De Juepuchas! – Ser de Juepuchas por Varios Años [2009]

Album post #10.  Ser de Juepuchas por Varios Años by De Juepuchas!, a solo project of Colombian Diego Maldonado.  In Maldonado’s words, “the project kind of resembles Girl Talk, The Avalanches, Daft Punk, Plastilina Mosh, M.I.S…”  Indeed, this is the closest record I’ve found to The Avalanches‘ magnificent album, Since I Left You.  The Avalanches and De Juepuchas! sample bits from songs, movies, and radio and combine them to create entirely new music – a sort of musical pointillism (though maybe it’s closer to a photomosaic or collage). 

All 19 tracks of Ser de Juepuchas… flow together seemlessly, though sometimes with surprising transitions (e.g. toilet flush).  For this album you should have no excuse not to listen to it as a whole.  Someone was kind enough to upload all of the tracks to youtube and form a playlist.  The BEST NEWS is that De Juepuchas! posted a FREE DOWNLOAD of the entire album (link found on their myspace page).  To stay with the format of my previous posts I have included some of the album highlights below.  My personal favorite section is tracks 10-12.

P.S. 10 points if you can find a sample from the Macarana.

P.P.S. I don’t speak Spanish.  Someone please translate the title for me. 

source: dataless

Sufjan Stevens – The BQE [2009]

 

Album post #9. The BQE by Sufjan Stevens, released tomorrow.  When will Sufjan get it?  We hipsters just want more Chicago!  Or something catchy or cute (like Christmas album #172) that we can shout at him when he plays for the first time in Portland, Maine the other weekend.  We don’t care about his new electronic or abstract music.  We’re drunk and flanneled and want to sing along!  “FREEBIRD! PLAY FREEBIRD!!”  What asses.

Well Sufjan’s orchestral suite about the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway is sure to lose their interest as well.  That is, of course, unless they shoot up and watch the accompanying original film by Sufjan, which features shots of BQE traffic and The Hooper Heroes (see videos below).  In fact, I bet we’ll see plenty of Hooper Hero Hipsters this Halloween. 

The BQE is intended as a mixed-media piece in which the audio and visual complement each other; however, the music is plenty strong on its own.  I suggest listening while driving since that is the theme afterall.  Do be sure to find a way to listen to Movement I – In the Countenance of Kings.  It is truly a moving piece and unfortunately I could not find a youtube link for it.  (see hint below).  For a short while you can listen to all of Sufjan’s BQE on spinner.

source: dataless and skallygren

hint: An easy way to listen to ANY full album 1x through is to get a lala account.  Another good place to listen to some quality albums is spinner, but each is only up for a couple weeks.

The Very Best – Warm Heart of Africa [2009]

Album Post #8. The Very Best‘s debut LP Warm Heart of Africa.  The Very Best is the name of the collaborative effort of Esau Mwamwaya and Radioclit, who also team up with big names Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend and M.I.A. for a couple tracks on this record.  I don’t have much to say about this electronic-laced Malawian music besides, listen to it – it rocks.

In addition to my tardiness this week, I have had trouble finding the whole album on youtube.  This playlist has 6 of the 13 songs and I have posted a few below.  Unfortunately, my favorite tracks, Chalo, Angonde, Mfumu,  and Ntende Uli are not on the playlist so you may have to do some digging of your own.

source: bsmith and jmac