Jetpilot Music Reviews

Another song from the sophomore effort of Depeche Mode frontman Dave Gahan has recently had the remix treatment and by God is it good.

The album is Hourglass, the song is Use You, and the remix is by New York’s halfway-hirsute (it makes sense once you check out the profile pic on their myspace) Kap10Kurt.

Enjoy.

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Dave Gahan – Use You (Kap10Kurt Remix).

Once you’ve doused yourself off from the remix, feel free to compare and contrast with the original taken from the album.

You’ll notice it starts off slow and brooding with the rhythmic thump of the bass carrying it along and Dave’s vocals kicking along like something sinister moving about beneath the waves. For me, I love how the menace gets thrown up a notch as the chorus snarls just like DM’s I Feel You (from their album Songs of Faith and Devotion). It has a much cleaner sound than I Feel You, benefiting no doubt from more modern production technology, which gives it an air of sparseness that suits it just nicely.

Hope you like it as much as I do.

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Dave Gahan – Use You from the album Hourglass [ buy ].

It isn’t an accident that Kap10Kurt found themselves remixing one of Dave’s tracks as it seems they manned the Roland10 in his band for the recording of Hourglass. It is a small world after all.

Apparently Kap10Kurt have done an extended remix of Kingdom, but I can’t for the life of me find it floating around cyberspace. If you have it or know where one might be able to get their hands on it, hook a brother up.

Depeche Mode @ myspace

Dave Gahan @ myspace

Kap10Kurt @ myspace.com

I’ve landed a gig called This is NOT a Melbourne Party in Melbourne, put on by my friend Dr. Hitchcock.

Sunday 16th December @ Platform 3, Richmond, Melbourne [ map ]

Featuring:
Jetpilot
Dr Hitchcock
Apex Beat
Lad Down Under

from 4pm. [ event @ facebook ]

Australian 80s revivalists Van She have just come out with their latest single, Cat & The Eye and it sounds really rather good. It also sounds incredibly familiar but I’m really not sure how to place it.

Either way here’s the weirdly nonsensical music video for Cat & The Eye. Enjoy…

If you aren’t familiar with Van She they’ve come out with a few brilliant songs on their self-titled EP, with Kelly and Sex City seeming to be the more recognisable tracks from the remixes floating around the blogosphere. Cut Copy and Alan Braxe have lent their talents to Kelly, while Sex City got the Nightmoves and South Central treatment. All in all excellent remixes of some excellent songs, and to to prove it, here are the unadulterated original versions of both songs.

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Van She – Kelly

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Van She – Sex City

Sex City is my favourite of the two. I’m not sure why, it just is. If you want to know how to get your hands on these and other Van She goodies, get their self-titled EP here.

I really enjoy Van She for the songs they come out with and because their sound is quite different to a lot of the club-centric stuff emanating from Australia. Don’t get me wrong, I love that stuff, but it’s nice to have a little variety.

After all, variety is the spice of life.

Hat-tip to Travis over at Bigstereo for the headline and hooking us up with the Van She music video.

Van She @ myspace

A year or so back, Kavinsky’s Testarossa Autodrive completely blew me away. Well, it blew me across the Tasman Sea to see him with SebastiAn, but that’s not the point I’m trying to make. The thing that bugged me at the time was that Kavinsky seemed pretty much a lone voice almost drowned out by the gritty electro that was flooding the blogosphere and the dancefloors.

Well it seems filtered synths are back with a vengeance with Kavinsky’s Gallic countryman Danger stirring things up on the blogosphere. He’s recently signed with Ekleroschock Records (home to DatA and Chewy Chocolate Cookies among others), so things really seem set for the guy.

misstoats over at Bigstereo said that “If Danger had his own car racing Kavinsky’s in the ‘Testarossa Autodrive’ video, this is what he would be listening to”, and I couldn’t agree more.

Danger has a very similar sound to Kavinsky in that dated synth sound we all know and love. Danger is also running with his own cartoon alter ego, a routine Kavinsky’s been rocking quite well since his Teddy Boy EP in 2005, so its no surprise strong comparisons have been made between the two.

All his tracks seem to be time-coded (9h20, 11h30, 14h54, etc.) which seems odd but doesn’t detract from the tracks themselves.

9H20 is the one that seems to be garnering the most attention, and it certainly deserves it.

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Danger – 9H20

11H30 is just as good if a slightly different feel.

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Danger – 11H30

The EP will have hidden gems like 14H54 (which is an absolute stonker of a track – if impatient, listen to the stream on his myspace) so you really ought to mark down on your calendar the 19th of November (ok, maybe I am dyslexic when it comes to dates because the EP came out today, although there’s no sign of it on the NZ itunes store – ugh!) for your copy of Danger’s EP.

Kavinsky @ myspace

Danger @ myspace

Ekleroshock Records@ myspace

Ok, so I’ve been trawling through the songs on my itunes that I’ve listened to more than 9 times but less than 49 times, and it’s an interesting smartlist that brings up a lot of the new tracks that are floating my boat as well as many of the less recent ones I loved and left for whatever reason, and the variety has been really rather enjoyable.

Well, blow me down if this song didn’t pop up one afternoon and capture me from the sharp drums and throbbing bass line.

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Azzido Da Bass – Lonely By Your Side from Kitsuné Maison Compilation 2 [ buy ]

I’d always written off this German DJ as one of the pointless Ibiza-touring wankers that specialise in the mediocrity of the Ministry of Sound sound (which he may actually be, I wouldn’t really know), but I must admit that Lonely By Your Side is seriously floating my boat right now.

Kudos to the folk at Kitsuné Music for their generally excellent taste and the recommendation.

Azzido Da Bass @ myspace

Kitsuné Music @ myspace

Saul Williams on his new record, created in collaboration with Trent Reznor is following a similar release to Radiohead. It’s due out on November 1st, and you can choose to pay nothing and get the album as 192 kbps MP3s, or pay $5 and get 320 kbps MP3s or lossless FLAC files.

This is the future people.

(and it’s about time, since Oink.cd just got busted).

I’d just like to make a quick apology for the absence of updates lately. I’ve been busy working on my PhD thesis, which I MUST finish by the end of the year, or I’ll go mad. And my co-conspirator His Whoreness is disconnected from the online world while he moves flats. I’ll try and get some tasty treats out to you this weekend to make up for it.

Just rest assured that we still love you.

This is quite possibly the worst song ever.

No really, it’s really bad.

Although only six minutes long, you’ll be left desperately counting the seconds, hoping in vain for a swift end.

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30 Seconds To Mars – Stronger (Kanye West cover) (I refuse to let you download this as a standalone mp3)

I really don’t know how the universe could allow emoliner outfit 30 Seconds To Mars to cover Kanye’s Stronger. I really don’t. I don’t even like Kanye West, but I’d much rather listen to Stronger than this monstrosity.

As gesture towards bringing harmony once more to the cosmos, I give you both Kanye West’s Stronger…

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Kanye West – Stronger from his album Graduation [ buy ]

… and the song that Stronger draws so heavily from: Daft Punk’s Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

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Daft Punk – Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger from their album Discovery [ buy ]

I’m sorry for posting Jared Leto’s shameful cover but it is only through confronting such crimes against music, that steps can be taken to ensure such affronts never happen again.

30 Seconds To Mars @ myspace

Kanye West @ myspace

Daft Punk @ myspace

A track has leaked off SebastiAn’s forthcoming sophomore album that remains yet-unnamed and quite possibly yet-unmastered, but my god is it a good’un. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Untitled.

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SebastiAn – Untitled

Quite the return to form from the man that brought us the hypnotic-if-almost-undanceable Ross Ross Ross and some of the best remixes of this year.

For good measure, I should probably introduce you to Ross Ross Ross. Reader this is Ross Ross Ross, Ross Ross Ross this your reader. Play nice. Better yet, play it loud.

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SebastiAn – Ross Ross Ross from Ross Ross Ross EP [ buy ]

I first came across this gem when it opened Simian Mobile Disco’s New Rave Mix for NME Magazine. The mix was an absolute blinder that totally opened my ears to so many acts of last year (I know it seems weird to talk about last year’s acts like yesterday’s news), but the song that always brought me back was Ross Ross Ross. I’d never heard anything like it.

Hungry for more, I chased down anything touched with the oddly-capitalised “SebastiAn” and a slew of fancy remixes came out of the woodwork. Mylo’s Paris Four Hundred. The Rapture’s Get Myself Into It. Cut Copy’s Going Nowhere. Kelis’ Bossy. Standing head and shoulders above them all however was the still-blistering remix of Daft Punk’s Human After All.

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Daft Punk – Human After All (SebastiAn Remix) from Human After All CD Single [ buy ]

Hat-tip to L&D for the live shot of SebastiAn and Kavinsky from their live set at The Prince in Melbourne back in the day. Best. Night. Ever.

We’ll be looking to rinse and repeat the experience when SebastiAn and Kavinsky open (among others) for Daft Punk at Never Ever Land in December.

SebastiAn @ myspace

Daft Punk @ myspace

Pnau are back with another little gem in the form of No More Violence. It isn’t quite the light and clean and fun ditty that is Wild Strawberries but it’s pretty good all the same.

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Pnau – No More Violence

Sure it takes a while to warm up but you’ve gotta love how it thumps like a bitch despite the oddly-chosen guitar and vocal tracks.

Check. It. Out.

Still. Waiting. For. That. Third. Album.

Hat-tip to the always excellent Disco Delicious for hooking us up with the track.

Pnau @ myspace