The BUG - London Zoo

The Bug, aka Kevin Martin, London's dark, deep and heavy dubstepraggapunk just released his new album "London Zoo" on Ninja Tune. After decades of making music his way, The Bug is back to torment our ears with 12 tracks of dubstep, grime, ragga, industrial and lots of Bass! - Heavy, deep, massive, dark, rough and infiltrating - going in the line of Stereotyp, Al Haca or Tolcha, and influenced by Jah Shaka, Adrian Sherwood, Lee Perry and Public Enemy. The Bug's sound is characterized by his noisy touch - very industrial, ambiental and bassheavy at the same time. Among former projects he was involved in are Techno Animal (industrial hip hop), Ice (experimental industrial hip hop) or Pressure (dubstep). An now The Bug is the result of all this. An urban creature from a big metropoli representing the sound of the underground.
Therefore, as a matter of fact, collaborations in "London Zoo" include other known faces from the scene, as Warrior Queen, Ricky Ranking and Tippa Irie. By the way, the artwork was made by Fefe Talavera, who just appeared at Barcelonas Hipnotik as Lil' Monster and who previously worked together with Al Haca.
That's all together a very arty piece I would say! Check the Bug out, he's on tour currently.

Leg NO - Dope & Hope

Music is a drug. And Christian Legno from London aka Leg-No knows it very well. He has been addicted to it since his early childhood. With 15 he started playing the drums, lateron he began making remixes and in 1996 he released his first album "TeknoMobilSquad 05" on Ultrasuoni Records. At the age of 19 he brought out his first single and worked on remixes for Mos Def and Clipse. And in 2004 he established his own Label "Touch Response Records".
Quite a lot of things in a short time, Leg-No is a busy man. But what about the music he plays, what keeps him going? Well - one thing for sure - Leg-No can't be fully defined, nor can he be labled. His music is a vast mixture of extreme bass lines combined with dubstep, wonky electro, wobbling house and glitchy hip hop. But it can be totally different, too.
His new album, “Dope&Hope” represents all his influences, but also involves some bits'n'pieces of Soul, R&B, Reggae and Grime. The vocals were recorded with well-known faces from the scene, such as Leeroy (Sain Supa Crew), Ghetto Priest & Spex Mc (Asian Dub Foundation), Emo Dada (singer of DJ Vadim) and the Finland collective Conscious Youths (Redrama, Paleface Mc e Capenape.). So, if addiction can be any positive to give hope, than Leg-No shows us how it goes. He creates a mixture that is dark, deep, soulfull and danceable at the same time. An eclectic mix of different bouncy genres.
By the way, apart from producing his new album, Leg-No also put his fingers on some fresh mixes for Spank Rock, Santogold and DJ Kentaro! So, check him out.

Have a listen & see here!

Rick Rubin - Spank Rock (Leg-No Remix)

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Free - DJ Kentaro feat. Spank Rock (Leg-No Remix)

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Tricky - Council Estate

Council Estate - Tricky

Afrika Bambaataa - Freestyle

HIPNOTIK Festival in Barcelona

This weekend was dope. First of all there was the Hipnotik Festival with Al Haca, RQM, AFRIKA BAMBAATAA, Graffitti action and lots of music, breakdance, mc's contest and conferences in CCCB in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Barcelona. And secondly in Madrid Stereo Mc's kicked a great DJ set with BaileFunk, Bmore, Bass and Hip Hop at Low Club and La Noche Blanca turnded the city into a big party.
Anyways, back on sunday to Barcelona graffitti artists were already taking over the CCCB and newcomers and old returners shared the stage in the sun. The guys from Debilorhitmicos from Barcelona played an awsome set of breaks, hip hop and old fashioned melodies making everyone go dancing, while Al Haca from Vienna afterwards got all into the roots electronic mix, playing the new KUBO tracks, Kuduro sounds and african electronic rap with deep basslines. The Lil' monster was there too, to make some dancing and additional vocals. Afrika Bambaataa was the last one to play as main act down in the basement hall, but unfortunately didn't surprise me as much, after all the bouncing acts from before! Sorry, big master. Nevertheless, the hall was packed as hell, the crowd went all crazy and seen from above, the air was an ocean of hands and arms moving forward and backward right according to the beat!

Here go some pics of Hipnotik:

Uproot Andy - New Mixtape

Hey, Andy Gillis from New York, resident at Mehanta Bar there, has a new mixtape out, called "Guacharaca Migration". A nice mashup-fusion-work of Electrocumbia, Reggeaton and some jacking Balkan influences. Check it out!
Get the Mixtape here.

Noche Blanca Madrid - Virtual Streetart

On saturday "La Noche Blanca" turned the complete city of Madrid into one big party with performances, visual art, concerts and DJ sets. There was also supposed to be a guy from "Cirque du Soleil" walking over a 100m long and at least 20m high cable, located between to main buildings on Gran Via - without any net of protection above the ground. However, this event was unfortunately cancelled because of too much wind.

Due to the huge amount of things to see, I didn't catch as much, but stayed a while at Caixa Forum to see the virtual graffitti presentation of Omnivor Lab from Barcelona, presenting virtual drawings and graffittis - Street Art 2.0 - from Btoy, Lolo and Tohyto.
Instead of using the traditional street art to paint walls directly, the artists explored new ways to express themselves, using virtual methods to animate their drawings and let them grow itself on the wall.

Lateron the Instituto Mexicano del Sonido played together with Wagon Cooking and Jay Haze, to present their album Piñata, which came out last year. A good mixture of Dub, Chachacha and Electronics. Good stuff altogether!

Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood

Just remembered the good old 90's and came across this amazing video. Weren't they the first comic-band ever at that time? Yo, love it!

Dub Gabriel has a new label

Dub Gabriel, Dub and electronic producer from New York, now living in San Fransisco, just founded a new label called "Destroy all concepts". Among the releases is his latest album "Anarchy and Alchemy". Heavy, deep, dark and organic bass sounds. It's worth to check it out. Also, because Dub Gabriel just produced a cover version of a song from the band Suicide this year - and guess with whom - yeah right, Michael Stipe from R.E.M!

www.myspace.com/destroyallconcepts
Dub Gabriel Interview on Global World Strike