DJ Boring / Miagma - Split 12"

I stumbled across this on a 3am YouTube sesh recently. There really isn't anything quite like closely examining all the different types of cheese in the reduced aisle at Tesco with underground deep house filling up your skull; that one Filipino shelf-stacker eyeing you suspiciously from behind the Anchor Spreadable.

The bass on this is absolutely incredible, as is the gentle progression of the beat; retaining that old-school house feel without dedicating too much time to rehashing ghosts of the past. All in all, as far as house tributes to Winona Ryder go, this is up there. Miagma on side AA offer a much more immediate house explosion; think Trainspotting meets Ridge Racer or something.

On a side note, I never realised how much of a cutey Winona Ryder was when she was younger... (edit: not that there is anything wrong with her now!)

Scorn - Logghi Barhogghi

This album was the final recording that Mick did with any connections to Earache. The album itself was produced and "marketed" by Earache Records, but released by Mick's own label, Scorn Recordings. Logghi Barhogghi is only the second Scorn album after the departure of Nik Bullen, and still sounds a bit bare and unsteady on it's feet, just like it's predecessor, Gyral. Although, unlike Gyral, LB is much more straight forward and was a definite sign of what was to come with Scorn from this point on. The name Logghi Barhogghi came from when Mick Harris over-heard an American tourist trying to pronounce the town Loughborough; that's fecking highlarious!

From start to finish, LB is a stripped-back affair of clanking percussion and heavy beats. The moody synths and unusual atmospheres are held right back. LB is all about the beat! On the first few listens through, this took some getting used to. I thought this was a remix album or some sort of experimental spin-off project, but this is a fully-canon Scorn album, despite it's very basic approach. Some tracks are stompers; heavy programmed percussion looped over and over until your brain just can't take it no more, other songs are a bit more laid back; some even barely audible, with just a purring bass line and ticking beat. Every now and then the phatter-than-your-mudda bass lines come in, scarily pre-dating all this dubstep stuff by well over a decade. That's fucking incredible!

I will say though the basic beats make this record a great buy for rappers to practice / freestyle / write tunes to. However, for most folk this Scorn album is definitely going to remain a challenging listen, and sadly will more than likely remain unknown to the festering masses. But, despite its awkwardness, LB is so goddamn far ahead of it's time it's literally frightening.

The Prodigy - Invaders Must Die (Box Set)

Hello and welcome to the Lines In Wax 250th post extravaganza! It's taken just over two years (and just under 20k hits), but we got there in the end, eh? It only seems like yesterday that I was doing the 100th post special; I can't believe how fast time goes. Anyway, here's to the next 250 posts...it's safe to say I already know what I'm gonna do for the big 500th - now that's thinking ahead. Cheers all!

Holy mother, look at the size of this package! (That's what she definitely did not say). Whilst I question the point in splitting an entire album over a series of 7"s (didn't Botch do something like this once?) I gotta admit that it looks absolutely fucking cool as fuck. Granted, it is a massive potch changing the disc over after every single song, but I did play them all through once just for the sheer fuck of it. The Prodigy seem to release all their own stuff these days through the oddly-named Take Me To The Hospital label, which is a sub-label of the UK independent Cooking Vinyl. This box is a walloper of a collector's item as you can probably tell from the photos, and it includes 5 orange 7"s, a CD/DVD version of the album, a bonus CD entitled Lost Beats, a poster and a bunch of graffiti stencils in case you love The Prodigy a little bit too much and have to tag that shit all up over the neighbourhood.

 

 

Invaders Must Die is a strong record. I'm not sure if it really is the logical progression for Liam Howlett and co., but there are plenty of absolute facking bangers in this little box. "Omen" I'm sure you've all heard a hundred thousand times on the tele; on music channels, as background music on TV programs from 2009 and as the theme song for every single fucking cage fighter this side of the fucking atlantic ocean. "Thunder" brings massive dub wup wups and ragga-man talky-talking to the table, whilst "Colours" is catchy and fast enough to still be played to the sweat-drenched, ecstasy-guzzling rave crowd. 

 

My favourite song on this album though would have to be "Warrior's Dance", which opens up all epic and grandiose as fuck, before breaking into a filthy beat led by a squeaky-voiced female that seems to have fallen out of  a crappy hardsytle mp3 mix and onto this record. As a rule I normally hate the squeaky-voiced shite that is slathered all over bedroom-grade dance music, but we all know that this vocal style was stolen from the rave scene and guess who were big leaders back then....The fuckin' Prodigy! So it's ok for them to use squeaky voices in songs. That's logical right? My second favourite song is actually the mostly-instrumental "Omen Reprise", that for a bit, almost sounds like latter-day Gary Numan. Unfortunately for purists, this short track is excluded from the orange 7"s for some pointless fucking reason. 

Just as unfortunately, Lost Beats isn't up to much, but it does make for some half-decent background music. I think that the beats should have stayed just that; lost. Despite that, this package is absolutely awesome as piss, but I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone unless they were a ginormous Prodigy fan. But, if that were the case, they'd probably own this anyway. I would severely recommend picking up the simple CD version though; if you love a bit of electronic music, that is. Right then, time to wrap this up. I've got an evening of snorting charlie and driving my Kappa-wearing slut of a girlfriend around the Gurnos estate in my Vauxhall Nova to attend to. 

Venetian Snares - Fool The Detector

I got this nice little EP when HMV still sold vinyl at decent, affordable prices. I think it was fiver, so you can't argue with that (April 2013 Edit: I actually got this from Spillers Records on my birthday last year. Sometimes it's hard keeping track of where I get all this crap). As far as Venetian Snares goes this record is pretty tame, there is a lot more ambiance and nice synth sounds than usual. The spazz-happy beats are still here, but seem a lot more laid back than the usual brain-melting fair of snare rushes and irregular bass drum palpitations.

It reminds me a lot of The Aphex Twin in parts. I know this will get Snares purists' panties all twisted but it really, really does sound rather similar. The way this was put out is also a bit weird. It seems that Aaron Funk has started his own label (on which this is released) called Timesig, but Planet Mu controls it behind the scenes. It seems a similar set up to the deal Bill Steer and Jeff Walker had with Earache Records.

Venetian Snares - Winnipeg is a Frozen Shithole Part 2

Initially, I was puzzled to why the WIAFS album was split into 2 parts on vinyl. I could live with it, but it annoyed me nonetheless. When I espied part 2 for cheap on Discogs, I snapped it up. Little did I know until this arrived (go me for researching properly) that these two volumes are just two tracks a piece; one on each side. Man that sucks! I guess it was an easy way to release four singles off the record for DJ consumption, or something. But shit guys, call it something else, will ya!

The tracks here are "Winnipeg Die Die Die Fuckers Die" and "Winnipeg as Mandatory Scat Feed"; excellent tracks in their own right but not the half an album that I was expecting. The tracks on this record seem more gabba orientated than anything. Well, when I say gabba orientated I mean that it's the usual Venetian Snares mindfuck affair with the addition of some phat, distorted 909 kick drums. Bitch please, this is hard work!

Nevertheless, I am a sucker for aural punishment and I enjoy this release, short as it is. This seems to be out on the efforts of Bang A Rang (an imprint of Peace Off records), and I'm pleased to say has full artwork printed, unlike the Planet Mu pressings of most Venetian Snares stuff. If you've never heard Snares, here is probably a good place to start.

Venetian Snares - Miss Balaton

This 12" is absolutely massive! Every time I put it on the bass on this Planet Mu pressing literally shakes my house! This is a prime example of electronic music cut onto vinyl; I would gladly use it to put all the analogue-or-die vinyl fans in their place, that is if I was cool enough to know people who could possibly argue over that thing.   

I was excellently blessed with this for free by someone who was trying to get rid of Snare's Meathole record on Discogs. They were offering this up as a bonus for the purchase. The title track is wicked awesome but my favourite is side B's "CCUK" (one of the highlights of Aaron's set at The Fleece in Bristol recently) which has excellent samples adorning the frantic fuckfest of breakbeats and plaster-loosening bass. 

Chug down some MDMA and have a little rave in your living room to this bastard!