An interesting read on album covers that didn't make the cut because of the taboos they addressed from terroristas to female sexploitation to phake phalli and pubes to Uncle Sam on a gurney.

Yesterday night went to get my groove on at the always groovy and fresh space that is the Salon Daome. I was pleasantly surprised by the presence of the HVW8 boys slapping down another fresh live painting to Uzi's soulful flavour. The painting was of none other than the Sir Clement Dodd, the subject of numerous posts right here at defchild. Later on in the night, I found out the reason for the HVW8 choice was as tribute to his passing 3 weeks ago!!!

I was thunderstruck .... 3 weeks ago ??!! and I'm only finding out about it now ?? Haba!! I read world news everyday from a variety of sources yet still with Nick Berg and the deteriorating situation in Iraq and in the in U.S. somehow, this didn't even make the headlines.

Dodd is one of my heros. In addition to getting a new more personal perspective on the man after discovering the masterful Studio One re-releases last year on Soul Jazz Records, his body of work, ethic, incognegro flavour and simply the massive extent to which his music, even several generations/incarnations later speaks to me, will always be a source of inspiration and admiration.

Rest In Peace Sir Clement Dodd.

Updated the projects page to reflect the some new endings and beginnings, also refined the About page. I am due to upload some new mixes as well as new tracks hot of the Grafofoni. Hopefully, this can all fall into place before Mutek, since I hope expand my reseau of professional contacts and scout out labels worthy of Grafofoni's future output.

There are many names on the program that I've never heard of, which can be a good sign. On the other hand, the mega-headliner night has the likes of Plastikman, who can be brilliant and was last year, but also can put out some stuff of questionable wikkedness. Notable absentees this year: Ricardo Villalobos and Luciano. I wonder if the expansion of Mutek Mexico and Mutek Chile (in December and January) have anything to do with it. I think if I hadn't had a good dose of music in Miami, I'd be feeling the lineup a lot less.

Speaking of Luciano, bought the Salif Keita: Remixes from Moffou the other week and Luciano has a decent remix of Yamore. Some of the producers however, just don't get this music and should NOT be remixing people like Salif. After listening to the original and then the remix album, I realized to which point some of these characters are not hearing what I am (haughtily assuming that I get this music). It is either that or our vocal aesthetics and production techniques are just vastly divergent.

NEVER should the female choral vocals of Malian singers (aka griottes/jelimuso) be chopped up and disgraced with a micro-sampled, skittery, Todd Edwards/Akufen/Crackhaus-style treatment. That “works” on vocals that aren't sung first of all and if they are sung, are not interesting enough to stand up by themselves. If the idea of remixing is to re-interpret original bits of a track and possibly spin in new elements to bring out hidden musical aspects of the original, some of these producers have necessarily retrogressed, arguably criminally!!

On a more positive note though Osunlade (quelle surprise), Gekko and Doctor L turned out brilliant re-interpretations.

In posting a bunch of my pics from Lagos recently, I struggled with the idea of how to present them, to contextualise these soundless, smellless, untouchable images to more effectively convey the “Lagos” experience, as varied as that might be.

I wanted to give someone who has never been there an idea of what it would be to be invisible and walking around. I've always thought things are more interesting in these kinds of places, when your effect on the surroundings are kept to a minimum. I mean its pretty difficult to observe and appreciate the myriad human dramas unfolding before you, if your “Otherness” changes the natural stability of the environment you are observing.

Here is the introduction to an architectural case study of Lagos from Mutations. This intro has stuck with me, not only for its culturally unladen approach, but its spot on identification of the “anguish” I've felt about the dearth of infrastructure and amenities that spawn flavours of innovation and development but also my failure to recognize the working alternative systems in that gap.

The fundamental conundrum of Lagos, considered as both paradigm and pathological extreme of the West African city, is its continued existence and productivity in spite of near-complete absence of those infrastructures, systems, organizations, and amenities that define the word “city” in terms of Western planning methodology. Lagos, as an icon of West African urbanity, inverts every essential characteristic of the so-called modern city. Yet, its still -- for lack of a better word -- a city; and one that works.

In short, we would argue, it is to do away with the inherited notion of “city” once and for all. - Mutations, { Harvard Project on the City }, page 652-653

Here are a handful of scanned images from this case study; pardon the shoddy scan-job, wielding this glossy 800 page brick wasn't particularly obvious.

http://www.rjamorim.com/test/multiformat128/presentation.html

Sometime over the next coupla weeks when the load is lighter, I'm all over this test. Especially interested in how Ogg Vorbis and AAC perform.