10 for Christmas

I guess by now you've understood why this blog is called the lazy blog :-)

But this time I have a decent excuse for my relatively long silence: I was in the process of relocating to Valencia, Spain, which means I've been away from my records and turntables since early November... Hopefully they'll be here by the end of January!

So in the meantime, here's a little selection of records I would recommend to check and/or buy for the Christmas  period. No particular order of preference, no equal representation of the different genres I like, and no relevance regarding the release date... Just a list of good records as they come to mind really. Hope everyone will find something fitting their taste!

Merry Christmas everybody!

Video - James Blake - Limit To Your Love

It seems that artists I like are on fire at the moment when it comes to delivering amazing videos to accompany their music. After Martyn and his short film, it's time for dubstep-not-dubstep-whatever-you-wanna-call-it wonderboy James Blake to step up with nothing less than an sonic and visual masterpiece.

Mix - Straight To The Soul

Straight To The Soul by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Mix - Lost In Dub

Lost In Dub by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Martyn - Great Lengths short film

One of the most interesting electronic music producers of the last couple of years has recently put out an amazing short movie directed by Ramon Gieling. Dutchman Martyn actually plays in the movie and the music is taken from a couple of tunes from last year's Great Lengths LP. Black and white, very poetic... Pure beauty.

Tracklists - Ten for the summer

Omar - Get It Together / Ether
Alaide Costa - Catavento / EMI Brazil
Don Blackman - Holding You, Loving You / Arista
D'Angelo - Africa / Virgin
Sylvia Striplin - You Can't Turn Me Away / Uno Melodic
The Peddlers - On A Clear Day You Can See Forever / CBS
Pharrell ft. Jay-Z - Frontin' / Star Trak Entertainment
Poets Of Rhythm - Summerdays / Gomma
Roy Ayers - Everybody Loves The Sunshine / Polydor
Nancy Wilson - Sunshine / Capitol

Mix - Dubstep's Revenge

Dubstep's Revenge by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Review - Digital Mystikz - Return II Space

Label: DMZ
Genre:  Dubstep

For years, the names Digital Mystikz - production duo consisting of Mala and Coki - and DMZ - label and club night in London run by the previous two plus Loefah - have been responsible for some of the most cutting edge, forward thinking bass music and have been largely contributing to the rise of what's nowadays known to most people as the dubstep scene.

Sunshine Mix

Sunshine Mix by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

NuWave Mix

Nuwave Mix by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Tracklists - Lazy Alf - June 2010

  1. James Blake - CMYK / R&S
  2. Quest - Smooth Skin / Deep Medi
  3. Fonzworth Bentley ft. Sa-Ra, Andre 3000 & Kanye West - Everybody / Promo
  4. Peven Everett - Girl Of My Dreams / Studio Confession
  5. Digital Mystikz - Livin' Different / DMZ
  6. Black Pocket - U're A Sta (dBridge Remix) / Fat City
  7. Kyle Hall - Body Of Water / Third Ear
  8. Reflection Eternal ft. J. Cole, Jay Electronica & Mos Def - Just Begun / Warner
  9. Dark Sky - Ghost Notes / Black Acre
10. Blackout - Boogie Kitchen / White Label

Review - Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part 2 - Return Of The Ankh

Label: Motown
Genre: Soul

Three years after the first part of her New Amerykah project, Miss Badu is back... it's the Return Of The Ankh. And what a return it is! I was eager to listen to this new LP as the previous one, 4th World War, was quite a leap forward for the soul sista, with an increased amount of electronic sounds and forays into new musical moods.

Fan-tas-tic

Sometimes music speaks louder than words, so I'll just let you enjoy this incredible piece of music in all its versions. Big up Mochilla for setting up this project. Pure genius.

Brand new mix

100513 by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Tracklists - Lazy Alf - May 2010

1.  SBTRKT - 2020 / Brain Math
2.  Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part 2 LP / Motown
3.  Africa HiTech - The Sound Of Tomorrow / Warp
4.  Flying Lotus - Do The Astral Plane / Warp
5.  House Shoes - Newports / All City
6.  Soil & Pimp Sessions - My Foolish Heart (Crazy On Earth) / Brownswood
7.  Strong Arm Steady - In Search Of Stoney Jackson LP / Stones Throw
8.  Mark De Clive-Lowe presents Rahel - Hope / Alala
9.  Peter Herbolzheimer Rhythm Combination & Brass Ft. Dianne Reeves  -  Cherokee / Freestyle
10. Martyn - Hear Me (Zomby remix) / 3024

Hip Hop Mix (060820)

Hip-Hop Mix (060820) by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Inspirations - Pépé Bradock

Let's kick off this Inspirations topic with my all-time favourite French electronic music producer, Julien Auger AKA Pépé Bradock. For more than ten years now, he's been blessing us with some of the finest house music one could ever dream of.

It all started in the mid-nineties in the Paris area. Coming from a jazz/funk background, Julien then turned onto the hip-hop movement, discovering turntablism and graffiti art. That particularly rich era in music also let him discover the rave culture and its main associated genres, house and techno. He released his first house tracks alongside Ark under the Trankilou moniker in 1996.

Southern Countryside Mix

Southern Countryside Mix (070316) by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Dubstep Mix

Dubstep090906 by Lazy Alf on Mixcloud

Welcome to the Lazy Blog

Finally.

I've been meaning to do this since I stopped the Pump Up The Jazz radioshow on Campus Paris, back in 2007. Having my own blog seemed like the next logical step as I'm a bit of a control freak and wanted to do something on my own. The backside of this is that nobody's gonna kick you in the ass to move on and actually get on to it.

So... It took me 3 years to eventually set up this thing. For the moment this is really minimal and I have to say, not particularly planned. Do I care? Not that much. At some point, one has to take the plunge. I'm doing it at this very moment, typing these few words. Let's see where it takes me... where it takes us actually!

And to start things off nicely, here are a couple of mixes from my archives. Hope you'll like them...

Stay tuned!