With one month left in Darla Farmer‘s remix competition the people over at Paper Garden Records are reaching out to the people, encouraging them to “bring the heat!”
The project will allow fans and professionals alike to appear on the upcoming Remixing the Electric Forest to be released at the end of summer 2008. In addition, the record will be on iTune’s front page for featured releases.
This gives people like me and you the opportunity to share a platform with the likes of Tom Campesinos of Los Campesinos, Optronix, among others. If you are interested in the contest, email Paper Garden at darlafarmer@papergardenrecords.com. They will hook you up with the song stems you need to construct your redux.
As Jeff Martin has proved, remix albums can make excellent venues for discovering new artists. This could definitely be your opportunity for exposure to an entirely new fan base. Get to it…
Given the breadth of contributors, it is difficult to describe the myriad of styles that reform Martin’s work. What makes this record so excellent is the consistency provided by the base that Jeff Martin has constructed. While nearly every track is laden with electronic beats and celestial atmospherics, the meat of the music is rooted in the organic, natural sounds of the acoustic guitar, banjo, piano, mandolin, violin, and cello. Indeed, most of the tracks are instrumental, flowing into the limbo that is post-rock. A few songs include Jeff Martin’s voice which has a surprising smoky quality that contrasts sharply with the velour texture of the music.
The most outstanding track off the Spoons remix record is its first. Shuttlecock is energetic, voluminous, and expansive. It comes to us remixed by Bristol’s Minotaur Shock from 4AD. The song begins with a beautiful interplay of strings and xylophone, which is then mixed with a syncopated acoustic guitar riff, a clarinet, and brass. As Shuttlecock accelerates and builds, it perfectly exemplifies the beauty that electronic/organic fusion achieves; the fast paced beats layer the spaces between the chimes of a dozen other rhythms; it increases in velocity, but remains measured and deliberate. This track is simply ridiculous.
Spoons: RCI has many other gems as well. Strange for a Tuner by Chequerboard is sequenced perfectly. Balancing Act by Decal has a latent retro 80s structure that becomes fully born as the track concludes. Some tracks lack many of the electronic elements that are so prevalent throughout the record. Plays Music by Mice Parade and the impassioned Augustine by the Dublin Guitar Quartet are both gorgeous instrumentals. For those of you who love multi-instrumentalists like Sufjan Stevens and Tortoise, the beats of the Album Leaf, or even if you are a listener of the more ambient songs from God Speed You Black Emperor, Spoons: A Collection of Remixes, Collaborations, and Interpretations is a perfect addition to an ever growing and diversifying, nameless genre that flees moment to moment and movement to movement, renegotiating our expectations of complexity and simplicity, tonal dialectics and the subtlety of repetition.
This remix of Dublin’s own Jeff Martin by the Bristol band Minotaur Shock is freakin’ excellent. The song is called Shuttlecock and will be well received by people into Chicago indie jazz acts like Tortoise, or eclectic instrumentalists like Sufjan Stevens. In fact John McEntire from Tortoise also happens to contribute to the album of Remixes, Collaborations, and Interpretations. This incarnation of Shuttlecock incorporates bells and horns for a multilayered, textural composition, which never sounds cacophonous; although, Minotaur Shock makes clear that chaos could happen at any moment. Minotaur Shock is on 4AD
Jeff Martin is on Casino Gravity Records and a member of the electronic group Halfset. Martin releases a new LP on May 27th and Halfset releases their second album in September. We look forward to reviewing these releases. Heads up, don’t confuse him with the other Jeff Martin from Ireland…the pirate look alike.
