Woolfy's first album (as Woolfy vs. Projections) totally passed BlackPlastic by and if the fanfare that greeted this release, If Ya Know What's Good For Ya!!, is anything to go by then it's no surprise. Released on DFA/Rong with very little marketing (just why can't DFA send emails to their fans, huh?) last month Woolfy don't even seem to have had much coverage from the blogging world.

Which is a shame because If You Know What's Good For Ya!! is pretty bloody good as it happens. With a sound that perfectly encapsulates the two labels collaborating on its release - the slightly tongue-in-cheek, indie dance of Rong and the gritty rocker chic of DFA all in one package.

Whilst there are a couple of tracks that fail to standout this is generally down to the quality of everything else on offer. The sleazy garage funk of opening track 'The Warehouse' sets the pace nicely and it is clear from the off that this isn't an album made for the dancefloor, it's made for the grimey come down afterwards or sun-baked afternoons laying in the park.

And the pace doesn't really let up - 'Oh Missy' is all angular gutars and yelped vocals and whilst the progressive sounds of cosmic disco on 'Loa The Disco' break the run of catchy vocal tracks you can't really deny its quality.

If Ya Know What's Good For Ya!! is actually at its best when it is serving up more contemplative numbers. The dreamlike 'Looking Glass' sounds like MGMT collaborating with the Chemical Brothers on one of those blissed out numbers they normally get Beth Orton in for towards the end of the album. The result is very striking. Equally brilliant is the battered and bruised 'Sonic Monday', with the vocalist capturing Bernard Sumner's stilted delivery on New Order's 'Temptation'. It's a track that sounds so hot you could stick it on and work on your tan.

So it may not be grabbing headlines but If Ya Know What's Good For Ya you'll grab this. Ahem. Sorry.  But seriously, don't sleep on Woolfy.

BP x

With the exception of LCD Soundsystem's Sound of Silver BlackPlastic's favourite DFA album ever is the Juan Maclean's glorious Less Than Human. An ode to the robot it is a glorious body of work that culminates in one of BlackPlastic's favourite ever songs - the delicate electronic anthem, 'Dance With Me'.

The Future Will Come, however, is a different beast. Jettisoning some of the introspection of the previous album this takes a lot of cues from various types of 80s popular music. The Juan Maclean is the alter ego of John Maclean and, with his partner in crime Nancy Whang (who is also part of LCD Soundsystem), he has clearly taken a lot of inspiration from the Human League's Dare! for this album.  Not only are nearly all the tracks on this album vocal duets but John even sounds just like Phil Oakey at several points. John has stated that until working on the vocals for this album with Nancy he didn't like anything in the Human League's catalogue after their transformation once the girls joined, preferring the early 'Being Boiled' era, but that he really began to appreciate it once work on The Future Will Come began and this new found fondness really shows.

So the sound is generally very different from the first album but it isn't a inspirationless re-tread of another act's material either - the vocals are much more prominent but there is still a lot of experimentation going on with the music. Only 'New Bot' really recalls any of the clinical nature of Less Than Human. It's a somewhat appropriate likeness given the title of the song but even this fades away as the chorus kicks in and John and Nancy's League-esque vocal sparring begins.

The Future Will Come is not Less Than Human continued... then. Instead it is an evolution, a fantastic combination of many separate sounds and influences. From the opening 'The Simple Life' the League are there throughout much of this album but there is so much more. Next single 'One Day' mixes snappy vocals with lush Detroit techno - synthetic strings that recall 'Strings of Life' ride melody that sounds like it fell out of New Order's song book when they weren't looking. The result is rather special.

The album's two other highlights can be found in the form of last year's 'Happy House' and the epic midpoint provided by 'Tonight'.  If you haven't already heard it the former is an epic revisitation of pre-nineties house music which only gets better with subsequent listens.  It's an ode to music itself and the beautiful symbiotic relationship between a hot sunny day and the perfect song to dance to. 'Tonight' on the other hand recalls Less Than Human's 'Dance With Me' in terms of the level of emotion - it's a haunting piece and it helps provide much of The Future Will Come's emotional gravitas.

On The Future Will Come the Juan Maclean haven't just re-confirmed their abilities, they've moved the goal posts. This a much more human affair and it benefits from the added warmth.

Please buy, don't steal, this album.  It's available on Amazon.co.uk on CD , LP and MP3.

BP x

Juan Maclean-space / Official Site.

Third of four in BlackPlastic's lists of 2008 and the focus for this one is on the best compilations and mixes of the year.

 

5. Top Ranking: A Diplo Dub

Diplo and Santogold's Top Ranking managed to do them both a disservice as it took Santogold's LP proper (produced by Diplo) and nabbed the best bits then pissed all over what remained. It was a trawl through some of the most exciting tracks of the past couple of years combined with some classics. Panda Bear AND Devo's 'Get Stiff' in the same mix? Yes please.

 

4. So Cosmic

2008 was all about the free online mix and by far the best of these was Cut Copy's So Cosmic. Okay, so technically this first hit the streets in 07 and we are beginning to sound like a broken record but it didn't appear online until 2008 and it is just. too. good. to. overlook. Beautiful.  And available here.

 

3. Cosmic Disco?! Cosmic Rock!!!

A big two-fingered salute to the myriad of Italo / Cosmic disco compilations out this year from Eskimo Recordings with Daniele Baldelli and Marco Dionig, Cosmic Rock was the real deal - a mix by someone that was there, unfettered by the desire to recontextual everything through modern eyes. Sure, at times it may have been cheesy but it was never anything other than awesome.

 

2. Fabric 41 mixed by Luciano

Sure, it may be little more than a Luciano DJ set commuted to CD but when the material an mixing is this good, who cares? The sublime breakdown into M83's 'Church' remains a highpoint of the year.

 

1. Notwave

Following the two remixes discs and a quiet period Notwace was a breath of fresh air from DFA. the concept itself was good - imagine what New York's experimental No Wave scene would have sounded like if it had never gone away - but the tunes were what made it. Every one not just different to anything else you'll hear on a compilation released in 2008 but sufficiently different from the rest of the album to make listening a joy.

 

BP x

The DFA still effortlessly piss all over all other record labels in the cool stakes just like your best friend's cooler older brother did when you were eleven. No matter how much they try, no other label quite manages to nail the maturity combined with experimentalism of a DFA release. Notwave sees them team up with Rong Music to revisit the NY No-Wave scene of the late seventies...

...Only instead of peddling some cuts from thirty years ago we get a fresh batch from current artists. With the exception of a cut from James Chance and the Contortions, one of the bands actually present for the original movement, these bands are drawing inspiration from a scene that passed away years ago but the tracks themselves are all bang-up-to-date.

So you get some nice, spikey, angular rock like the muted 'Unwelcome Guest' from Quad Throw Salchow and Freshro's dark and sexualised cover of Spoon's 'I Turn My Camera On' that just make great, intelligent, pop records. Tim Love Lee turns in two mixes in the form of the free-falling 'No Search No Entry' by Striplight and Circuits' 'Pistols at Dawn'. The former sounds like Republica re imagined as a post-punk roller coaster whilst the later is a throbbing crescendo to a climatic vocal call that results in the record descending into a tribal rock breakdown. Both are utterly fantastic.

Notwave is the DFA's best compilation in ages, possibly ever. Streamlined and beautiful, it boasts a fantastic atmosphere that drags the listener through more sounds, places and genres than you could find in most entire record shops. From clipped dub workouts like Tussle's 'Elephants Meandering' to the dark and evil re imagining of the Peter Gunn theme that is Welcome Stranger's paranoid 'Smoke Machine', Notwave is never less than exhilarating.

BP x