Shades of Blues

De La Soul and Prince Paul are guilty of ripping off other musicians. They always have been and, god bless 'em, they always will be. For their intro to Buhloone Mind State, they pretty much just dropped the needle on this Outlaw Blues Band LP and took turns chanting over it until they were ready to put in real work. Anyway, enough about those lazy bastards. [end sarcasm]

Now here is a sumptuous blues album... or, at least, half of it. It wouldn't be the blues if you got it all now, would it?

B-SIDE BLUES

Xingu !!

Legend has it this LP by the El Combo Xingu was discovered by Egon and his boys over at Stones Throw. At the time, collector's were comfortable shelling out half a G large for this Chilean funk-bomb. Taking the broker route, i waited for my two-digit $hopportunity. It doesn't have the "original" cover, but this one is far more interesting! It's a Peruvian thrift store throwaway flipped inside out and stamped with the label of the promotional distro company that, most likely, sent this off to the local radio stations to enter the 1972 South American zeitgeist.

I knew about the James Brown "Hot Pants" cover. But the versions of Herbie Hancock's "Bring Down the Birds" (from the soundtrack to Blow Up as used by Deee-Lite for "Groove is in the Heart") and Led Zeppelin's "Moby Dick" –with its awesome drum break– are only a few of the highlights on this Long Player. It's such an interesting listen all around that i went ahead and recorded the whole damn thing for ya!

AQUI ESTA !!

Music Please

This rare funk 45 by the Pleasure Web was on my list the moment i heard DJ Jock Max drop it almost a decade ago on a local radio show. When i finally found Music Man i was thrilled! But because the short and instrumental B side is so much better than the A, and because the tempo changes erratically, its not easy to play outside of a showcase format. So i created this edit and posted it on the web for your downloading pleasure:

MY PLEASURE