You never knew Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid had a progressive rock side did you? Here they team up in a large plexiglass pyramid with the `Floyd and Welcome you to the Master Scene, the Voulez Vous Machine, sil vous plait. (My pre-GCSE French is failing at this point monsewer)
And there’s something deliciously icy bout putting them over progressive rock….also the lyrics oddlly mesh with Welcome To The Machine, maybe from the other side, but they sound so robotic here that it feels like the Machine is talking:
“Ain’t no big decision (ah-ha) You know what to do (ah-ha) La question c’est voulez-vous Voulez-vous… …you know the rules, you know the game Master of the scene We’ve done it all before and now we’re back to get some more You know what I mean
`La Ritournelle is a track that has very deep meaning for me, and I’ve wanted to mash it and Tellier’s work for a long time but nothing worked – seems I did so twice as there are two Sebastian Tellier tracks that have never been posting actually, I found another one which I’m also posting here.
This is the other Sébastien Tellier track I did, around the same time actually. Not sure why I didn’t post it? Maybe it was too similar to my Marvin Gayle mashup which again is around that time.
This is a track from the Narco soundtrack he did – Le long de la rivière tendre which is really good, mixed with Marvin Gaye’s Mercy Mercy Me.
And the moodymashes haven’t gone away….they just got shelved for the festive and disco fare which is also posted very soon or elsewhere!. .
Some songs just trigger an immediate personal reaction, like going straight back to where I was. Pagan Poetry was one, a difficult time where I was in love with someone I should not have been, and he’s long gone to a distant Valhalla – or more likely Helheim. The Björk song reminded me of him and works really well with Die For You, which has similar themes of darkness and uncertainty. Hence I wanted to reflect that sound of whispers, secret codes, the claustrophobia and yearning, the darkness and light.
To say this The Weeknd’s Die For You vs Bjork – Pagan Poetry mash is highly personal and just done for me to express something I can’t express in words…is an understatement. I nearly didn’t post it for those reasons….it’s skirting too close to the wind. Layers upon layers of what I reveal (or don’t), secret codes, whispers, ghosts – that’s what I put into this. It’s odd for someone who seems to be an open book, there are chapters that are firmly glued shut. A dark horse hiding out as a unicorn.
After I made it I found out the Weeknd song is big on The TikToks. Shame I’m not really one to post there after having 2 of my videos immediately pulled.
I thought that doing this might give some resolution, exorcise the memories but turns out, it doesn’t work like that. It feels too naked and revealing, but maybe other people can relate?
Given the sad death of Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac, I thought I’d post this old mashup here, with a positive message – yes don’t stop making your kind of music!
An unusual thing – a mashup that isn’t related to a challenge!
A friend told me the title (in not exact words) because I was unhappy with where my mashups were going and also the tumbleweed reception some of them get. So when I was messing with Fleetwood Mac instrumentals (quelle surprise) I realised another one worked with one of my favourite songs – Mama Cass’s Make Your Own Kind Of Music and that Don’t Stop would be a perfect musical and thematic fit.
So this is a message to you all – make your own kind of mashups, music, remixes – and screw the algorithm and the viral ‘fame’ – as long as you’re happy, then anything else is an extra.
Really digging Midnights, the new-ish album by Taylor Swift atm and obsessed by the songs Anti-Hero, You’re On Your Own, Kid, and Snow On The Beach. I’m only on track 11 cos I keep stopping to make mashups of the album. Even DJNoNo got in on the act! At this rate I’ll have an album….
I first heard Anti-Hero via a mashup by Aggro1 – which I played on the latest podcast, it’s my favourite mashup of this year so far. The whole bit about midnights being your afternoon and depression resonated so much, I named the latest podcast after it.
Almost….so I had a go myself with Radiohead’s High And Dry – I started this late Wednesday night after the Bootie Mashup Talk ended, but spent far too long fiddling with the echoes and vocal production that LeeDM101 beat me to it. Great minds, etc. It did feel rather obvious, I almost released this as a Captain Obvious track but he doesn’t do downtempo….more of him later.
As I said DJNoNo wanted a go at the Taylor Swift mashathon so he chose ‘You’re On Your Own, Kid’ with Englebert Humperdinck’s The Last Waltz as a sort of palette cleanser to the serious nature of the other mashes, and was actually released first. The theme of being singularly alone and reliant on yourself appeals to DJNoNo, it’s very him, and it made him smile. A lot of nostalgia in this one.
And finally given that I was beaten by Lee on the other one, I rush released my Christmas Festive Sadbanger, which was waiting for December but Xmas has come early this year! It almost had Elvis in it – Silver Bells works quite well, but given the possible legal nightmare of an Eagles mash, I didn’t want to make it worse by adding Elvis to it (both are very litigious copyright-wise, Don Henley copystriked one of my mashups, he hates them).
It was partly inspired by Adriana’s excellent Dorothea Goes Home For The Holidays but I personally could never do a Coldplay mashup…so Cold Patrol / Snowplay is the next best thing! My first Snow Patrol mashup, actually.
I’ve talked many times about how bittersweet But for a sad festive mashup, it’s weirdly hopeful and magical….I did not intend that, honest. I wanted to make the best Xmas roll credits mashup ever, but the longing and loss is in there most from Please Come Home This Christmas – ‘I will be happy…once again’ and ‘there’ll be no more sorrow, no grief and pain’ – big hopes for many this Christmas, but sadly I know it probably won’t be true. For many, will have the blues this Christmas.
And yes, a collab between tbc and Captain Obvious!
Thanks to Ian Fondue and ToTom for advice for this and the Radiohead one. It’s a bit rough, and I might put out a V2 before Xmas, we’ll see if I spot anything major with it.
And BONUS! Yes I did a fourth mashup of that album – Taylor Swift Mastermind vs Rolling Stones – Sympathy for the Devil – I had fun making Taylor the devil! Also total feels on the ‘no-one would play with me’ line.
Here are three mashups from unrelated challeneges but part of a trilogy – mostly downtempo or plunderphonic, the middle section is more a traditional A vs B – but very much about the state of play in the USA today from the outsdie.
It’s apparently a Superb Owl? My tribute to America 😛 You probably won’t like it…
There is a serious side to this mashup, inspired by Negativland’s ‘Our National Anthem’ which is really bothered by the co-opting of Black Lives Matter to sing lines like ‘Rockets Red Glare, Bombs Exploding In Air’ – remember Tulsa?
That anthem disturbs me, in this age of possible WW3 and new cold war….and of course I am ambivalent or worried about American globalism as much as I am bothered by Chinese and Russian sabre-rattling….we’re in the middle!
Also deeply ironic that something so American and against an attack by the British on a fort was stolen from an English drinking tune. And a pagan one at that about Anacreon, an ancient greek poet again double ironic given the puritan history of the States.
Instamatic – America (Contrafacto) (Mickey Guyton vs Team America vs Childish Gambino vs Pete Seeger vs Oak, Ash & Thorn)
Someone on reddit yesterday said I was like Ben Sherman and hated hiphop and didn’t think it was music – I LOL’d cos I probably have forgotten more hiphop than they’ve ever heard.
So in that vein I was checking the new Post Malone album I loved the collab with Fleet Foxes, not so fond of the song but the backing is amazing….so I mixed it with Sia’s cover of California Dreaming I think just for the San Andreas soundtrack? It’s one of my favourite songs of all time.
This is the third track in the American trilogy – the first ‘America’ was also a challenge track which was ambient/experimental, and the 2nd is the Sia vs California Dreaming one which is more traditional. This is classic tbc ambient ‘Moody Mash’ yet with a very sharp point, and I pumped up the experimental by focusing on a theme and the panning/call and answer/juxtaposition intercutting and FX – delay on stun and wanted the kitchen sink BIG sound in places.
Like it is a film credits blues gospel song for the end of an empire
It’s about the American Dream gone wrong, it’s my personal reaction to Uvalde and the rise of fascism in the US, so it’s a mix of plunderphonic and mashup, but there aren’t many pop mashups with Suicide in them, or indeed about this subject.It’s more in my mind closer to Negativland’s Our National Anthem or Guns within a mashup structure than most things. Also the original LCD track references the death of Alan Vega, so hence using Suicide.
And there’s a lot of me in here, hence the schizophrenic sound, off-kilter, it is not meant to be a happy cheerful listen, even if it hangs together. That push/pull tension is intentional because I don’t want any to think I am using ‘Dixie’ and ‘Battle Hymn of the Republic’ (which is part of the Elvis track) in any way other than utterly scathing contempt and anger. Also a LOT of America tracks are flag waving patriotic ones, or uncritical, like the T-Swift. Again using that cross-purposes here, recontextualising it.
Also I was playing with speed, I’d never normally slow something down that much, or use sources that were several semitones apart, but I forced myself, pulling the sources far away from ‘Kansas’ as possible.
tbc aka Instamatic – American Dream Part 3 (American Trilogy) (LCD Soundsystem vs Paul Simon vs Elvis Presley vs Suicide vs Idlewild vs Taylor Swift vs MKTO)
Since Sowndhaus has gone done a few times recently including last night, it’s reminded me of the massive backlog of tunes I never posted here – mostly challenge tunes, but all good pieces including these two queer disco mashups for Crumplbangers Discord challenge.
I think have got better and better in the last year or so of challenges – tempted to make an album, but first I need to post around 6-8 months (!) worth of work here. Not everything, but all the good or interesting ones….they need to have a home if Sowndhaus goes down for good. It’s a chore to post them here…but luckily they do have artwork and blurbs, so that’s not too bad.
And these were my first mashups on the new laptop….
Our barricades are our dancefloors, our resistance is queer joy.
Surprised no-one in the challenge used these tracks – nor has made this mashup (AFAIK – did a quick Google and YT and Bootie Mashup DB search, but didn’t spend hours looking…so apologies if it’s an accidental reboot) but this is an obvious quick Av sB joining new and old queer anthems – I Will Survive from the pre-AIDS disco era and until today, and Gossip’s Standing In The Way of Control which is the same theme for my generation.
Created for the recent Crumplbangers Challenge from DJ Firth and oki who wanted us to create a confidence inspiring song with pride – well Pride came early, as I wanted to create a defiantly queer banger to resist what’s going on in Qatar and the sad shooting at Club Q in Colorado, echoes of Pulse – and it was Trans Day of Remembrance yesterday.
So here is my first ever Born This Way mashup – including Dua Lipa cos she said HELL NAW to playing Qatar and made clear she only would if they improved their human rights – sadly many others have taken the blood money, shame on them. And Sister Sledge as a nod to my roots and it featuring in The Birdcage movie – which I desperately wanted to use Gloria Gaynor’s I Am What I Am but couldn’t get it to work with anything, so this will have to do.
And yes despite the title, it is a collab between Instamatic and Captain Obvious! I am not totally sure about the Gaga vocal, it needs fixing in places, but it was such a faff to do, not sure when or if II’ll go back to it. Maybe nearer Pride next year.
Thanks to Ian Fondue for the Deelay recommendation, used that to good effect on both tracks
Also a bonus for another challenge – a Rina vs YMCA mash!
Well I started making this for Pride / my Crumplstock set, then while working on it I realised Pride is an emotion so fits this week’s Crumplbanger Discord challenge as pride is an emotion! And also the song includes a variety of emotions, defiance, resistance, anger, camp – is camp an emotion? This is the most proudly camp mashup I’ve done since Madonna vs Junior Vasquez or Scissor Sisters vs Madonna!
Thanks to Cecile DeMilla for introducing me to the Rina track.
This is one of the many ‘lost’ challenge tracks I either didn’t post at all, or posted over at Sowndhaus and didn’t post here. Not sure why, I know at the time the vocal sounded slightly off to me, then again Adele is all E M O T I O N A L in this track, so it’s *elmo shrug* from me why I did that. The surprising thing is that I made artwork for it, those tracks usually get posted as I only do that for tracks I think are good.
While idly singing Easy on Me I started hearing the piano to Man With The Child In His Eyes.
Technically this shouldn’t work, and almost (and probably) doesn’t. Either a good lesson that you should ‘try’ things rather than relying on Tunebat/Googling keys, or a trainwreck lesson that you can’t force things.
Not sure which it is at the moment, but putting it out there anyway because I think it works enough. And there aren’t enough Kate Bush mashups in the world!
Myself and DJNoNo don’t so collaborations as much as we should, but there was a challenge to do so – hence these tracks from DJFnoFno (fnogg and DJNoNo) and InsToTomatic (ToTom & Instamatic).
Also we have +2 Bonuses (Bonusii?) of lost tracks from DJNoNo.
I bring you: DJ Fno Fno! (Messrs fnogg & DJNoNo) and their Royals At The Gay Bar – Lorde – Royals vs Electric Six – Gay Bar for the Crumplbangers Challenge Collab Week. This got a special mention cos of the name 😉
Idea was from fnogg entirely, production was shared between them, passing Ableton Live projects back and forth a few times.
fnogg did the first rough demo pass with YT ripped stems, DJNoNo then recreated a HQ Electric Six instrumental from the stems with a totally new instrumental mix (we couldn’t find a HQ of the instrumental), and then edited it to the demo to fnogg’s template. He then added that and the Lorde and Gay bar vocals HQ stems to match and created the breakdown and ending which wasn’t in the demo.
fnogg then took it over and then redid the Gay bar timings and added more in, and did the drop/cutins and the whoops and basically made it 100% funnier. Passed it back to DJNoNo for final massaging, mastering, production and general faffing.
Artwork was a shared collab too, with DJNoNo at the controls and input, advice and other concepts from fnogg.
Another mashup from the Crumplbanger Discord Collab challenge. This got 3rd place and “Best Multimash’ special mention 🙂
Us two? Doing multimashes? With our A vs B reputations?
Started as a demo from ToTom with just the Supergrass and Blondie and nothing for the verses or ending. Invaluably he had marked out the segments with key shifts, which was a great help with my lack of music theory.
After some Ableton Live tech woes where I had to sort of rebuild the project by pasting it into Ableton Live Lite a bit at a time (!), I added the others but there was a lot of back and forth swapping certain bits out, finding out what artists we hate 😉
Some artists came and went but it became a narrative theme multimash about obsessive love and we had a lot of fun with the call and response).
Production/mastering is my fault (and proved to me that I really should use my nicer headphones rather than the in-ear buds, it’s how I spotted that the original instrumental was out of phase!).
FIRST BONUS! Not a collaboration but a lost DJNoNo demo for a collaborative compilation.I rummaged around NoNo’s closet and this fell out. It was created for a bluegrass compilation that didn’t happen (?) and was rejected anyway cos they didn’t want covers or humour – it uses a cover of The Beef Seeds covering Lorde’s Royals – yes another Royals mashup – so was abandoned. Listening back it’s classic NoNo and works pretty well.
And given what’s happened to the royals and war since, weirdly prophetic.
DOUBLE BONUS! Another lost mashup – this time for a challenge, not sure whay he was thinking about when he made Laurie Anderson’s artpop O Superman into a twerking RnB sexy mess, but here we are. Tweet never sounded so….arty? It was an RnB challenge so I guess he thought it was funny. It works weirdly very well.
(“This is your mother” made me LOL for reals…I had forgotten that bit)
A finally one I’m really proud of and was the only real ‘exclusive’ in my Crumplstock set (the others being unreleased things a few people had heard). I’ve always wanted to make a Chic vs DP bootleg, so I did it via the back door! I heard Doja Cat while dancing at one of the last Duckie clubs and started singing Wikka Wrap by the Evasions over it (shout out to Rhythm Scholar whose remix of Coolio’s 1,2,3,4 reminded me of it recently).
When I got home, I tried it and it worked! And of course it directly references Good Times, and then I found that Something About Us vocals worked with that, so it’s the most funkiest and smoothest summeriest mashup I’ve ever done.
