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Tom Meighan / Sergio Pizzorno / Chris Edwards / Ian Matthews Stardate: Summer 2006. As these words are being written, Kasabian are jetlagged, but happy. Three days ago, they returned from Mexico City, where a disused supermarket full of saucer-eyed devotees treated them like returning heroes. "They even sang along to the keyboards in Processed Beats," exclaims Serge Pizzorno. And then when we did the new stuff. It was..." Pizzorno is rarely lost for words. When he is though, here's Tom Meighan to pick up the baton "...legendary. I've never felt a force like it." Can a record be legendary before it has even come out? You might think you know Kasabian. After all, the dissolute Glimmer Twins of the post-Britpop firmament made no secret of their sources on that eponymous first album. A couple of years after Meighan and Pizzorno met in Leicester, aged 11, it was 1993 and Oasis were making the rock'n'roll dream seem like a goal attainable to a generation of schoolkids. Recorded at the now-mythical farm where they arrived for a party and never got around to leaving, Kasabian's eponymous debut bypassed most critics and connected dramatically with an audience that recognised them as one of their own just as Oasis had done with Meighan and Pizzorno in 1993. Kasabian sold over 700,000 in the UK and the band were the undisputed victors of last year's festivals, putting in bristling performances at Glastonbury, Reading/Leeds and T In The Park. But if a debut album is all about showing your influences, this is the point where Kasabian truly show us who they are. The first thing you'll notice about Empire is that no other band in the world could have created it. The confidence is perhaps understandable given the lack of fanfare with which they managed to instantly shift 8000 tickets for their Ally Pally show last year. But the scale of its vision though is something else entirely. Asked a while back to describe the album's eponymous opener, Meighan's instant response was, "Marc Bolan smoking crack with Dr Who." "No other band apart from Radiohead would have the balls to put in a tempo change like that," adds Pizzorno. Under the circumstances, you decide it's impolite to tell him that Radiohead didn't get actually around to it until their third album. This time around the demonic amyl throb of Serge's electronic soundscapes feed into the very core of Kasabian's music. The flood of ideas is unstoppable. Propelled along by handclaps and Ian Matthews' inspired Studio 54 style drum fills, the filthy analogue glambience of Shoot The Runner will be inescapable between now and Christmas. Last Trip, appropriately, comes on like a postcard from the furthermost outpost of a 4am bender Meighan's brittle, anxious exhortations leading the way over an arrangement which recalls a beefier version of Suicide's primitive electro-pulse. Three songs in and Empire already sounds like an index of rock'n'roll possibilities. When it comes to taking the credit for their music, Kasabian rarely need to be encouraged. In this case though, they're swift to acknowledge the invaluable input of producer Jim Abbiss who, according to Meighan, "was very good at dealing with situations in the studio." Was that necessary? One imagines that when a double act like Meighan and Pizzorno disagree, they must really disagree. "Actually, we bicker," says Meighan, "But it's only ever when we're drunk. You know that Hot Chocolate song, It Started With A Kiss? Well, with us, it ends with a kiss, but starts with a bottle. But Jim kept our heads clear, so that there was no anxiety, like 'what the fuck are we gonna do next?'"
Daily Debrief: Interplanetary Internet a possibility
Sending e-mails or online shopping while orbiting the Earth in outer-space seems like the stuff of science fiction movies. But in this Daily Debrief, CNET's Kara Tsuboi and Rafe Needleman discuss how NASA is working to make these far-fetched ideas a reality.
C-mon and Kypski: "Bumpy Road"
It may be hip-hop, C-Mon & Kypski are, more than anything, all about adventure, freedom and fantasy. A recent journey to Morocco is a good example. After two years of intensive touring (from Amsterdam to Istanbul, South by Southwest to Eurosonic), the guys of C-Mon & Kypski (Simon Akkermans, Thomas Elbers, Daniel Rose en Jori Collignon) decided to give their fantasy a helping hand. With unshaven beards they left with a camper van full of ideas and recording equipment to Morocco. Over a period of four weeks they created what is now their third and latest album 'Where the wild things are'. The album title, 'Where the wild things are', which is refers to the famous children book from 1963, written by Maurice Sendak. The most concrete product of their journey is the new single' Bumpy Road', which recieved it's name from the circumstances of the recordings. It is by far the happiest C-Mon & Kypski song till now, and irresistibly invites it's listener to explore the wide world yourself. No wonder the music of C&K does not have any musical borders. At first the group made it easy for themselves to be put under the genre of hiphop/turntablism, but not any more. C-Mon: "it really is a C-Mon & Kypski album, but some influences have decreased, some added. Especially rock plays a big part whereas we didn't use guitars before. Most important, we don't cut and paste anymore, we used less samples for this album and played a lot more instruments ourselves. We've grown in creating a sound." And so C-Mon & Kypski unite a whole lot of genres into their own sound, from afrobeat to electro, a psychedelic dreamtrack that is coverted to a pumping rocksong. Where do you find klezmer and tango seamless united into one song? Of course, C-Mon & Kypski.Until now C-Mon & Kypski did every dirty job on the album themselves, but on their new album they thankfully make use of the services of rappers Sadat X (Brand Nubian, USA) Pete Philly and Kain (The Last Poets, USA) saxophone player Benjamin Herman (New Cool Collective) The Amsterdam Klezmer Band and the rockers of Voicst also collaborated on the album.
The Motorola Hint QA30 seems like a good idea, but some major design concerns keep it from being a top messaging phone.
After a long visit to the planet Krypton, the Man Of Steel returns to earth to become the peoples savior once again and reclaim the love of Lois Lane.
Boards of Canada: "Dayvan Cowboy"
Directed by Melissa Olson, the first ever official music video from Boards of Canada is truly a thing of beauty. Suspended on the edge of space in a balloon, an astronaut looks down at the beautiful planet earth and prepares to dive in. Leaping from the balloon, he floats down through the earth's atmosphere, dense cloud cover and into the ocean. The daredevil voyager emerges from the chaos of the sea on a surf board, riding a huge wave to the shore. Using reassembled documentary footage, the video to "Dayvan Cowboy" translates the power and atmosphere of Boards Of Canada's music into a dreamlike, imaginary journey from space, into the sea and to the shore, in one continuous sequence.
"A Scanner Darkly" is set in suburban Orange County, California in a future where America has lost the war on drugs. When one reluctant undercover cop is ordered to start spying on his friends, he is launched on a paranoid journey into the absurd, where identities and loyalties are impossible to decode. It is a cautionary tale of drug use based on the novel by Philip K. Dick and his own experiences. Like a graphic novel come to life, "A Scanner Darkly" uses live action photography overlaid with an advanced animation process (interpolated rotoscoping) to create a haunting, highly stylized vision of the future. The technology, first employed in Richard Linklater's 2001 film "Waking Life," has evolved to produce even more emotional impact and detail. Written for the screen and directed by Richard Linklater, the film stars Keanu Reeves, Robert Downey Jr., Woody Harrelson, Winona Ryder and Rory Cochrane.
Geek Pop: 'X-Files,' 'Rogue,' and 'Mario Kart'
Our weekly guide to all things geeky this week finds menace from outer space in 'The X-Files: I Want to Believe,' and from Aussie waters in 'Rogue.' Plus the return of 'Lost' and the launch of 'Mario Kart' for the Wii.
It all started after Charlie Tate graduated from the London School of Furniture. He was approached by the infamous Paris-based Big Cheese Records to form a funk bank, and Big Cheese All Stars were born! 2 singles, an album, and several extensive stints of touring, supporting the likes of Don Blackman, Roy Ayers, Gil Scott-Heron, Fred Wesley and James Brown put an end to a career in bespoke cabinet making. A future immersed in the funk, the soul and the jazz seemed assured. While still with the All Stars, an opportunity to play base in Neneh Cherry's band arose and the best part of the year was spent on the road touring her "Woman" album. A lot of fun was had. A lot of drinking was done. But the love of the funk, the soul, and the jazz prevailed. Unfortunately the sheer size of what the All Stars had become essentially caused its demise. Just about then, the idea of forming a record company began to take shape. King Kooba had been in existence for some time now, the first release having been on a subsidiary of the aforementioned Big Cheese Records. But the thought of an autonomous vessel for representing the Kooba and several other projects seemed too good to resist. Enter Second Skin Records, and what a productve lot they turned out to be! Roughly 30 singles and 12 albums, not a bad output from a hybrid label offering all manner of styles from drum and bass, beats, ambient, bizniss, electronica and breaks. Pretty much most of what was going on at the time, perhaps the varied style of the label, but particualrly what the Kooba were up to, appealed to San Francisco's Om Records. Several licenses, then an album, and a relationship with Om had been cemented. With the release of "Indian Summer" in the fall of 2002, a man like Charlie decided his fate lay in the Bay area...The rest as they say is history!
There's something odd about Hot Chip. Some fracture between conception and actuality that makes them all the more intriguing. Ostensibly Hot Chip sign up to the Hip-Hop dream as espoused by MTV Cribs and presumably as lived by, ooh, Pharrell Williams? They just seem to have some problems translating it to Wandsworth, SE London, is all. In fact they seem to have trouble squaring it with the equal, but to some extent opposite, influence of, say, Bill Callahan from Smog. Or Lambchop. Or Crystal Gayle. So, instead of doing the obvious thing and working out what sort of band they are going to be, they conclude that they will be all of them at once. And then they'll make it all in a room smaller than the box room at your Mum's house. With whatever's lying around. That is, whatever's lying around - toy trumpets, kazoos, blah. This to conform to a cherished idea of Brian Wilson's that, in the studio, anything goes. "Whereas a band like Primal Scream simply want to BE The Rolling Stones for one album, then King Tubby on the next, and Royal Trux on another, we prefer to make references in miniature to the spirit of the records and performances we love and admire," says vocalist/keyboard player Alexis Taylor. Unlike most of their heroes and role models, however, Hot Chip prefer things to be slightly off or too loud or in some way odd, and set great store in the accidental nature of recording. Perhaps it is this that gives them the slightly homemade feel that permeates the whole "Coming On Strong," and makes it an album so high on charm.
