Factory – Need a Release

Here’s something a little different for sunday… early/mid 90’s booty hiphop, which still has enough “oldskool” elements (heavy funky drummer breakbeat, acid bassline, reasonably fast tempo) to warrant me posting here. This track is also probably more obscure than anything else I’ve posted on this blog. There’s basically no info about its vinyl release on the net, discogs or otherwise. I ripped this from the cassette album, which is easier to find but sounds pretty bad (not sure if that’s the tape or the original song quality though).

British booty DJ DJ Guy was nice enough to fill me in on some info about his vinyl copy, which he dropped in a recent mix:

The 12″ has a white label with red text. “We Can Get Freaky (Won’t Nobody Tell)” is on the A-side and B-side has the amazingly awfully named “I Luv You Moms” which is crap. It’s on MDI Records with a catalog number of E.L.H. 1076 (the matrix on the record is ELH-1076). Executive Producer is Ed Harrison and both sides also say “Romie Oh!” under the track names – I don’t know what that means though.

Up until reading that, I wasn’t even sure this track had made it to vinyl. I’m still looking to buy the vinyl version if anyone ever finds a copy…email me!

NHB – we can get freaky

Here’s a clip of the song from the ever-amazing “New Dance Show”:

Also, here’s a sick mix by DJ Food that features the track

as mentioned in the comments today, I totally forgot about this EP.

The Raver’s Choice (Vibes + Wishdokta) – I want your body

And, my favorite MJ sampling record which I *don’t* own (but am always looking for a cheap copy of if anyone has a spare…)
D Livin’ – Why

But, it’s the first thing that popped in my and a few other people’s heads when hearing the news:

Obscure FM – Michael Jackson is In Heaven Now!

E’dam and Skuf are best known for Sensi / The More I Get, the More I Want. I also really like their “skratch the beat” release (which is easier to find than this EP and just as good), and featured it in a mix I posted a while back. Here’s a discography page containing all their productions as low bitrate but full track mp3s. This EP is a decent 4 tracker reminiscent of some of the lesser known Labello Blanco releases… kind of one of those releases that sounded more exciting from low fi clips than when I got the record itself, but still a decent record for sure.

The Skunk Club & The Herb Superb – Sandman Mix

As a record collector, I’ve occasionally run into situations where I hear a track and try to get an ID for it, only to find out it’s on a record I already own. I usually take this as a sign that I’m spending too much time searching for records to buy, and not enough time enjoying the records I already own. Case in point: this rad single on ULR. I posted a “track ID request” last week on all sorts of boards (and here) trying to track this down…. when I finally got an answer, it turned out to be on a single I had already bought a year and a half ago. On the plus side, the EP it’s on is cheap and easy to find, pretty much the definition of “obscure overlooked stuff”. Audio is a little distorted since I was having a good time blasting this while recording it, if you want a crystal clear copy I suggest ponying up the whopping 3 needed to own this bad boy

1st Prodject – Interferance

“Legendary ‘rave’ producer Eon, a.k.a. Ian Loveday, passed away Wednesday, June 17, from complications with pneumonia”

Another piece with lots of background information, by someone who knew him well.

Sorry for the delay in posting this, needed to make time to rip some of my favorite Eon singles… massive respect to this guy.

Eon – Spice

Eon – Fear (Prologue Plus Original Mix with Bats)

Eon – Basket Case(White Coat Mix)

Here’s another EP that I would have no idea about if it weren’t for B2VOS, where it gets mentioned fairly regularly. This is actually a US downtempo/”trip hop”/acidy breaks EP by Omar Santana, which uses plenty of classic hiphop and rave sounds. The EP itself is strictly downtempo speed, however it can be pitched up +8 (or, in the case here, -8 on 45) to turn it into a pretty wicked hardcore/jungle EP.

Dark Side of the Shroom – Oh Zone Layer

Endless thanks to MattyC from B2VOS for hooking me up with the original DVD for this…Matt is the same guy who also ripped the original Hyper-on Experience 92 Demo featured on here a while back. if anyone can recommend a free streaming site where I can host the full clip for this as a single file (~18 minutes), please let me know.

The original video quality isn’t that great, but who cares… it’s Hyper-on Experience!! Kind of amazing to see them dropping their craziest two tunes first , the crowd kind of doesn’t know what hits them.. Also, I’m pretty sure that’s DJ Trax on the turntables / scratching for them.