It's Happened Before

If like me you've had a week to forget, then a bevy of beauteous, bouncy beats is just what the doctor ordered....

....as long as the doctor is Dr. Syntax, that is, former Fluke fellows Mike Tournier and Jan Burton, whose remix of AIR-adjacent Gallic gents Mellow gets today's selection off to a rollicking start.

Staying in France briefly, Fred Falke invites German chums Axel Bartsch and Asem Shama aka VanGuard back to stay at his, the results a stuttering, juddering night in the studio.

Purple Penguin was a record shop, a label, a recording artist and a way of life in my beloved birthplace Bristol. Whilst they were never as massive as, er, Massive Attack, Tricky or Portishead, they were purveyors of mighty fine trip hop music, as debut single Passion attests.

The music of Cantoma aka Phil Mison was a relatively recent discovery for me, though the song selected here - a remix of North Shore by London boys Conrad McDonnell and Dan Tyler aka Idjut Boys - was released as a 12" single way back in 2010. Like a Balearic breeze blowing through your mind.

Pet Shop Boys really need no introduction, neither should DJ and producer Danny Tenaglia, but their coming together for a remix of 1996 single Before was really rather inspired. One of my favourite PSB tracks from that period and inspiration for the title of today's selection.

Hot Chip have been circling around in my consciousness since my post on Alexis Taylor's current single on Wednesday. In 2011, Dan Snaith took time out from his Caribou day job to put out music as Daphni. Dan was invited to remix Hot Chip's single Night And Day, a Record Store Day 12" single in 2012 which hits hard and doesn't give up.

The Other Two is a tongue-in-cheek, raspberry-blowing reference to the fact that whilst New Order stalwarts Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook were getting attention for their projects, Gillian Gilbert and Stephen Morris quietly got on with making music of their own. Ashley Beedle is on typically fine form on this dub remix of 1993 single Selfish.

Closing this collection are The Woodentops and, in keeping with today's title/theme, it's happened before. The remix of A Pact by Skyscraper HiFi aka Jon Dasilva and Jonas Nilsson originally featured last March on the Dubhed selection It's A Glamorous World, but that feels long enough ago to justify another appearance here. A chuggy, huggy masterpiece.

I hope that's got the blood flowing and the head cleared. If not, you may require urgent medical assistance!

1) Paris Sous La Neige (Vox Remix By Dr. Syntax) (Edit): Mellow (2000)

2) Back To Stay (VanGuard Remix): Fred Falke (2009)

3) Passion (Vocal) (Single Version): Purple Penguin (1995)

4) North Shore (Idjut Boys Version) (Instrumental): Cantoma (2010)

5) Before (Danny Tenaglia's Underground Mix): Pet Shop Boys (1996)

6) Night And Day (Daphni Mix): Hot Chip (2012)

7) Selfish (The East Village Dub): The Other Two (1993)

8) A Pact (Skyscraper HiFi Remix B): The Woodentops (2025)

It's Happened Before (45:58) (GD) (M)

Altered States

A 20-track, 80-minute journey through cosmic consciousness, courtesy of The Future Sound Of London. 

A seemingly random but well-timed comment last weekend coincided with an idea that had been percolating in my mind for a while. In response to the Stuff compilation CD I posted, blureu enquired,

"Have you ever done a The Future Sound Of London compilation post? Just curious. Thanks!"

My immediate thought was, "Yes, lots!", so I was quite surprised that whilst Brian Dougans and Gary Cobain have featured here regularly, they've only had one selection dedicated to their own work, in August 2021. Even then, it was a relatively brisk (under an hour) selection of remixes of other artists as either The Future Sound Of London or The Amorphous Androgynous. You can find that post and selection here.

 

I was suitably inspired to have a go at creating a new selection and, I'll be honest, I'm really pleased with it. One of those mixes where each track was offering itself up whilst the previous one was playing; the sequencing is my first take, no changes, no fancy mixing, quite a lot of edits and overlays and...I love it.

 

I also surprised myself with some of the track choices and the feel of the selection overall. It was an entirely intuitive mix so whilst I expected to include Lifeforms or Cascades, for example, I instead found myself choosing Max from 1996's Dead Cities or an obscure John Peel session from 1992 or a FSOL remix of Candese, one of their many aliases and collected on the essential Earthbeat compilation.

It's also given me the opportunity to share a few tracks from their annual calendar series, which I've subscribed to for the past few years. 

This one inevitably is for blureu - thanks, I got a real buzz from creating this selection.

1) Eyes Pop - Skin Explodes - Everybody Dead (Live ISDN Transmission From The Kitchen, New York) (1994) 

2) Elaborate Burn (1994)

3) Max (1996)

4) Papua New Guinea (Mellow Magic Maze Mix By Patrick Woodcock & Pierre Begon-Lours) (2001)

5) Papua New Guinea (Andrew Weatherall Mix - 7" Edit) (1992)

6) Hidden Sign (2008)

7) Space Hippy (John Peel Session) (1992) 

8) Deconstructed Room (2019)

9) We Have Explosive (Pt. 1-outro / Pt. 2-Remix By Leon Mar / Pt. 3-intro) (1997)

10) Day One (FSOL Cosmic Jukebox Mix v1): Deadly Avenger (2002)

11) 100 Baby Spiders (2008)

12) You Took My Love (Earth Mix By The Future Sound Of London): Candese (1991)

13) Mango Tree (Version) (2007)

14) Papua New Guinea (Translation 8: The Big Blue) (2009)

15) Utterance (2020)

16) Are They Fightin Us (1994)

17) Slow Photo (2017)

18) Opk Machines Trx M2 (2022)

19) Zen Jenny (2021)

20) Calcium (Album Version) (1991)

1991: Accelerator: 20

1991: You Took My Love EP: 12

1992: Papua New Guinea EP: 5

1992: The BBC Sessions EP (bootleg): 7

1994: ISDN: 1, 16

1994: Lifeforms: 2

1996: Dead Cities: 3

1997: We Have Explosive EP: 9

2001: Accelerator / Papua New Guinea Mix Anthology (2x CD): 4

2002: We Took Pelham EP: 10 

2007: From The Archives Vol. 3: 13

2008: From The Archives Vol. 4: 6, 11

2009: Papua New Guinea Translations: 14

2020: FSOL Calendar 2020: 15

2021: FSOL Calendar 2021: 19

2022: FSOL Calendar 2022: 8, 18

2023: FSOL Calendar 2023: 17

Altered States (1:22:28) (Box) (Mega)