Erasure - Love is a Loser (808's Across the Nation mix)

In 1985, Vince Clarke, late of his recent musical experiments with Alison Moyet (Yazoo), and Feargal Sharkey (the one off single which was The Assembly), decided to put an ad in the London musical newspaper Melody Maker, looking for a vocalist. Out of many hopefuls to respond was Andy Bell, a very hopeful singer from Basildon. After some successful auditions, Erasure was born, becoming one of the most enduring acts to survive outside of the 80's.

Their debut album Wonderland in 1985 was my first introduction to this duo, and I've been a lifelong fan ever since. A number of remixes were spawned from the tracks on this album, but one that got sadly overlooked was "Love is a Loser", a really bouncy and joyful synthesizer track with a really addictive beat. I always thought this track deserved the extended 12" treatment, but it never happened.

So, I decided to fix this oversight once and for all. I used only the original track from the album, but managed to align instrumental sections to eventually isolate the vocals, synth lines, percussion, and even the bassline, then reassemble them together. I used flanging on the vocal and snare bits, and even added my own sampled percussion from a Roland TR-707 and 727 mahcine, two machines Vince used on the Wonderland album. The opening has almost a loping reggae feel to it, but this is most definitely a classic 80's extended remix track. Get ready for a trip back to 1985.

Running time for this mix is 6 minutes and 5 seconds.

Listen to this track on legitmix.com

Catch My Fall (Cygnet Mix)

A repost of a mix I've done some time ago :-)
Catch my fall (Cygnet Mix)

CULTURE BEAT feat. JO VAN NELSEN - Der Erdbeermund (chronovisor mix)

"Die graue Welt macht keine Freude mehr.
Ich gab den schoensten Sommer her,
und dir hat's auch kein Glueck gebracht, nicht wahr.
Hast nur den roten Mund noch aufgespart fuer mich,
fuer mich so tief im Haar verwahrt.
Ich such' ihn schon die lange Nacht im Wintertal, im Aschengrund.
Ich bin so wild nach deinem Erdbeermund."

Here is the info:


CULTURE BEAT feat. JO VAN NELSEN
Der Erdbeermund
(chronovisor mix)
13:44
[1989]
music file

Stevie Wonder - Master Blaster (Jammin') (808's extended mix)

I was a big fan of Stevie Wonder back in the day, and at age 11 I remember getting the album Hotter than July for Christmas. It had lots of wonderful tracks on it, but I always liked the message behind the reggae-influenced "Master Blaster".

I managed to get ahold of the 7" single of this, and noticed there was a VERY interesting dub mix on the other side, using all kinds of wild effects and interesting sounds. So in doing this mix, I decided I would blend this version with the original album cut.

In doing this mix, I didn't use a lot of straight edits ... for much of it the two mixes play on top of each other, but I will do crossfades at key points, including one part towards the end where Stevie sings acapella for about 2 bars.

The entire mix clocks in at 7 minutes and 19 seconds.

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MILES DAVIS - CHILLIN' WITH MILES

MILES DAVIS - CHILLIN' WITH MILES
(MEGAUPLOAD link due to server limitations)

Hi Everybody!

I have to apologize for the dirth of posts lately due to a recent vacation.

Anyhow, I put together a chilled Miles Davis compilation for my mp3 player and I thought you might like it, too. It's culled from the 1951-1961 time period & exclusively from his jazz combo work. This 3+ hours set worked wonders on my vacation!

Here is the tracklist:

01. Yesterdays
02. My Old Flame
03. How Deep Is The Ocean
04. I Waited For You
05. Smooch
06. Blue Haze
07. When Lights Are Low
08. Blue Room
09. You Don't Know What Love Is
10. Bags' Groove [Take 1]
11. 'Round Midnight (DreamTime Edit)
12. The Man I Love [Take 1] (DreamTime Edit)
13. I See Your Face Before Me
14. Green Haze
15. Nature Boy
16. Easy Living
17. Changes
18. There Is No Greater Love
19. My Funny Valentine
20. You're My Everything
21. Something I Dreamed Last Night
22. When I Fall In Love
23. It Never Entered My Mind
24. 'Round Midnight
25. On Green Dolphin Street (DreamTime Edit)
26. Fran Dance
27. Stella By Starlight
28. So What
29. Freddie Freeloader
30. Blue in Green
31. Flamenco Sketches
32. Old Folks
33. Drad-Dog
34. I Thought About You

As there are a couple of DreamTime Edit tracks in this collection, I thought it was OK to post it here.

Here is a video of "So What":



Enjoy!

Final Solution (Cygnet Mix)

Final Solution (Cygnet Mix)

Classic Pere Ubu song, sung here by Peter Muphy. Fom the 1986 album ‘Should the World Fail to Fall Apart’ this is a mix of his first solo hit Final Solution (no relation to the 2nd world war). I used the 12″ remix and the Final mix as well as a little bit of Pere Ubu’s original.

Groove on!
Cygnet

Joe Jackson - Steppin' Out (808's Neon Mix)

This has always been a favorite 80's track of mine, since it's USA release in 1982. Joe Jackson was a singer from England, who tried his had at a variety of styles ranging between rock, new wave, jazz, swing, and classical music. This was of course his most remembered song, a delightful piece of new wave synthpop from the album "Night and Day" which went to #6 in the USA.

During my stint as a DJ at St. Ivan's Infirmary, a virtual 80's dance club in Second Life, I collected a number of rare and underground 80's mixes, and one that always stuck in my mind was a mix of this song by a Brazilian remixer known as DJ Tony. It ended up being a staple of all my DJ gigs, and recently, when I felt inspired to do a re-edit of his mix, I decided to try to cook up my own mix of this song.

For this mix, I used only the album version of the song, but with some serious modifications. For example, I was able to take the beat and bass loop from the beginning of the song, and use it against the rest of the song to create an acapella mix, and about three mixes of the song, one of them an instrumental, without the beats present. Using these elements, and a bit of airplane flanging, I think I have managed to capture the authentic 80's extended remix feel that I think this song deserves.

This mix clocks in at 6 minutes and 11 seconds.

Listen to this track on legitmix.com

The Alan Parsons Project - "Old and Wise" (808's Extended Mix)

This song always had sentimental value to me. Of course, it was the third single off of the Alan Parsons Project's fantastic Eye in the Sky album from 1982. And with it being Halloween (or Samhain), the subject matter of facing one's own mortality seems to ring true here. This song's lyrics are very haunting.

Well, when fellow blogger Dreamtime came up with their own extended mix for the title track off this fantastic album, I felt I had to contribute my two cents in. So this is my result ... to explain, it helps to know a bit about the Alan Parsons Project and how they operated musically.

The Project had a habit of bringing in outside vocalists (besides core member Eric Woolfson of course) to sing their songs, and a vocalist named Colin Blunstone does an awesome job on this one. On many occasions Eric Woolfson (who was the Project's in-house vocalist) contributed to the majority of the Project's biggest hits, including of course "Time" (which I have extended mixed on this blog) and "Eye in the Sky". Well, I did some searching, and it turns out that there was a demo version of this song, with the same instrumentation, but with Eric Woolfson singing the lead vocals instead! This gave me an intriguing idea ...

The mix features both versions of the song, Colin's and Eric's. Colin starts off singing for the first half of the mix, then after his last verse, there is a nice crossfade over into Eric's version, which is more stripped down and only has piano, drums, and bass, before a final crossfade and flange into the terrific ending with an awesome saxophone solo.

This mix clocks in at a glorious 8 minutes and 39 seconds.

Listen to this mix on legitmix.com

THE SPLASH BAND - John Carpenter's The End (chronovisor mix)

Hello music.blog.lovers!

If you want to read the german text to this posting, please visit my music.blog.

Thank You! ENJOY! Floyd Anderson.

Here is the info:


THE SPLASH BAND
John Carpenter's The End
(chronovisor mix)
09:00
[1984]
music file

Billy Ocean - Loverboy (808's Extended Mix)

Another classic track from 1985. This one has a special meaning to me. This was of course the second single from Billy Ocean's "Suddenly" album, and I think the strongest single from that album.

In making this mix, I used both the original 12" mix, and a dub mix which was on the B-side of the 7" single. The arrangement of the parts I used in this mix, were inspired by a similar arrangement that was used in an exclusive mix which used to be played on KISS FM 99.9, a radio station out of Asheville, NC, which played a lot of exclusive 12" mixes back in the day. That mix is still burned in my head, and I duplicated the arrangement as closely as I could, adding some extended material to the ending, and doing crossfading between the two mixes instead of just straight edits.

The result, I think, is a true 12" mix which stands out uniquely from the official 12" mix release, it's a lot more interesting to listen to. As with the original mix, the running time is 8 minutes and 6 seconds.

Listen to this track on legitmix.com