Yo all, back again with HC6 - A change of direction from the past three sets of fresh, exciting new shit - Here’s a solid hour of fresh, exciting old shit :) - A good dig through the realms of 60s garage punk, proto rock and pumping mod. Most of the tracks date from round 1964-66, with a couple of later ones, and they’re mostly from the UK (the American equivalent deserves a mix in it’s own right, as does the rest of the world!) - Anyway, some you might know, some you might not, but just putting this together has got my pulse racing 10-20 BPM faster than usual, so hopefully it’ll have a similar effect on your good selves! Enjoy :)

Tracklist:

The Birds - Leaving Here
The Creation - Biff Bang Pow!
The Easybeats - Friday On My Mind
The Beat Merchants - Pretty Face
The Koobas - Face
The Boys Blue - You Got What I Want
The Clique - We Didn’t Kiss, We Didn’t Love, But Now We Do
The Attack - We Don’t Know
The Lancasters - Satan’s Holiday
Fire - Father’s Name Is Dad
Davy Jones & The Lower Third - You’ve Got A Habit Of Leaving
The Creation - Making Time
The Haunted - 125
Them - I Can Only Give You Everything
The Primitives - You Said
The Outer Limits - Help Me Please
The Movement - Tell Her
Cuby & The Blizzards - Your Body Not Your Soul
The Chasers - Inspiration
The Mickey Finn - Garden Of My Mind
Paul & Ritchie & The Cryin’ Shames - Come On Back
The Poets - That’s The Way It’s Got To Be
The 5AM Event - Hungry
The Beat Merchants - Messin’ With The Man
Ipissmus - Hold On
The Blue Stars - Social End Product
The Birds - No Good Without You Baby

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Okay, here be HC5 - The third and final installment of our favourite tunes of 2006. It’s been a lot of fun compiling this lot, have to say, and it’s reminded us that this year has been rather good all round for fine music. Our hats come off to all the artists featured over the past three weeks - Thanks!

Since you ask, if we had to pick out a couple of albums and say they were the best of the year, it would fall to a close tie between these three, we reckon:

The Joe Beats Experiment - Indie Rock Blues

Guillemots - Through The Window Pane

Spank Rock - Yoyoyoyoyo

Brains, balls and soul all present and correct in the highest of levels within all three of those, which is just the way we like it. You really should listen to them from start to finish, if you haven’t already. Well worth it.

Anyhoo, tracklist for HC5 is:

Brightblack Morning Light - Everybody Daylight (from their eponymous album)
Scritti Politti - The Boom Boom Bap (from the album “White Bread, Black Beer”)
Guillemots - Through The Window Pane (from the album of the same name)
Lupe Fiasco - The Instrumental (from the album “Food & Liquor”)
Ty - Don’t Watch That (from the album “Closer”)
Cunnilinguists - Hellfire [Joey Beats Mix] (unreleased)
M.Ward - Sad, Sad Song (Joe Beats Experiment Mix) (from the album “Indie Rock Blues”)
The Grates - Rock Boys (from the album “Gravity Won’t Get You High”)
Subtle - Midas Gutz (from the album “For Hero For Fool”)
Union Of Knives - Opposite Direction (from the album “Violence And Birdsong”)
Scuba - Twista (single)
Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Phenomena (from the album “Show Your Bones”)
Mew - The Zookeeper’s Boy (from the album “And The Glass Handed Kites”)
Cynic Guru - Drugs (single)
Extra Golden - OK-Oyot System (from the album of the same name)
Eliot Lipp - Rap Tight (from the album “Tacoma Mockingbird”)
Trentemoller - While The Cold Winter Waiting (from the album “The Last Resort”)
Matthew’s Celebrity Pixies Tribute - Wave Of Mutilation (website)
Jarvis - Running The World (from the album “Jarvis”)

That’s yer lot for ‘06 - Hope you enjoy!

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Ah, the Festive Vortex. That most fidgety period of days twixt Xmas and New Year. The lucky amongst us can easily fill this time with noble pursuits and endeavours, but spare a thought for the unlucky ones, who have no alternative than to either vegetate in front of their television munching endless rounds of turkey sandwiches, or maybe take another trudge round the already well-combed winter sales. Yes, for some the Vortex can be a tough time.

So to raise the spirit of the times, and to enable mental preparation for the coming New Year celebrations, here’s part two of our skip through the records that made our switches click in 2006. Hope you enjoy.

Tracklist:

Hollertronix - Gold Digger [Diplo Remix] (single)
Spank Rock - Bump [Switch Remix] (single)
Motor - Black Powder (from the album “Klunk”)
The Come-Ons - I Feel Love [Michael Ivins Flaming Lips Remix] (single)
Wolfmother - Woman [mstrkrft remix] (single)
Superqueens - Per Ardua Ad Strangeways (from the album “Royal Shit”)
The Rapture - Whoo Alright Yah Uh Huh (from the album “Pieces Of The People We Love”)
Cansei De Ser Sexy - Alala [Bondo De Role Remix] (single)
Peaches - Do Ya (from the album “Impeach My Bush”)
Peter, Bjorn & John - Young Folks (from the album “Writer’s Block”)
Grandaddy - Elevate Myself (from the album “Just Like The Fambly Cat”)
The Emperor Machine - Bodilizer Bodilizer (from the album “Vertical Tones And Horizontal Noise”)
Distance - Traffic (single)
Amy Winehouse - Rehab (from the album “Back To Black”)
DJ Farrapo & Yanez - Baiano Vem Baiano Vai (single)
Eagles Of Death Metal - I Want You So Hard (from the album “Death By Sexy”)
Dev2.0 - Boy U Want (from the album “Dev2.0″)
Ali Love - K Hole (single)
Kelis - Bossy [Cavemen Remix] (single)

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Feeling chock full of festive cheer, having just returned from late-night food shopping, it’s time to present the third Hectic City - The first hour of a three part sort-of-mixed run through of some of our favourite tunes of the year.

Originally I was going to do some talky-talky in between the tunes, but once the pile of possible tracks had been assembled, it proved so difficult to trim them down that it was the talky-talk that ended up on the cutting room floor, the better to make way for more of those fine tunes.

And it has been a fine year for tunes. No links on the tracklist, sorry, but everyone there is easily googleable, I think, so please don’t let that deter you from searching out some fine tunes.

Hope you enjoy. We did. Part two and three to follow.

Tracklisting for part one:

Cornelius - Music (from the album “Sensuous”)
7L & Esoteric - Play Dumb (from the album “A New Dope”)
Paul Simon - Outrageous (from the album “Surprise”)
Dondolo - Dragon [Brennan Green Remix] (single)
5 Mic Cluster - Basildon Lover (from the EP “Crystal Mic”)
Cansei De Ser Sexy - Let’s Make Love And Listen To Death From Above [Spank Rock Remix] (single)
LCD Soundsystem - Time To Get Away (from the album “Sound Of Silver”)
Nicky Van She & Dangerous Dan - Around The World Again (single)
New Young Pony Club - Get Dancey (single)
Luke Haines - Off My Rocker At The Art School Bop (from the album of the same name)
The Legion Of Doom - Crazy As She Goes (bootleg)
Breakout - Planet Rock [part one] (single)
The Gossip - Listen Up [mstrkrft remix] (single)
My Robot Friend - Swallow (from the album “Dial 0″)
Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve - Dig (from the mini-album “Spring”)
Zero DB - Bongos, Beats and Basslines (from the album of the same name)
Girl Talk - Bounce That (from the album “Night Ripper”)

P.S. Oh, by the way, New Year’s Eve is now sold out (although it looks likely that it’ll be running until the morning, so if you come down from 4am onwards there’s a pretty good chance you’ll get in), but if you do want some K-action, don’t forget Eric’s doing a set at Bust The Box on New Year’s Day - it’s free, but always packs out, so get down early and claim your corner!

Happy holidays :)

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Something a little different for the second installment of the Hectic City podcast. I guess we should be flattered that we’ve been given the String Quartet Tribute treatment - after all, many artists of our stature have had this unusual form of honour bestowed upon them, so we must feel safe in their company, if a little bemused.

Unfortunately, as yet we’ve been unable to get hold of a full copy of the album, despite repeated requests, but as the next best thing, we’ve managed to record several excerpts played on recent BBC Radio broadcasts. These bootleg recordings have been edited together and we now serve them up to you as Hectic City podcast No.2. 

 Hectic City No.2 [12:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Okay, well, let’s get away from the heavy duty stuff for a bit, and get back to the music, and finally (well, for me anyway) I’m proud to announce the first Hectic City podcast! Yay!

(FX: Champagne bottle smashing against server. Several people cheering half-heartedly.)

Fingers crossed, this will be a weekly event, so fire up yer Juices and point them at the RSS feed, and you’ll find something eyebrow-raising landing in your folder each week.

This week there’s a DJ Mix from earlier in the year - Not a full mash-up mix, although there’s a couple in there, but some good tunes all round, I think - I’ll not say any more, but if you click on the first link below, that’ll give you an intro to the mix from yours truly - the second link will provide the mix itself.

Many thanks to the excellent Podpress guys for making such a fine plug in, too. Let me know if you’re having any problems hearing or downloading, cheers!

…And, of course, we hope you enjoy it - no worries if not, as there’ll be another, vastly different one along next week… 

 Hectic City No.1 - Introduction [2:42m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
 Hectic City No.1 - Funk Hop & Electro Rock Mix - Summer 2006: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download