Rubblebucket – Omega La La Remixes (2011)
The best artistic re-imaginings breathe new life into the original while still standing on their own. Rubblebucket succeed magnificently in their efforts to re-imagine a handful of tracks from last year’s Omega La La. ‘Down In the Yards (Rubblebucket Remix)’ doses the original with adrenaline and fairy dust, ‘Silly Fathers (RAC Remix)’ turns the affair into a cinematic dream, and ‘Came Out of a Lady 8-bit (Fun Secret Remix)’ explodes into a video game fantasy land, with dense fuzz cutting through the melody.
These remixes are tiny explosions that reflect the original tunes like fun house mirrors. Whether you enjoyed Omega La La or not, the remixes are worth checking out. – Jeremy Schaefer
Baby Huey – The Baby Huey Story: The Living Legend (1971)
Huge man, huge voice. – Vinh Cao
DJ Signify – Of Cities (2009)
Hazy laze. – Vinh Cao
Yoshi Wada – Lament for the Rise and Fall of the Elephantine Crocodile (1982)
Our due diligence is done. We’ve ruminated, we’ve meditated, we’ve all but levitated in preparation for the come-what-may. To wit, we’ve spun spidery webs throughout the land to cushion its blows whenever the flurry should descend upon us. There’s not a foible to be found in our ramparts, built from the ground up with fortitude and focus, as a deep bellow carries the heft of Gregorians as well as the polyphony of Bulgarians in tow. Regardless of these lineaments, our coat of mail stands decidedly alone, a reclusive hum tailored to a single cause: fitting the messy blots of the hereafter into manageable frames. Painstakingly carved to ensure harbor, the stronghold we’ve raised offers only one way in. Through it.
Open the floodgates, we’re at the ready.
…
A few seconds in the thick of the torrent are all it takes to humble. This downpour cannot be corralled, too mountainous, too monumental to wrestle into any semblance of order, not shattering the bulwarks but swallowing them whole, broaching our defenseless defenses from every fathomable angle. Bagpipe-y din presents a really slippery current, perpetually shifting in density and direction, tossing in an additional stratum and then pinching one out before we can make sense of the facelift, rising and falling in the whirlwind so frequently we can’t tell the two movements apart.
This spate defies understanding. This picture defies perception. Prod, probe, and project as we might, the dots will connect themselves at their leisure.
Now coaxed from cubicle to wilderness, the voice we’d heard earlier sees its conjurations ring far truer because its guard is down and its scope has swollen. We’re inviting it in. All of it. Instead of blowing shit out of the water, the expansive stir breathes life into our surroundings — every leaf, every twig, every last blade of grass is roused by a veil of electricity, pointed skyward as celestial beacons, itching with yens, searching for dens, eyes fixed upon the silly reveries that have somehow begun to flirt with reality. These visions are both dew-speckled and sepia-toned, ancient, fresh, muzzled, preferring to hint at unseen heights than plainly hand them over. Here is the power of suggestion in full force, intentionally falling shy of outright ruckus to outline the rhapsody contained therein, urging us to step up to the plate, simmering away as a reminder of all the wild goose chases we’ve led and the distinct possibility that a big one may finally take flight.
We’re at a loss. – Vinh Cao